Albert Gutierrez — Theater Critic

It’s in the theatre that one can best experience The Notebook. The stage version, moreso than the original novel or the popular 2004 film, best exemplifies why this story continues to endure across time and with audiences. It doesn’t seek to reinvent romance, nor is its depiction a perfectly sensible love story. Rather, it understands that so-very-human need to be remembered, to know that our choices matter, and to believe that our story was worth telling.

If it weren’t played out so damn well on the stage, I’d have walked out after Act One. But that’s the strange thing about Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. It’s not a great story by any stretch, but it’s still great theatre.

Musical theatre doesn’t always have to be jaw-droppingly amazing in its nuance and themes. It shouldn’t always be intellectually stimulating with richly developed characters conveying complex emotions through song. Sometimes, we just have to allow ourselves to sit back and indulge in the absurdity that’s unfolding on the stage.

One reason SHUCKED has been so well received is its masterful balance of tone. Don’t get me wrong, this musical is rife with corny jokes and clever puns and random, pithy asides up the wazoo. It’s an intentionally funny musical with jokes running a mile a minute. However, the knee-slapping comedy of this musical never comes with that wink and a nod that is a tired old sitcom’s bread and butter. The comedy comes mainly from every character playing the straight man. To them, in their world, and in the context of their conversations, nothing is funny. It’s high stakes drama, it’s soap operatic relationship twists, it’s heavy themes of how fear of change creates tradition. And yet, the libretto makes it hilarious. It’s up to the audience to decide what’s funny and what isn’t, not the characters on the stage. As a result, every winning line is earned because it’s not just done for a cheap joke and an easy laugh. The comedy helps serve the story as much as the songs do.

INTO THE WOODS deals with a variety of themes and issues within its packed storylines and dense cast of characters. Reluctant parenthood, loss of innocence, the dangers of wish fulfillment, infidelity and accidental death. All ripe for an episode of 'thirtysomething.' But the two most prevalent tales of INTO THE WOODS are a deconstruction of both The Hero’s Journey and The Heroine’s Journey. Through both the characters of Jack and Cinderella, we see how these models of storytelling unfold. Jack is our Hero of a Thousand Faces, a simple everyman who is plucked from his nowhere town to embark on a journey to a world and life that changes him, and he returns home a better man than he was before. Cinderella, our feminine Heroine, longs for what she believes may be a perfect world, discovers its reality is not what she wants, and re-invents herself to find the balance within that gives her true happiness.