Mary (Erin Mackey) and John (Josh Young) try to find love in turbulent times in new Broadway musical (photo by Joan Marcus)
Nederlander Theatre
208 West 41st St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through December 20, $65-$139
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amazinggracemusical.com
As the new Broadway musical Amazing Grace opens, a man (Tony winner Chuck Cooper) stands at the side of the stage and announces, “There are moments when the waves of history converge. When the transformation of one man can change the world,” declaring, “It is a story that must be told.” There may indeed be a fascinating tale behind John Newton, the writer of the title song, a beloved Protestant hymn, but this is not necessarily it. Tony nominee Josh Young (Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita) stars as Newton, the ne’er-do-well son of the regal Captain Newton (Tony nominee Tom Hewitt), an important businessman and slave trader in the port town of Chatham, England. John has just returned from a stint on the high seas, where he meets up on the docks with Mary Catlett (Erin Mackey), his “dearest friend in the world,” and is chastised by his father, who takes away his son’s mariner’s license and demands he return to England, the family business of slaving, and his studies. Against his father’s orders, John runs a slave auction that turns disastrous when abolitionists intercede, leading to bloodshed and an escape. It doesn’t take long for John to find himself at odds with everyone else as Mary starts meeting secretly with the abolitionists, the dandy Major Gray (Chris Hoch) begins wooing Mary, and his father demands that he find the missing slave. John then sets off on a dangerous journey that only gets worse because of his haughty attitude and love of the drink, heading toward rock bottom at full speed.
John Newton (Josh Young) battles with his father (Tom Hewitt) in AMAZING GRACE (photo by Joan Marcus)
The Playbill points out that Amazing Grace is Christopher Smith’s “first work of professional writing,” and it shows as the musical continues, bogged down by clichés and obvious plot twists. Smith, who wrote the music and lyrics and cowrote the book with Arthur Giron (Moving Bodies, A Dream of Wealth), strives to take us deep into the heart and soul of John Newton, exploring the travails that resulted in his composing one of the most famous songs ever written, but it turns out that Newton’s story is not nearly as compelling as the song itself. The cast is terrific — Hewitt (The Rocky Horror Show, Another Medea) and Cooper (The Life, Memphis), as the Newtons’ slave and John’s closest friend, are particularly impressive, and Mackey (Chaplin, Wicked) is in fine voice. But director Gabriel Barre (Summer of ’42, The Wild Party) never finds a consistent rhythm as the production attempts to navigate racism and white privilege but cannot escape mundane sentimentality and political correctness, especially in a banal finale. Part of the problem is that slavery is a one-sided conflict, and it is difficult to have sympathy for Newton even as he is being redeemed. The producers tried hard to avoid major religious overtones, given the title song’s association with the concept of redemption, and they achieve that in the first act, but the second act turns out to be far more preachy, complete with religious implications. Still, Amazing Grace, which has been in the works for eighteen years, has its moments, concluding with a sing-along of the complete eighteenth-century hymn that continues to have such an emotional impact, sung recently by President Obama at the funeral for shooting victim Rev. Clementa Pinckney in Charleston, South Carolina.