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Modern Musical Voice Awakens 1891 Tragedy

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By CURTIS ROSS

The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 28, 2008

It's a surefire formula for Broadway success: a musical set in 19th century Germany in which sexually repressed teenagers express their innermost thoughts through modern pop and rock songs.

Er, no.

A surefire formula for Broadway success would be adapting an already popular movie (see: "Legally Blonde") or building a show around a pop group's hits (see: "Mamma Mia").

"Spring Awakening," based on an 1891 tragedy written by Frank Wedekind and featuring music by pop-rock singer-songwriter Duncan Sheik, showed substance still can succeed on the Great White Way, winning eight Tony awards, including best musical, best book and best score.

"There is a genuine hunger for a piece that has substantial content," says Tom Hulce, one of the play's producers.

The play first opened off-Broadway at the Atlantic Theater in May 2006, moving to Broadway that December. It opens Tuesday at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center,

"When we began working on the piece at the Atlantic, we had no particular idea where we would finish," says Hulce, known to moviegoers for his roles as Mozart in "Amadeus" and Pinto in "Animal House."

"So the opportunity to lift the piece up to Broadway, and then for the reception to be so spectacular, was a truly amazing experience," he says.

Wedekind's play centers on a group of schoolchildren in a German village, all coping with both the onset of puberty and a society in which sexuality is a forbidden topic. With scenes depicting or hinting at sexual intercourse, masturbation, homosexuality and suicide, early performances often faced legal action or outright bans.

More than a century later, the topic of teenage sexuality resonates still, says composer Sheik.

A scene in which a teenage girl finds out she's pregnant seemed to mirror current events last summer, when Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin revealed that her unmarried 17-year-old daughter was pregnant

During a performance just after the news broke, "the entire audience burst into applause" during the scene, Sheik says.

"It was hilarious synchronicity," he says. "There's still this ridiculous thing, this cognitive dissonance, about sexuality."

Theatrical dissonance could have been the result of staging the play in its original setting - Germany in the 1890s - but using thoroughly modern pop and rock music for the score.

"I thought that theatrically it would be both a really difficult thing to achieve and thrilling to achieve," Hulce says. "If they could achieve it."

Sheik, lyricist Steven Sater and director Michael Mayer had already considered this before talking to Hulce.

"There was some discussion of doing a completely contemporary version," Sheik says.

Ultimately, the three decided "to keep the show in 1891 - there was so much atmosphere and energy - and that music will be modern."

"Instead of making smooth transitions," Sheik explains, "we decided to foreground the fact that the scenes are one universe and the songs are out of time and inside the heads of the young people. When they're singing, they become contemporary kids."

The songs would give the young people the ability to find the kind of articulation and exhilaration, and the possibility for flight, that their lives did not offer, Hulce says.

The songs also add a new layer, since Wedekind's work never gave that voice to his young characters.

"It was a given that they didn't have the same kind of beautiful release and a way to climb in and celebrate experiences," Hulce says.

"There's an amazing thing that happens with the audience. Whether your point of entry is as a parent or a teacher or an adolescent or someone remembering adolescence, the play has so many different particular experiences.

"You find the one most connected to you, so you can climb into the story," Hulce says. "By the end of the story, there's a kind of collective accumulation that unites the audience in a way that's pretty amazing."

ON STAGE

WHAT: "Spring Awakening," an award-winning Broadway musical

WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday; 8 p.m. Friday; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Jan. 4

WHERE: Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, Carol Morsani Hall, 1010 N. MacInnes Place, Tampa; (813) 229-7827

HOW MUCH: $38.50, $51.50 and $67.50

Reporter Curtis Ross can be reached at (813) 259-7568.

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