Once is the acclaimed new musical based on the Academy Award-winning film. Authentic, funny and refreshingly unique, Once tells the story of an Irish musician and a Czech immigrant drawn together by their shared love of music. Over the course of one fateful week, their unexpected friendship and collaboration evolves into a powerful but complicated romance, heightened by the raw emotion of the songs they create together. Featuring an ensemble cast of gifted actor/musicians, helmed by the creators of the theatrical sensation Black Watch and fashioned by a team of Tony-winning designers, Once is a musical celebration of life and love: thrilling in its originality, daring in its honesty... and unforgettable in every way.
Pure, moving and inventive – these are the foundations of the irresistible production that opened Sunday, and it is a study in how to beautifully adapt a movie to the stage. In many ways, in fact, this Once is better than the original Once.
Once stays homey, charming, and inviting; on a smaller scale than usual for a Broadway musical, which turns out to be a good thing. It is also slow moving and slight. It requires patience, or at least the right mind-set, to fall for this show (Falling slowly, indeed.) The musical is an hour longer than the movie. But even with John Carney’s movie script adapted by a first-rate playwright, Enda Walsh (whose most recent play produced in New York was the eerie Misterman), the story in Once the musical is only a bit less sketchy than the film.
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