Review: Aimee Doherty Hits Homer with PENELOPE

At this time last year, the American Repertory Theater was premiering a stirring new dramatic adaptation of Homer’s “The Odyssey” by actor and playwright Kate Hamill, which moved back and forth between King Odysseus and Queen Penelope during a three-hour production with two intermissions.

Proving that local theatergoers have no shortage of interest in the classics even when updated, now through March 1, Lyric Stage Boston is presenting “Penelope” – a slight one-act, 80-minute musical inspired by the ancient Greek poem detailing the Trojan War exploits of unseen warrior king Odysseus and his subsequent decades-long journey home to his wife and his kingdom.

Longtime Boston theatergoers may remember that this isn’t the first musical with a plot centered on Odysseus and Penelope, awaiting his return to Ithaca. In 1975, Boston’s Colonial Theatre was a pre-Broadway tour stop for composer Mitch Leigh’s “Home Sweet Homer,” starring Yul Brynner and Joan Diener, which closed on Broadway after just 11 previews and its opening performance at the Palace Theatre in January 1976.

Composer, lyricist, book-writer, and arranger Alex Bechtel has so far fared much better with “Penelope” by narrowing in on the title character to craft a contemporary musical adaptation of “The Odyssey” from the perspective of Odysseus’ patiently waiting wife. Following its world premiere at Hudson Valley Shakespeare in 2023, the show had an extended run at Signature Theatre in Washington, D.C., in 2024 and productions at Theatre Horizon, the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, and Ancram Center for the Arts in 2025, and was presented in concert at Joe’s Pub at The Public Theatre in New York in 2024 and 2025.

Under Courtney O’Connor’s cleverly imagined direction, “Penelope” is served up cabaret-style – on scenic designer Janie E. Howland’s appealingly appointed oceanside Greek veranda set, atmospherically enhanced by lighting designer Karen Perlow – as a moving and funny love note about those who wait for someone they love and believe in, delivered with winning aplomb by the versatile Aimee Doherty, a two-time Elliot Norton Award and three-time IRNE winner, who has previously appeared at Lyric Stage in musicals including “Hello, Dolly!,” “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder,” “Into the Woods,” “On the Town,” and “Follies” in her first one-person show.

If the nearly sold-out crowd at one recent performance is any indication, the actor and singer can more than handle performing solo. To prove it, captivated her audience even when seated at an imaginary loom, miming weaving. And when Doherty sang of her character’s vast patience and enduring love, “I could wait for you forever, if you told me what forever was for,” she had the audience leaning in to miss not a word or emotional inflection.

As Penelope poured herself a scotch, and Doherty offered a glass to a front row patron, the show’s mood shifted into full gear with the sanguine protagonist giving us the backstory of Helen of Troy, known in Greek mythology as the face that launched a thousand ships, whose good looks led the Greek fleet to set sail for Troy, resulting in a ten-year war, and what it’s like for Penelope herself to have been all but abandoned while still young.

There are some murkier moments in “Penelope,” too, though, during which it’s tempting to let the mind wander to what Doherty might do next. While it could take a while for the rights to “Mamma Mia!” to be released, Doherty seems ready-made to one day play Donna Sheridan on a local stage, especially if Howland designs the Greek Island scenery.

For now, however, Doherty – who’s also appeared at the Huntington in “The Hills of California,” “Merrily We Roll Along,” “Sunday in the Park with George,” and “A Little Night Music,” and in other plays and musicals at SpeakEasy Stage Company, Central Square Theater, Gloucester Stage, and more – is center stage in “Penelope,” her first outing solo in the spotlight. Backing Doherty, effortlessly chic in a red jumpsuit, are music director and pianist Dan Rodriguez, violinist Marissa Licata, Ethan Wood on viola, Kett Lee on violoncello, and percussionist Josh Goldman, all superb on their respective instruments and sharp looking, too, in summery white attire by Costume Designer Mikayla Reid.

Doherty is most at home in musical theater, but here ventures beyond Jerry Herman and Stephen Sondheim to a broader array of musical realms – from pop to folk rock and rhythm and blues. While displaying this range will likely earn Doherty new fans, Penelope already has her share of admirers, “monsters” in her parlance. These numerous, all too ardent suitors are kept at bay, though, so that the faithful Penelope can spend her days alone with her weaving, and her nights unraveling her work.

“I can weave whatever I want, go wherever I want, as long as I never finish. And as long as I always come back,” she says.

The same might also be said of Doherty.

Photo caption: Aimee Doherty in a scene from the Lyric Stage Company of Boston’s production of “Penelope.” Photo by Nile Hawver of Nile Scott Shots.