Far From Heaven

Musical (2014)
Music by Scott Frankel
Lyrics by Michael Korie
Book by Richard Greenberg

With Jennifer Ellis (Cathy Whitaker), Maurice Emmanuel Parent (Raymond Deagan), Jared Troilo (Frank Whitaker), Aimee Doherty (Eleanor Fine), Will McGarrahan (Dr. Bowman), Audree Hedequist (Janice Whitaker), Josh Sussman (David Whitaker), Sophia Mack (Sarah Deagan), Darren Bunch (Gus), Tyer Lenhart (Chase Decker), Michael Levesque (Dick Dawson), Carla Martinez (Esther), Jennifer Mischley (Doreen Dawson), Ellen Peterson (Mona Lauder), Caroyn Saxon (Sybil), Rachel Gianna Tassio (Nancy)

The summary basically says it all: Cathy Whitaker (Jennifer Ellis) is married to Frank Whitaker (Jared Troilo) who is handsome, successful and, though she doesn’t know it right away, gay. It becomes clear soon enough and she makes a glorious effort to help him through it and to return safely to their marriage. Meanwhile, he’s falling apart inside and she begins to develop a natural connection with Raymond Deagan (Maurice Emmanuel Parent), the gardener who has recently taken the job over for his deceased father.

When I saw the film on which this musical is based twelve years ago, Far From Heaven (2002), I thought it was okay, but not great. There was something a little too self-consciously noir about it, something too mannered to make it believable. Modeled after the 1950s films of Douglas Sirk, and, in particular, All That Heaven Allows (1955) starring a mature Jane Wyman who falls for a younger Rock Hudson, the 2002 Far From Heaven was meant to bring that mood and some of those themes to the fore while adding those of closeted homosexuality and forbidden interracial relations between the sexes.

Something about this musical version made it considerably more appealing to me than the film. I don’t know if the somewhat stagy construct of a musical helps to provide the sort of distance that makes a view into this now somewhat strange world of the 1950s more acceptable, or whether the flowing tonalities of the score and the somewhat offbeat lyrics helped to soften and shape the dark tone that felt so intentionally pronounced in the film.

Whatever the reason, this musical version really worked for me. The combination of 1950s jazziness, moodiness and colorfully anachronistic glamour gets mixed into a noirish, but tasty and tasteful, cocktail.

Jennifer Ellis in the title role as Cathy Whitaker is superb. Her neverending smile, right out of a fifties fashion magazine, is all about the presumed upbeatness of that era. It was a decade smitten with its own relief from war and depression and elevated into a space of buoyancy and considerable superficiality. But Ellis plays it, though smilingly, with a genuine naive buoyancy that seems to fit. Her smiling is about optimism, even though the world is crumbling around her. And, only in the end, when that smile does begin to fade and to show the creases of realism, it becomes penetrating and heartbreaking.

Maurice Emmanuel Parent as Raymond Deagan, the gardener, has a lovely, sweet presence that makes him entirely believable as a romantic lead who does not romance too hard, but draws in with the quiet power of his personality. Like Dennis Haysbert, who played the role in the film, he has a gentle nobility that speaks delicately but heroically. Parent’s resigned stance, and his grimly reserved recognition of racism on all fronts, speaks volumes.

Aimee Doherty, who usually lights up a stage, does so here in the role of Cathy’s good friend, Eleanor Fine. She gives a saucy zip to the simmering stew of this tragic drama, perking it up, with gestures of body and voice, so that it doesn’t flag.

Jared Troilo, as Frank Whitaker, gives a good rendering of a gay man caught in an intolerant era, and vividly shows what liberation feels like when it comes to him.

The two kids who play Cathy’s children, Audree Hedequist (Janice Whitaker) and Josh Sussman (David Whitaker), are out of this world. They act and sing beautifully and seem completely at home on the stage, both of them very funny, spontaneous and natural.

The cast is large and effectively supports the action with song, gesture and dance. A wonderful elongated dance scene in the second act is particularly satisfying.

The scenic design, emphasizing the containment of picture frames, echoing the art exhibit at which Cathy and Raymond really first connect, is a simple, but eloquent idea. Used throughout, it effectively communicates the idea of worlds lined up next to one another but separate, beckoning to be interpreted and brought together.

The music is interesting – haunting and meandering, while still providing enough forward movement to keep things rolling. It’s more like an opera than a typical musical – something vaguely akin to the style of the great Schönberg-Boublil musicals Les Misérables and Miss Saigon (1989) which have virtually no spoken dialogue. This show does, but there is far more continuous supporting music even during that dialogue than there is in most musicals.

The theme and setting of this show is so closely related to that of Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner at the Huntington Theatre Company that one wonders whether they planned this together. See them both if you can. They are quite different productions, but speak of similar times, similar themes and are both extremely well done.

– BADMan