Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Passionate production
“The Bridges of Madison County” soars at the Broward Center.
Robert James Waller’s slim 1992 novel “The Bridges of Madison County” sold more than 60 million copies, its popularity leading to a 1995 movie version starring Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood.
Waller detractors, and there are many, view the book as 224 pages of awkwardly written, sentimental mush. Yet Tony Awardwinning composer-lyricist Jason Robert Brown and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Marsha Norman saw something stageworthy in the story of a life-altering, four-day affair.
Although their show had a relatively short, 137-performance run on Broadway in 2014, Brown won Tony Awards for his score and orchestrations.
Slow Burn Theatre artistic director Patrick Fitzwater and his creative collaborators have plumbed every bit of the musical beauty, unexpected passion and sorrowful sacrifice inherent in the BrownNorman “Bridges of Madison County,” which runs through Feb. 4 in the Amaturo Theatre at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts.
Although Norman hasn’t excised all the Waller cheesiness with her script, Fitzwater and company have crafted a memorable production that is visually striking and overflowing with those thrilling moments when great voices are expressively interpreting great music.
The story, “Bridges” fans may recall, revolves around Francesca Johnson (Anna Lise Jensen), an Italian war bride living on an Iowa farm in 1965. Life with her ex-G.I. husband, Bud (Mark Sanders), their teen son, Michael (Kyle Kemph), and daughter, Carolyn (Julia Dale), has settled into a routine of cooking, cleaning, farm chores and refereeing the kids’ frequent squabbles. But when the rest of the family leaves for a national 4-H competition in Indianapolis, Francesca’s world is turned upside down.
Robert Kincaid (Cooper Grodin), a National Geographic photographer who has come to Iowa to shoot Madison County’s covered bridges, knocks on Francesca’s door to ask directions to the one bridge he hasn’t managed to locate. In that moment, two lonely people discover each other, and before long they surrender to an affair that could change their futures.
Brown’s score is stylistically varied as it mixes ballads, country-flavored music, the remembered sounds of Francesca’s native Naples and almost-operatic songs that demand great range and finesse.
For this cast, which features four Equity actors in leading roles, that isn’t a problem. Jensen is simply superb as Francesca.
As great as the leads are, the rest of the Slow Burn cast delivers excellent solo and ensemble work.
“The Bridges of Madison County” is running through Feb. 4 at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts, 201 SW Fifth Ave., in Fort Lauderdale. Showtimes are 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday (additional matinee 1 p.m. Jan. 31). Tickets cost $47-$60. To order, call 954-462-0222