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JUKEBOX HEROES: A BEAUTIFUL NOISE / & JULIET

Young and old Neil Diamond (Will Swenson and Mark Jacoby) explore their life and legacy in A Beautiful Noise (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

A BEAUTIFUL NOISE: THE NEIL DIAMOND MUSICAL
Broadhurst Theatre
235 West Forty-Fourth St. between Broadway & Eighth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through January 7, $84.50-$318.50
abeautifulnoisethemusical.com

There are few things I dread more in theater than jukebox bio musicals, which generally consist of a fawning, glossed-over book and mediocre orchestrations of famous songs that always sound better on the albums made by the star who’s being celebrated. For every well-received Jersey Boys, about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, there are unfortunate, overblown, clichéd shows about Michael Jackson, Cher, Tina Turner, the Temptations, Donna Summer, and Carole King. That’s not a good track record.

But every once in a while an extremely clever jukebox musical hits Broadway, taking familiar, existing songs and building an exciting and original story around them. Rock of Ages was a hugely entertaining tale constructed out of songs by such ’70s dinosaurs as Styx, Journey, REO Speedwagon, Foreigner, and Quarterflash. American Idiot re-created the fictional narrative of a Green Day concept album without Broadway-fying the music. Jagged Little Pill examined American suburbia through Alanis Morissette’s oeuvre. And Head Over Heels smoothly inserted hits by the Go-Go’s into a little-known Elizabethan drama like they were a natural fit.

A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical, scheduled to run through January 7 at the Broadhurst, is a major disappointment. The frame story is that the Brooklyn-born Diamond (Mark Jacoby) is meeting with a therapist (Linda Powell) to explore key moments in his life and career. “This isn’t going to work,” he tells her. He’s not kidding.

The book, by four-time Oscar nominee Anthony McCarten (The Collaboration, The Two Popes), goes back and forth between the present day, as Diamond begins to open up to his doctor, who is making him revisit his songs in the huge volume The Complete Lyrics of Neil Diamond, and the past, as his younger self (Will Swenson) rises from shy Brill Building songwriter to folkie to pop superstar. Along the way we meet his parents, Rose (Bri Sudia) and Kieve (Tom Alan Robbins), his early supporter Ellie Greenwich (Bri Sudia), predatory producer Bert Berns (Robbins), and the women who would become his wives, Jaye Posner (Jessie Fisher), Marcia Murphey (Robyn Hurder), and Katie (unseen).

Neil Diamond (Will Swenson) goes for the glitter in jukebox bio musical (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

Tony-winning director Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening, Hedwig and the Angry Inch) can’t find the right rhythm as the narrative meanders, and Tony-nominee Swenson (Hair, Les Misérables) swaggers as Diamond but is unable to embody him as the show presents us with spiritless versions of “I’m a Believer,” “Solitary Man,” “Song Sung Blue,” “Cherry, Cherry,” “Love on the Rocks,” “America,” “Cracklin’ Rosie,” and the obligatory singalong “Sweet Caroline.” (The arrangements are by Sonny Paladino, with orchestrations by Paladino, Bob Gaudio, and Brian Usifer.)

David Rockwell’s set is plenty flashy, with bright lighting by Kevin Adams, standard choreography by Steven Hoggett, and a wide range of costumes by Emilio Sosa. I found myself more involved with the woman a few rows in front of me who kept taking her phone out to video several songs than the actual narrative.

“I don’t . . . I don’t like to talk about myself,” Diamond tells the doctor early on. A Beautiful Noise doesn’t have that much to say about Diamond that we don’t already know (or need to know), so if you really need to hear his music — and you should, because his catalog is one of the best in the business — stream one of his albums or find a tribute band playing in your area.

A delightful cast parties its way through & Juliet (photo by Matthew Murphy)

& JULIET
Stephen Sondheim Theatre
124 West Forty-Third St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through April 21, $89-$338
andjulietbroadway.com

Meanwhile, something inspiring and exhilarating is happening over at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, where they are taking a new spin on the Bard, whose catalog is unquestionably the best in the business. David West Read’s & Juliet does a fantastic job with a sensational concept: Anne Hathaway (Betsy Wolfe) argues that her husband, William Shakespeare (Stark Sands), screwed up the ending of Romeo and Juliet, and she has decided to change it so Juliet (Lorna Courtney) actually survives and is now in search of a new life, without Romeo (Ben Jackson Walker).

Soutra Gilmour’s lively set prepares the audience from the start, with the curtainless stage containing a large neon sign of the title, the word Romeo having fallen off, as well as a glistening jukebox ready to fill the room with great music. Bill Sherman’s orchestrations and arrangements will delight you, no matter what your preconceived feelings are about the Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, Robyn, Demi Lovato, Katy Perry, *NSYNC, and Justin Timberlake. But for good measure, Bon Jovi, Ellie Goulding, and P!nk are added to the mix (and Céline Dion!).

However, the songs were not chosen randomly; they were all written or cowritten by Swedish producer Max Martin, who’s clearly an experienced hitmaker of the highest order. (The conceit of sticking with one songwriter’s work doesn’t always pan out, as evidenced by Bat Out of Hell, with famously bombastic songs Jim Steinman wrote for Meat Loaf and others.)

The story begins in Elizabethan England, as Will is about to present the world premiere of Romeo and Juliet, but Anne steps in the way, asking, “What if . . . Juliet didn’t kill herself? . . . I mean, what do I know, but it seems like she’s got her whole life ahead of her, she’s only had one boyfriend. Maybe she doesn’t kill herself just because he killed himself?”

Against his better judgment, Will collaborates on the new plot, making Romeo a serial cheater and creating a new best friend for Juliet, a gender-neutral character named May (Justin David Sullivan). To avoid being sent to a nunnery by her parents (Nicholas Edwards and Veronica Otim), Juliet takes off for Paris with May and Angélique (Justin David Sullivan and Melanie La Barrie), her nurse and confidante. Anne writes herself into the play and portrays the carriage driver.

In Paris, they go to a Renaissance Ball, where Juliet meets a musician named François DuBois (Philippe Arroyo, although I saw the excellent understudy Brandon Antonio), whose testosterone-fueled father, Lance (Paulo Szot), is the host of the fancy soirée. “As you can see, I play the virginal,” François tells Juliet, who responds, “Me too. I feel like doing it once shouldn’t count.”

Juliet (Lorna Courtney) looks for love in charming Broadway musical (photo by Matthew Murphy)

Pretty soon there’s all kinds of couplings and uncouplings going on as Angélique and Juliet sing “Oops! . . . I Did It Again,” May and François lead the company through “I Kissed a Girl,” Anne and Juliet duet on “That’s the Way It Is,” Lance, François, and May team up on “Shape of My Heart,” and everyone joins in on “Can’t Stop the Feeling!”

Directed with virtuoso aplomb by Luke Sheppard (The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, In the Heights), who turns the proceedings into a kind of affectionate adult fairy tale, & Juliet is a rousing success. It tackles misogyny, homophobia, gender bias, and other forms of social injustice with a playful sense of humor and a genuine heart, from Paloma Young’s elegant costumes, which mix the traditional with the modern, Howard Hudson’s frenzied lighting, Andrzej Goulding’s dazzling projections, and Gareth Owen’s explosive sound. Jennifer Weber’s appropriately energetic choreography keeps it all moving through Gilmour’s set, which includes miniature landmarks, fun furniture, and, yes, a balcony.

Native New Yorker Lorna Courtney (Dear Evan Hansen, West Side Story) is thoroughly engaging as Juliet, a young woman ready to take control of her own life. Sullivan portrays May with a touching bittersweetness, and La Barrie is eminently likable as Angélique, who remains by Juliet’s side even when she thinks she’s making some very bad choices. Two-time Tony nominee Sands (Kinky Boots, To Kill a Mockingbird) and Wolfe (The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Falsettos) make a great pairing as a husband and wife battling over more than just theatrical conventions and expectations.

At its heart, the wonderful show is centered around Emmy winner Read’s (Schitt’s Creek, The Performers) terrific book, which provides plenty of room for character development while never missing an opportunity for a clever literary laugh.

At one point, Juliet declares, “This is already the best night ever, and all we’ve done is leave my bedroom!” Angélique explains, “Juliet, we have to go. If your parents see you, you’ll be forced to join the nunnery.” Anne cuts in, proclaiming, “Well, we will have none of that.” Angélique asks, “What?” May says, “Ew.”

“Sorry, my husband makes puns. It’s a force of habit,” Anne clarifies, even explaining the joke for those who might not have gotten it immediately.

There’s nothing to apologize for.

BERNARDA’S DAUGHTERS

Sisters gather at the family home in Flatbush to figure out what happens next (photo by Monique Carboni)

BERNARDA’S DAUGHTERS
The Pershing Square Signature Center
The Romulus Linney Courtyard Theatre
480 West Forty-Second St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through June 4, $37-$87
thenewgroup.org
www.nationalblacktheatre.org

Carlos J. Soto’s set is a harbinger of what is to come in the world premiere of Diane Exavier’s Bernarda’s Daughters, a powerful and moving coproduction from the New Group and National Black Theatre that opened at the Romulus Linney Courtyard Theatre at the Pershing Square Signature Center this week. The audience sits on three sides of the staging area, a sparse room with several painted wooden boxes on the floor and the skeleton of a house, with only the frames of doors and windows, occasionally illuminated in a string of LED lights. While it appears that the five protagonists in the title can leave at any moment, just walk through the empty doors or even climb through the windows, they are trapped by both fear and legacy. For ninety minutes the characters discuss their futures, but it always ends up with them back in the house, their life at a standstill.

Bernarda’s Daughters was inspired by Spanish poet and playwright Federico García Lorca’s last completed play, The House of Bernarda Alba, which he wrote in 1936, the year he died at the age of thirty-eight. First produced in 1945, the story has been adapted into a musical, an opera, a dance, and several films, with the location changing from Spain to Iran, India, Australia, the American south, and other places around the world, proving the universality of the themes.

Exavier’s version is set in modern-day Flatbush, Brooklyn (my hometown), where five sisters have gathered in the family home: Louise (Pascale Armand), Harriet (Alana Raquel Bowers), Lena (Kristin Dodson), Maryse (Malika Samuel), and Adela (Taji Senior). Their mother is in Haiti, attending the funeral of their father. The play begins with each sister delivering a brief introduction. For example, Louise, a city nurse who has a different mother but the same father as the other four, explains, “Each of us sisters is a room in our mother’s house, our grandmother a countryside. Intimate and immense. If you were to, say . . . put on a play about us, there would be no center-staged couch, no staircase, no fabrication of a gentrifying city just outside the windows, no nod to some ancestral land. Our city is dying and our city is inside of us. There are countries that are dying and those countries are inside of us. We are at the edge of living. We are the world we live in.”

Florence Delva (Tamara Tunie) is concerned about Adela (Taji Senior) in Bernarda’s Daughters (photo by Monique Carboni)

Outside, the noise of construction and protest pierces through their conversations; amid gentrification, there’s been another police shooting of a young, mentally ill, unarmed Black man. “They don’t see the people in the neighborhood. They live in those castles with the police as their front desk,” Adela says of the influx of white people flooding into the neighborhood. “They dial 911 like they’re out of toilet paper. ‘Excuse me, can you just?’ ‘Would you mind?’ It’s sick. I’m so tired of it.” Adela wants to join the march but can’t take action, instead watching it through the window, her face only a few feet from the audience, implicating us in what is happening to their community.

Louise and Harriet have a plan to use land their father left Louise in Jacmel, Haiti, to build a small vacation villa. They all discuss whether they will be moving out of the house — which their parents might have acquired under suspicious circumstances — or staying there with their grandmother, Florence Delva (Tamara Tunie), once their mother returns from her mourning period. When they find out what havoc their parents’ decisions have wrought, however, their lives are suddenly turned upside down.

“Louise, you know you can’t buy, you can’t rent, you can’t be dead here. Shit’s insane,” Adela says. Louise replies, “It’s ridiculous. Whatever happens, just don’t put me in Long Island.”

But as Adela says, “I feel like the house is killing us slowly. . . . You guys have to get out.”

Exavier fills the dialogue with poetic interludes and quotes based on writings and statements by James Baldwin, Louise Glück, Mary Ruefle, Trumbull Stickney, Morgan Parker, Kamau Brathwaite, Toni Morrison, and Florence Miller, whose husband was choked to death in Crown Heights by the police in 1978. In a compelling monologue about sex, sun, cats, and the dead, Maryse, who is a school librarian, says, “I love watching the sun on graves, illuminating names, how bright the light is, blazing the stone, and the sky so blue above recalling the color of bone.”

Later, Harriet says, “You really think I love love so much? You don’t know anything. I’m mourning it! I’m so far past love I never even stood a chance. I was born beyond it. We all were. Love — in this fucking country? My womb was full of rocks. That’s what bodies like ours think of love: babies made of stone. . . . I really think we are the end of it all. And I think that’s what makes us so goddamn American. Because this stupid country is like the waking end of a crazy-ass fever dream. And you trying to out-America everyone you lay down with because the only way to have a little power is to step on somebody else’s back is just wrong! But even worse than that, it’s useless.” Meanwhile, the words free and freedom appear seven times in the play, ideals that seem to be just out of the characters’ reach.

The actors portraying the sisters are outstanding, with native Brooklynite Dodson standing out as the boisterous Lena. The women believably argue and share personal intimacies like real sisters; however, Obie winner Tunie (Building the Wall, Familiar) has her hands full as the over-the-top Florence, who hearkens back to the old days in Haiti but is overdrawn here. The curtain at the rear of the stage feels unnecessary, but Rodrigo Muñoz’s costumes meld Brooklyn with Port-au-Prince, and Marika Kent’s lighting and Kathy Ruvuna’s sound are effective, particularly the never-ending commotion going on outside.

Directed by Dominique Rider with a clear connection to the characters, Bernarda’s Daughters is a potent look at what the Haitian community in New York City has, what it’s lost, and where it might be heading. Like Adela proclaims, “I keep telling you guys. It’s a different Brooklyn out there.” She’s not just talking about Flatbush.

KHAN!!! THE MUSICAL! A PARODY TREK-TACULAR

Khan (Zachary Kropp) is flanked by two of his minions (Crystal Marie Stewart and Laura Whittenberger) in Star Trek parody (photo by Carol Rosegg)

KHAN!!! THE MUSICAL! A PARODY TREK-TACULAR
Players Theatre
115 MacDougal St.
Thursday – Sunday through June 4, $25-$65
www.khaniscoming.com

Brent Black’s Khan!!! The Musical! is a series of missed opportunities, unable to pass its own Kobayashi Maru training exercise, trapping itself too often in no-win situations.

In the 1967 Star Trek episode “Space Seed,” Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) of the USS Enterprise exiles Khan Noonien Singh (Ricardo Montalbán) and his Botany Bay crew of genetic superhumans to the abandoned planet Ceti Alpha V. Fifteen years later, Khan returns to seek revenge in Nicholas Meyer’s hit 1982 film Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

Khan!!! The Musical!, subtitled “The Parody Trek-Tacular,” running at the Players Theatre through June 4, takes place in 2336, as Lt. Commander Data (Julian Manjerico) is writing a musical about Kirk and Khan’s intense battle, to be performed by a holographic cast of members of Starfleet. The emotionless Data regularly stops the show to inquire how the artificially intelligent audience program is enjoying it and to introduce the next scene.

“Musical theater. Is it merely an archaic four-hundred-year-old art form gone the way of disco, boy bands, and Klingon disco boy bands? Or does musical theater hold insights for all humanoids?” he begins. “As part of my mission to become more human, I wanted to find out. So I forced myself to watch one thousand hours of twentieth-century Earth musicals, then synthesized them all into a playwriting subroutine, and assembled a musical comedy based on one of the most dramatic events in Starfleet history.”

Despite some very clever lines and funny moments, too much of Khan!!! The Musical! ends up feeling like it was written by AI or ChatGPT.

On hand are all the beloved favorites of the starship Enterprise: Mr. Spock (Max Nusbaum), chief medical officer Leonard “Bones” McCoy (Lindsey M. E. Newton), chief engineer Montgomery “Scotty” Scott (Newton), helm officer Hikaru Sulu (Clayton Matthews), communications officer Uhura (Crystal Marie Stewart), and Admiral Kirk (Shyaporn Theerakulstit, who played Sulu on three episodes of Star Trek Phase II); in addition, Pavel Chekov (Matthews) is now the first officer of the USS Reliant, the starship taken over by Khan (Zachary Kropp). New to the cast are Lt. Saavik (Laura Whittenberger), a half-Vulcan cadet who believes in following the rules; Joachim (Manjerico), Khan’s subservient right-hand man; Peter Preston (Manjerico), Scotty’s nephew; Dr. Carol Marcus (Stewart), head of Project Genesis; and her son, David (Manjerico).

Oddly, Captain Terrell, who in the film was played by Emmy winner and Oscar nominee Paul Winfield, has been changed into a redshirt, the term used for extremely minor characters who get killed on away missions; he’s listed in the script as Terrell, but my guess is that since there’s no Black actor in the cast, they opted not to have a person of a different background portray him. (The script requests that productions avoid whitewashing.)

Admiral James T. Kirk (Shyaporn Theerakulstit) leads a song and dance as he battles an old enemy in Khan!!! The Musical! (photo by Carol Rosegg)

Khan!!! The Musical! starts off with a bang as it sets the stage for what is to come. Ivey Jenkins-Long’s ultra-low-budget set features bridge consoles on wheels, a handmade cardboard Genesis missile, and a makeshift engineering room. Jolene Richardson’s costumes evoke those of the television series and films, with Kropp looking particularly fine in his torn, open-shirted warrior getup, although I still can’t figure out why they didn’t make a joke about “fine Corinthian leather,” as Montalbán described the interior of the Chrysler Cordoba in a series of mid-1970s car commercials.

Otherwise, inside jokes, pop-culture references, and shots at numerous Star Trek inconsistencies abound. “You know, Khan . . . you seem to leave a trail of death everywhere you go, but like some kind of Imperial Stormtrooper, you keep missing the target!” Kirk growls at his adversary. “The no-win scenario isn’t really about passing or failing. The point is your character,” Bones tells Saavik, who replies, “I have often wondered what the point of my character is.”

Nicholas Kaminski’s music direction and Angel Reed’s choreography pay homage to such classics as Chicago, Les Misérables, Grease, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show in such songs as “Young,” “The Needs of the Many,” and “Buried Alive,” but they quickly become repetitive, and too many numbers are unnecessary, particularly “When the Chickens Come Home,” with giant mutant fowl laying an egg kicking off the second act. Constant mentions of the game Battleship and Joachim’s desire to go bowling are tedious, as are Kirk and Spock calling each other by fan-fiction-inspired lover nicknames, “Frosty-buns” and “Jim-jam”; the concept is good, but it would have been better if they changed the nicknames each time. The show was co-conceived by Black with Alinca Morgan, who contributed “additional materials,” and is directed by John Lampe, who will have to take the Kobayashi Maru again.

It also gets confusing as some actors closely impersonate their characters’ voice and movement while others don’t; Theerakulstit’s embodiment of William Shatner is fun at first but slows down the pace as it continues, and the decision to have David talk like Shatner peters out immediately. And the amount of time spent on Preston is inexplicable.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan is one of my favorite movies, so maybe I was expecting too much from Khan!!! The Musical! There were a lot of Trekkies in the audience the night I went, many of whom were off to the Trek Long Island convention that weekend, and they were having a great time.

The most famous moment in the film is when an angry Kirk clenches his fist and screams out, “Khan!”

After the show, I wanted to scream out, “Khan!!! The Musical!”

BOB DYLAN BIRTHDAY BASH

Who: Near Dead Experience, Philosophers, Chest Fever
What: Concert celebrating Robert Allen Zimmerman’s eighty-second birthday
Where: Brooklyn Bowl, 61 Wythe Ave.
When: Wednesday, May 24, $15, 8:00
Why: In July 1987, Bob Dylan teamed up with the Grateful Dead for a half dozen stadium shows in the United States. Last month, Dylan’s Never Ending Tour traveled to Tokyo, where Bob surprised everyone by adding slot to his otherwise iron-tight setlist for covers of the Dead’s “Truckin’,” “Brokedown Palace,” and “Not Fade Away” (originally by Buddy Holly and the Crickets). So it’s only fitting that GD tribute bands Near Dead Experience and Philosophers (aka Phil and the Osophers) will be at Brooklyn Bowl on May 24 for a bash celebrating Dylan’s completion of his latest revolution around the sun. In addition, Chest Fever, which plays the songs of the Band with Robbie Robertson’s blessing, is on the bill, focusing on the songs Dylan and the Band recorded together, primarily on Before the Flood and The Basement Tapes, as well as their own tunes.

It also happens to be my birthday, so I’m requesting Jerry’s version of “Tangled Up in Blue”; meanwhile, Dead & Company have announced that they’re hanging it up following their summer tour, with their last shows ever July 14-16 in San Francisco, adding a bittersweet tinge to the birthday bash, which will also feature surprise guests. I was at the above show, at the Meadowlands on July 12, 1987, where the camaraderie between Dylan and the Grateful Dead is clearly evident, so evident that Bob asked to join the group in 1988 and maybe again in 1995.

RECANATI-KAPLAN TALKS: GRAHAM NASH

A Graham Nash self-portrait from 1972 is one of two dozens works on view at City Winery (photo courtesy City Winery / Graham Nash)

Who: Graham Nash, Anthony DeCurtis
What: Live and livestreamed conversation
Where: 92nd St. Y Center of Culture & Arts, 1395 Lexington Ave. between 91st & 92nd St., Buttenwieser Hall at the Arnhold Center and online
When: Thursday, June 1, $25 online, $35 in person, 8:30
Why: On “A Better Life,” the second song on Now, his first album of new material in seven years, two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Graham Nash sings, “Let’s make it a better life, leave it for the kids / It’s a lovely place, welcome home to the human race / We can make it a better life — one we can be proud of / So that at the end of the day, I hope we hear them say / that we left them a better life.” In his most recent book, A Life in Focus: The Photography of Graham Nash (November 2021, Insight Editions, $60), the musician, visual artist, and social activist explains, “I’ve been taking photographs longer than I’ve been making music.”

Coming off three shows at City Winery in which he played songs from throughout his long and distinguished career, the eighty-one-year-old Nash will be at the 92nd St. Y on June 1 at 8:30, in conversation with Rolling Stone contributor Anthony DeCurtis. Now contains such other tracks as “Right Now,” “Golden Idols,” and “I Watched It All Come Down”; meanwhile, two dozen of his pictures are on view through July 11 at City Winery in the exhibition “Graham Nash: Enduring Images,” including photos of Columbus Circle, David Crosby, Balboa Park, Johnny Cash, Jerry Garcia, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and an old house in Santa Cruz. At the 92nd St. Y talk, which can be attended in person or online, Nash will also perform some songs from the new record, demonstrating once again how he’s made this life better for all of us.

THE REBECCA LUKER SONGBOOK: A BENEFIT CONCERT

Who: Julie Benko, Andréa Burns, Carolee Carmello, Nikki Renée Daniels, Laura Darrell, Ali Ewoldt, Marina Kondo, Emilie Kouatchou, Bryce Pinkham, Scarlett Strallen, Jessica Vosk, Sally Wilfert, more
What: Tribute to Broadway favorite Rebecca Luker
Where: Symphony Space, 2537 Broadway at Ninety-Fifth St.
When: Monday, May 22, $35-$250, 8:00
Why: On May 10, 2018, Alabama-born Broadway star Rebecca Luker presented “Project Broadway: The Rebecca Luker Songbook” at Symphony Space, a concert featuring the world premiere of eighteen songs written specifically for her by such composers as Deborah Abramson, Sam Davis, Stephen Flaherty, Jenny Giering, Sheldon Harnick, Henry Krieger, Andrew Lippa, Matthew Sklar, and Joseph Thalken. The three-time Tony nominee (Show Boat, The Music Man, Mary Poppins) announced in 2020 that she had ALS, and she died on December 23 of that year, survived by her husband, Tony winner Danny Burstein, and his two sons.

On May 22, a wonderful collection of Broadway stars will honor Luker and the fifth anniversary of “The Rebecca Luker Songbook” when they gather at Symphony Space and debut twenty-four different songs written for Luker, by Carmel Dean, Scott Eyerly, Giering, Mike Heitzman and Ilene Reid, Krieger, Lippa, David Loud, Martin Lowe, Joshua Rosenblum, Sam Willmott, and others. (The project included more than eighty original numbers.) Among those performing will be Julie Benko, Andréa Burns, Carolee Carmello, Nikki Renée Daniels, Laura Darrell, Ali Ewoldt, Marina Kondo, Emilie Kouatchou, Bryce Pinkham, Scarlett Strallen, Jessica Vosk, and Sally Wilfert; Thalken will serve as music director, with Deborah Avery on clarinet, Katherine Cherbas on cello, Craig Magnano on guitar and ukulele, and Benny Koonyevsky on percussion. The concert will raise funds for Project ALS, which “identifies and funds the most promising scientific research that will lead to the first effective treatments and a cure for ALS. We recruit the world’s best scientists and doctors to work together — rationally and aggressively — to develop a better understanding of the ALS disease process and, in parallel, better therapeutic strategies.” Tickets range from $35 to $250; the concert, directed by producer Annette Jolles, will also be livestreamed for $35.

MUSEUM OF THE REVOLUTION

Milica Novakov is determined to make a better life for her family against all odds in Museum of the Revolution

MUSEUM OF THE REVOLUTION (Srđan Keča, 2021)
DCTV’s Firehouse Cinema
87 Lafayette St.
May 19-25
museumoftherevolutionfilm.com
www.dctvny.org

In 1961, Yugoslavia selected a design for the Museum of the Revolution to be built in New Belgrade, honoring the nation’s democratic socialism as it became part of the Non-Aligned Movement. “The purpose of this museum is to safeguard the truth about us,” architect Vjenceslav Richter said at the time. That quote opens Srđan Keča’s strikingly photographed, heart-wrenching Museum of the Revolution, followed by a proverb that proclaims, “The wind got up in the night and took our plans away.” The twenty-year project was shelved halfway through as the country turned to capitalism, leaving behind only the basement level, where unhoused, destitute people sought shelter.

In 2014, the Yugoslav-born writer, director, and professor created a multimedia installation about the would-be museum for the Serbian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale of Architecture. While filming in the abandoned location, he met an old woman named Marija Savič, known as Mara, who lived in the basement, along with a young girl, Milica Novakov, and her mother, Vera. They had formed a kind of three-generation family struggling to survive, mired in seemingly inescapable poverty.

Milica and Vera spend their days in the middle of traffic, cleaning the windshields of the very few drivers who let them. In the snow, Milica tries to make a heart but continually fails; a few moments later she is running around with Mara, laughing and smiling as young girls should.

Vera Novakov is running out of hope in Srđan Keča’s Museum of the Revolution

Museum of the Revolution begins with more than twelve dialogue-free minutes as Keča, who also served as cinematographer and edited the film with Hrvoslava Brkušić, shifts from archival footage depicting the hope of the new Yugoslavia to the dank, filthy, dungeonlike area where that promise disappeared. It’s an almost impossibly dark space, a small fire burning for heat, outside light visible through a path strewn with garbage, blocking their way to a better life.

Mother and daughter head into the city so Vera can send money to her husband, who is in prison. At one point they pass by a school where children can be heard playing, but that kind of education is not available to Milica, who is dedicated to helping her mother any way she can so they can get out of this tragic situation.

Vera holds back tears so Milica won’t see. They bathe and wash their clothes in a dirty lake. Vera picks lice out of Milica’s hair. Mara tells Vera the story of her own daughter, Dragana, whom she gave up as child. Mara wanted to reconnect and told Dragana, “If I couldn’t raise you when you were a child, at least we can be together when I die,” but Dragana rejected her.

As corporate towers and luxury residences under construction rise around them, it’s clear they have nowhere to go. Vera’s desperation grows, but Milica still believes that they will soon have a normal existence, in which her mother has a job and picks her up from school every afternoon, going together to a home with its own bathroom.

Museum of the Revolution features gorgeously photographed extended shots with natural sound — wind, rain, traffic — while other scenes are underscored by Hrvoje Nikšić’s gentle, cautionary music. It’s a painfully intimate film; Milica and Vera pay no attention to the camera, just going about their days and nights, neither seeking sympathy nor railing against the system.

Keča’s debut feature after such shorter works as A Letter to Dad and Mirage, it’s a haunting tale filmed like a fictional narrative; I had to keep reminding myself that it’s a documentary. In fact, the credits identify the three protagonists as if they are portraying characters, not themselves. It could be anyone’s story, in any country, but it’s all too true.

The final shot of Milica is unforgettable — a stark comparison to Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) on the beach at the end of François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows — followed by several minutes of eerie silence as a solitary light glows in the darkness.

Museum of the Revolution runs May 19-25 at DCTV’s Firehouse Cinema, with Q&As with Keča on May 19 at 7:00 with DCTV public programs director Dara Messinger, May 20 at 8:30 with documentarian Pacho Velez (The Reagan Show, Manakamana), and May 21 at 12:30 with digital director and film critic Violet Lucca.