Happy End: Sinners and Saviors

It seems simultaneously deliciously ironic and wholly appropriate to see Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's caustic 1929 musical Happy End staged in the basement of a church. In Theatre 1010's revival, performed in the basement of the Park Avenue Christian Church on the affluent Upper East Side, the songs echo off of the bare walls of the cafetorium and the electrical circuits can't handle the lighting system. Meanwhile, the text of the musical gleefully mocks religion and those who blindly follow it. Brecht and Weill are probably grinning with joy right now.

After all, a show with the famous tagline of "Robbing a bank is no crime compared to owning one" probably shouldn't get a lavish, elegant production. This is a raw, gritty musical, and director David Fuller emphasizes those qualities in this production, letting the script, score, and talent stand out.

Said script and score follow a ruthless group of gangsters in 1919 Chicago and the innocent Salvation Army officer who tries to reform one of the gang's most notorious villains. (Officially, Guys & Dolls took no inspiration from Happy End. None at all.) Several of the Kurt Weill's songs for the show became popular—"The Sailor's Tango," "Ballad of the Lily of Hell" and "Song of the Big Shot" can still be found in cabarets and revues today, and "Surabaya Johnny" is a hit by any standard.

David Fuller directs this production like a classic gangster movie from Hollywood's Golden Age (complete with a silent movie depicting a botched robbery), allowing his actors to be wonderfully over-the-top. When genuine emotion creeps in, the characters seem as surprised by it as we are, and the moments seem that much more special. Most of those moments belong to Lorinda Lisitza, who plays Lillian "Hallelujah Lil" Holliday with a bittersweet innocence that makes her more optimistic than naïve. When she sings "The Sailor's Tango" or "Surabaya Johnny," it is impossible to take your eyes off of her. (Giles Hogya's atmospheric lighting helps considerably.) Lisitza's Lil is a wounded soul desperate to believe the best of people, and she never sets the character or her values up as a joke. As thief and murderer Bill Cracker, Joey Piscopo (yes, son of Joe) is wonderfully dynamic, reveling in the amorality of his character while letting his façade slowly crack under Lil's influence. Bill is no Mack the Knife, and Piscopo doesn't try to be suave or gentlemanly. Violent emotions, whether for good or bad, are always just beneath the surface, and explode in the best possible way when he sings and dances. As the mysterious Fly, Judith Jarosz has the clearest voice of all the actors (a necessity when performing in such a echoing, cavernous space), and gleefully chews the scenery while conjuring images of Bette Midler and Mama Cass in the best possible way.

While this production of Happy End won't be to everyone's tastes, Brecht and Weill purists will find much to appreciate. The strong cast and clever director overcome the technical problems of the performance space to create a lively and intelligent evening of thought-provoking musical theatre.  

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