Carole King biopic makes ‘Beautiful’ music
Deceptively simple but artfully crafted, “Beautiful — The Carole King Musical” echoes the train of indelible songs that just keeps chugging through it like “The Locomotion.”
The jukebox musical spins a relatable narrative coupled with legendary lyrics and melodies that audiences will still be loving — and humming and singing along with — tomorrow.
Anchored by a lead performance by Sarah Bockel that really is some kind of wonderful, the stage biopic recounts how now-iconic singersongwriter Carole King got her start as an eager 16-year-old songwriter from Brooklyn, New York, who boldly took her teenage ballad “It Might as Well Rain Until September” to Don Kirshner’s (James Clow) Times Square hit factory Aldon Music.
Although she succeeds in selling the song, the precocious composer bows to her acid-tongued mother Genie’s (the entertaining Suzanne Grodner) wishes that she attend Queens College, where she meets handsome chemistry major and aspiring playwright Gerry Goffin (Andrew Brewer). When he asks her to pen the music to a song in his latest narrative, a fertile songwriting partnership and romance are born.
The troubled relationship between King and Goffin, who died in 2014 at the age of 75, boasts ample drama to ensure that “Beautiful” is a fullcolor tapestry and not just a string of catchy hits loosely tied together. The unforgettable songs are effectively woven into the fabric of the storytelling.
Although it occasionally takes dramatic license, the musical chronicles how the couple married young after accidentally making a baby and struggled to balance parenthood and day jobs with writing songs that have become pop standards: “Pleasant Valley Sunday,” “Up on the Roof,” “One Fine Day” and more. When “Will You Love Me Tomorrow” became a smash, the couple was able to focus on music full-time, but Goffin’s infidelity and mental health issues, exacerbated by drug use, doomed their marriage.
Book writer Douglas McGrath keeps the musical from becoming just a soapy stage version of “Behind the Music” — and doubles the number of beloved hits at the show’s disposal — by centering the story on Goffin and King’s fierce friendship and rivalry with another songwriting couple: Barry Mann (Jacob Heimer), a quick-witted hypochondriac and composer, and Cynthia Weil (Sarah Goeke), a smart and sophisticated lyricist, who together penned memorable numbers like “On Broadway,” “Walking in the Rain” and “He’s Sure the Boy I Love.”
Scenic designer Derek McLane’s cunningly devised and ever-changing set convincingly re-creates the famously competitive atmosphere at Aldon Music, where Kirshner pitted songwriters against each other to pen potential chart-toppers for various singing stars. Several of them are proficiently portrayed as Goffin and King and Mann and Weil continue to crank out hits: The Drifters (Josh A. Dawson, Jay McKenzie, Avery Smith and Kristopher Stanley Ward) show off flashy harmonies, choreography and coordinated suits on “Some Kind of Wonderful,” “Up on the Roof” and “On Broadway”; The Shirelles (McKynleigh Alden Abraham, Traci Elaine Lee, Ximone Rose and Alexis Tidwell) appear with matching pink dresses and elegant vocals to croon “Will You Love Me Tomorrow”; and Neil Sedaka (John Michael Dias) brings comic relief and a smooth voice with snippets of his ballad “Oh Carol.”
But the most captivating musical moments feature the songsmiths laboring to perfect their now-fabled tunes. Many in the openingnight crowd Tuesday in Oklahoma gasped as Heimer began dismissively singing a new creation he had just been nitpicking: “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” a Mann-Weil collaboration that became one of the biggest songs of the 20th century. Heimer scored another highlight with his scorching electric guitar rendition of “We Gotta Get Out of This Place.”
As Mann and Weil, Heimer and Goeke supply a plenitude of heart and humor, while Brewer brings enough nuance to make the often-conflicted Goffin sympathetic.
Naturally, Bockel is required to carry the story, which is told largely in flashback as King plays a sold-out Carnegie Hall show to celebrate the success of her breakthrough album “Tapestry.” Bockel
portrays King’s metamorphosis from talented teen to settled superstar with a charismatic earthiness. Plus, she shows off powerhouse vocals on “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman,” “So Far Away” and the title track.
“Beautiful — The Carole King Musical” plays through Sunday at Civic Center Music Hall, and the audience shouldn’t dash off too quickly after the performers take their bows, lest they miss some earth-moving interactive fun.