South Florida Sun-Sentinel Palm Beach (Sunday)
We’re all on the road to ‘Hadestown’
Ancient tale resonates in today’s America
NEW YORK — America’s on the road to hell — better jump right off, my children. Too dangerous to look back. Instead, try to find the cracks in that famous wall we’re building.
That’s pretty much the message of “Hadestown,” the thrillingly alarmist new Broadway musical with the score that feels like it comes from somewhere deep in the American gut. Now an eye-popping, mythological blend of steampunk, “Westworld” and Bourbon Street anarchy, this dystopian tuner has its origins in a 2010 concept album, a folk opera of sorts, by the remarkable singer-songwriter Anais Mitchell.
“Hadestown,” which has been masterfully staged by Rachel Chavkin and arrives on Broadway via both the New York Theatre Workshop and London’s National Theatre, is a retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth, the story of a girl (Eva Noblezada) who gets bitten by a poisonous snake and descends to the underworld, only to be chased down by her true love (Reeve Carney).
In Mitchell’s musical telling, no less than Andre De Shields narrates this yarn as a user-friendly Hermes, staring out at the audience, and dispensing rhythmic truths alongside the torchy Persephone (Amber Gray) and a threewoman chorus, part Aeschylus and part from “Little Shop of Horrors.”
Hadestown comes off a lot like a nasty company village, a macabre take on a Pullman or a Bourneville, places where cowed workers on scrip feared the paternalistic boss. Who happens in this case to be called Mister Hades (Patrick Page).
Page, in unfettered, macabre form, gets to sing the most ear-jerking song, “Why Do We Build the Wall?,” a kind of call-andresponse ditty between Mr. H. and his indentured servants, all parroting the idea that walls are to protect our freedom and keep us blocked from the poverty of others. Given how Mitchell’s music, with its pounding beat and obsession with notes that are lower and higher than God, lands somewhere between gospel, blues, blue-collar work song and the ravings of a rabid cult, the number roars off the stage of the Walter Kerr Theatre with a political ferocity that has not been matched on Broadway in a good long while.
Incredibly, the song dates to 2006, when Donald J. Trump, the obvious current target, still was best known as the host of “The Apprentice.”
Actually, that’s the secret weapon of “Hadestown.” It feels like the most relevant and resistant musical in town but never comes off as shrill or moving in some kind of dull lockstep with all the other self-aware plays and musicals lamenting Trump’s America by playing tritely to the choir, critics and all. That’s because the book and score of “Hadestown” predated Trump’s arrival, and thus the audience makes its own connections without being led there by the hand.
Plus the pounding political realities, the aesthetically tiresome either-or binaries of today’s divided America, are leavened by lots of sweet songs and scenes concerning themselves with the mysteries and, thank the devil, the complexities of mortal love and trust.
Both Chavkin and her hurling choreographer, David Neumann (you feel the sweat of machinery in every single underground move), seem to be to be wholly in sync with Mitchell’s aesthetic. And Rachel Hauck’s design is a true stunner — it levitates and descends as the story demands. And, at one point, it seems to come swinging out into the house, ready to knock you into oblivion.
Yet Noblezada is so empathetic, you’re right there with Carney (who’s weird, but often in a good way) when his smitten alter ego hits the highway to hell, on a mission from God.
As you likely know, Mr. Hades eventually lets Orpheus and Eurydice go with a condition. Orpheus can’t look back to make sure Eurydice is still there. Otherwise, poof. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
So where does trust end and caretaking begin? A good question for any relationship, front of mind at the Walter Kerr as you watch Noblezada sucked down into the fiery pits of hell, Carney’s pretty visage cracking with pain. He’d go to the wall, of course, just to get her back.
As would we all, my children. As would we all.
“Hadestown” plays on Broadway at the Walter Kerr Theatre, 219 W. 48th St.; www.hadestown.com Chris Jones is a Tribune critic. cjones5@chicagotribune.com