Review: THE FANTASTICKS at Music Theater Heritage

Now “playing” at Music Theater Heritage inside Crown Center  is the latest iteration of the most produced musical play in history. It is called “The Fantasticks.” 

If “Fantasticks” is new to you, you are past due for a treat.  This particular production is among the most outstanding interpretations of a remarkable play available anywhere.   

If you are one of the thousands of performers who have played these parts over years or  an audience member at any one of the many productions, you will enjoy the pleasure of revisiting an old friend.   

Some musicals dazzle you with hydraulics, chandeliers, and an orchestra the size of small army. “The Fantasticks” offers a spare set, eight actors, a balloon moon,  and an upright piano.  

The MTH production of “Fantasticks” stars renowned Flamenco guitarist and actor Nilko Andreas in the dual role of the narrator and “El Gallo.” Nilko is outstanding as El Gallo.  His guitar musicianship adds a valuable third member to the musical ensemble.  It is something I have never seen approached in this way in any other production.

If any one song lingers from “Fantasticks,” its is El Gallo’s “Try to Remember.” 

If any show is indestructible, this one is it. I have always thought of "The Fantasticks” as a lyric poem with music.  It remains such but the exceptional casting of all of these actors gives the show another whole dimension.

At the risk of jumping “El Gallo’s” lines, There are a few things I need to explain before the lights can come up and the overture can play.  

“Fantasticks” is the story of a boy (Matt), a girl (Louisa), their two fathers (Huckabee and Bellamy), and a wall.   The boy and girl are young adults passing from their teenage years.  Matt and Louisa in this production appear to be exactly at this point in their life. 

Matt is sung by Aidan Sarmiento.   Louisa is sung by Daniela Rodriguez Del Bosque. Both are super in their roles.  Both have been able to find nuances that have escaped older actors (including me). 

The two fathers in this piece are very good friends who would like their children to share a life together. Our two fathers are part of the comic relief of the show. They are Tim Noland (Hucklebee) and Richard Harris (Belamy).  

Kids being kids act rebelliously. 

Fathers being Fathers foolishly choose to fake a feud and trick the boy and girl into falling in love.  Enter the reason for the wall.

The Fathers hire a bandit to abduct the girl and conspire for the boy to save her. 

That should be all you need to know.  Anything additional, any of the actors might need resides in an old trunk found onstage.   

Supporting characters provide the show’s sly humor. The two fathers—comic conspirators more vaudeville than villain—deliver their scenes with nimble timing and affectionate absurdity.

Meanwhile, a traveling actor Henry (Ron McGee) and his sidekick Mortimer (Joshua Gleeson) inject a dash of theatrical parody, skewering melodrama while simultaneously indulging it.  They add an hysterical side note to a slyly humorous tale. The Mute (Damian Blake) is, well, mute, but he manages to inhabit the character more than fully without uttering a sound.

The original off-Broadway “The Fantasticks” set cost only $900 to get ready in the tiny Sullivan Street Theater. It ran continuously from 1960 until 2002, and was performed in that venue 17,162 times, and in an average of 250 additional theaters each year worldwide. 

“Fantasticks” was then revived in 2006 in a theater named for the original “El Gallo,” Jerry Orbach and continued it there until 2017 (an additional ten years). 

Our Musical Director is Ty Tuttle.  The director of this production is Emily Shackelford.  I suspect that Emily is the source for this entirely new take on this old favorite.

The last time I saw “The Fantasticks” Louisa was played by one Emily Shackelford at the Kansas City Repertory Theatre.  Emily has evidently been inside this musical fable ever since and in a very good way.  She has mined details and nuances inside the show in ways I have not seen before. The attention to detail at the second and third levels to the main action is remarkable. “The Fantasticks” has this way of worming its way into your consciousness and it stays with you.

I first saw "Fantasticks" in 1963 and have seen dozens of performances since.

“The Fantasticks” has something that many larger shows never achieve: that is intimacy, warmth, and the quiet sense that the story unfolding belongs partly to you. At just over two hours with intermission, it feels almost ephemeral, like a bedtime story told and gone by morning. Yet that transience is also its strength.

In an era of LED backdrops and million-dollar sets, "The Fantasticks" feels almost radical in its simplicity. It whispers where others shout. And somehow, the whisper carries further.

Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt’s deceptively modest fable remains a small miracle of economy. The miracle is treated with care rather than clutter, allowing the show’s handmade theatricality—and its surprisingly mature emotional undercurrents—to shine.

Moonlight, make-believe, the price to be paid for growing up allows for"The Fantasticks" to prove itself once again timeless after some sixty-sixty years from the originia production..

“The Fantasticks” can be seen at Music Theater Heritage inside Crown Center through February 22,  Tickets are available online at www.musictheaterheritage.com or by telephone at 816.221.6987. I fully recommend you enjoy this exceptional, new rendering of a Music Theater classic.