‘Drood’ is a killer idea well-played in San Jose
Guggenheim Entertainment presents the musical based on a Dickens novel
Rupert Holmes, who’d been enjoying a career writing clever pop songs for himself and such stars as Gene Pitney, the Platters, the Drifters, Wayne Newton, Dolly Parton and others, was asked by theater impresario Joseph Papp to write a new musical.
He hit on the idea of making Charles Dickens’ final — and unfinished — novel into a musical, by combining it with the British pantomime form.
This was sheer genius. Holmes took something known and grim and unfinished, and combined it with the goofy and entertaining “panto” style to create a play within a play featuring a panto troupe. And since people had tried and failed to come up with a satisfactory ending to “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” Holmes got the idea of having the audience vote on how it should end.
People loved it — it’s funny, and the songs are great earworms that stay with the audience for hours afterward. The show won best musical honors at the Tony and Drama Desk Awards; Holmes won Tonys for book and score, and Drama Desk Awards for lyrics, music, book and orchestrations. Not bad for his first musical.
Now Guggenheim Entertainment in San Jose has gathered a very good cast to perform this impressive musical at 3Below Theaters & Lounge. A smart decision was made to use rented
orchestral tracks, rather than try to find a space to squeeze 21 musicians into the intimate theater, and saving the rehearsal time.
Holmes took the opportunity of composing his first musical to really challenge the performers. It’s not just the wide vocal ranges, from soprano to baritone sometimes in the same song; it’s the contrapuntal songs, with sometimes as many as five different but simultaneous melodies.
But the cast is equal to the challenge, with, F. James Raasch, Amy Bouchard,
Hayley Lovgren, Theresa Swain and Jackson Davis doing a solid job with “Ceylon/A British Subject” in Act 1.
There is a lot of excellent singing in this production, including Benjamin Pither as the Mayor/Chairman in “There You Are,” Swain as Princess Puffer with “The Wages of Sin,” and Pither and Stephen Guggenheim with “Both Sides of the Coin.”
Pither is very adroit and funny as Chairman William Cartwright, who infuses every turn on stage with panache, dressed in elegant spats, and puts on a hilarious voice as Mayor Thomas Sapsea in the play within the play.
The story has Drood visiting his uncle, Jasper. Drood is betrothed to Rosa Bud, which angers Jasper, who wants her for himself. Neither Drood nor Rosa Bud want the marriage; they just want to be friends. But Rosa Bud doesn’t want the creepy Jasper, either. Then Landless shows up and is immediately smitten with Rosa Bud, whose honor must be defended. Drood disappears, although the coat he’d been wearing, slashed by a knife and covered in blood, is found.
Throughout the story, the panto troupe stops the action occasionally to note that a clue has just popped up. So, no worries about keeping up. And it’s all funny.
A favorite, ongoing gag: Bouchard plays Janet Conover, a panto trouper who plays Helena Landless, who is from Thailand. At first, Bouchard gives Landless a vaguely Asian accent, but that evolves into something that sounds Eastern European, then Conover complains that it’s silly to try to do accents at all.
Eventually, the audience is allowed to vote on a number of questions. Is Drood dead? Who is that weird-looking “detective” who showed up? If Drood is dead, who killed him? Out of four women and four men, which two get to hook up for a happy ending, and sing their happy song?
Yes, it’s a lot, but it’s fun, and well-performed by the cast of 11.
Director Scott Evan Guggenheim does a great job keeping the show moving, and Jennifer Copaken’s choreography adds a lot of fun.
One of the brilliant musicals, performed by an excellent troupe, in a very nice space.