Review: North Carolina Theatre's BEAUTIFUL: THE CAROLE KING MUSICAL

Beautiful tells the inspiring true story of Carole King when she was starting out as a teenage songwriter at 1650 Broadway in the 1960s. Back then, she was writing songs in collaboration with her husband at the time, Gerry Goffin, for so many different musical acts such as Bobby Vee, The Drifters, The Shirelles, Little Eva, The Chiffons, The Beatles, and The Monkees. That was all before she went on to become one of the most successful singer-songwriters in music history.

About 8 years ago, I reviewed the national tour of this Tony & Grammy-winning hit when it played at the Durham Performing Arts Center. Since then, the Broadway production continued a successful run at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre until it closed on October 27th, 2019 after 2,416 performances. Meanwhile, the tour kept going until its final stop in Vienna, Virginia on June 22nd, 2022. Now, Beautiful: The Carole King Musical is available for licensing to schools, community, and regional theatres all over the world.

As for North Carolina Theatre’s production, director/choreographer Parker Esse provides some slick musical numbers while also being very suggestive in his staging of the book scenes. Speaking of which, the book by the late Douglas McGrath has a great throughline that explores Carole King’s humble beginnings, her relationship with Gerry Goffin, and how she became the successful singer/songwriter she is today. Not to mention that McGrath also crafted several clever expositional lines of dialogue. For all the terrific entertainment and humor there is in the show, the second act is also more heartfelt.

Everyone in the cast literally brings the house down. Elena Ricardo is perfectly unique, funny, and vulnerable as Carole King. She nails the incredible character arc, going from an aspiring songwriter to a reluctant singer to a global superstar. Not to mention that when it comes to the singing, she captures the essence of how the real Carole King sounds while also bringing her own voice to the proceedings. Tim Rogan gives a wonderfully complex performance as Gerry Goffin, Carole’s first songwriting partner and husband who on the inside is conflicted and tortured with his emotions. Nick Moulton and Kate Loprest both make for a memorable duo as fellow songwriting team and couple as Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, respectively. Moulton in particular is perfectly neurotic while Loprest is perfectly sarcastic and funny. Other highlights of the cast are Noah Weisberg as music publisher and producer Don Kirshner and Cheryl Allison as Carole’s mom, Genie Klein.

Baby boomers should easily know every single song in this musical. Meanwhile, younger audiences should still get a kick out of each and every single one of them. Although please don’t read the song list in your playbills. It’s better to be surprised while watching the show. Nonetheless, North Carolina Theatre’s production of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical proves to be a really good time.

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This production is currently playing at Raleigh Memorial Auditorium, which is located inside the Martin Marietta Center for the Performing Arts, through October 15th. For more information, please visit: https://nctheatre.com/event/event-beautiful-the-carole-king-musical/

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