BWW Reviews: BLOODY BLOODY ANDREW JACKSON at University At Albany

Audiences expecting a historic, telling musical of our seventh president of these United States, Andrew Jackson, are in for quite a surprise. The show, which prefaces that it is not historically accurate, is an emo and rock filled tale of Jackson, the formation of the Democratic Party, and his torture and removal of Native Americans. The musical uses extreme irony to expose the faults of our nation's history and leaders, a topic that is very relevant in the today's news.

BLOODY BLOODY ANDREW JACKSON originally opened on Broadway in 2010 with Benjamin Walker in the title role. The score is written by Michael Friedman with a book by its director, Alex Timbers. The musical played 120 performances at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre before shuttering on the Great White Way due to poor performance at the box office.

This college production, directed by Chad Larabee, opened Wednesday at the UAlbany Performing Arts Center in Albany, New York. At the helm of the production is Alec Lewis as Jackson himself, fitting the rock star role quite well and delivering a moving performance, specifically towards the end of the show, as Jackson loses his wife and begins to face difficult presidential decisions.

The cast of the show is quite small, composed of solely fourteen actors. Standouts included Johan Buchen as James Monroe, a powerful actor who grasped the attention of the audience each time he spoke. Kaelyn Wood, as Soloist #2, delivered a truly powerful performance with "Second Nature," as photos of different equality movements appeared on a projection screen, depicting to the audience how the shows message stands firmly nowadays.

The set design by Andi Lyons, along with the costume design by Anne Croteau, is very well done, transporting us to a Wild West scene mixed with some hardcore rockers.

The true star of the show, however, was Ellen Liebenthal in the role of the Storyteller. Her comedic genius and uplifting energy left the audience full of laughter each time she appeared onstage. Quite unfortunate, however, that she was killed off very soon in the show, as her energy could have tremendously helped the rest of the production.

Maybe it was because it was opening night, or maybe it was because most of the performers were not theater majors, but something lacked in the production, often feeling flat and unentertaining. Many jokes felt too forced, attempting any way possible to get the audience to interact and provide the energy that the show desperately craved.

Most of the problems lay in the book of the musical, written by Alex Timbers. Characters remained very under developed, particularly Rachel, Jackson's wife, played here by Caity Gallagher. Rachel was introduced with fairly no back story and by the time she died of grief towards the end of the show, we had already forgotten her name.

The overall mood of the production, which includes no intermission, changed drastically at one point, going from a comedic story to an intense, dramatic tale of the forced exodus of Indians to the west. This left the audience unsure whether to laugh or feel moved, adding to the overall confusion of the piece. Though the book was intended to satirize how corrupt and mixed-up our nation's government was, and still is, too much effort was placed on getting a laugh than delivering the message.

While the production offered many stand out moments and provided an interesting take on Andrew Jackson and our nation's history, it overall ran dry, feeling forced and under developed. Perhaps if the actors had taken more time to truly develop their characters and understand the purpose of why they were placed onstage, the production's message would have been better portrayed. Unfortunately, the low energy of the musical, along with the forced jabs at humor, overshadowed the satirical, political statements trying to be so desperately addressed.

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