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There
must be a show biz adage about a show being
only as good as its source material.
Something akin to the Swiftian aphorism
about making a silk purse out of a sow’s
ear, perhaps. Which in the case of Coram
Boy, now playing its final weekend in New
York, means that the silk purse is the
technical production, while the sow’s ear is
the young adult novel on which the show is
based.
Perhaps you had to read the book—at
fourteen. Or still be in a case of arrested
adolescence. To hear the actors exhume their
lines (such chestnuts as “Don’t worry,
Mother. I’m here now,” and “Mother, he’s not
interested in me. And besides, he’s
arrogant!”) is to feel the Babysitters Club
has come to life—LIVE! ONSTAGE! The London
Chapter of the Babysitters Club Acting Out
18th-Century Teenage Angst. And indeed, the
audience was filled with secondary school
student groups—and their long-suffering
teachers. Good for all of them. There’s a
need for the inculcation of theatergoing
habits. And, indeed, as evinced by their
enthusiasm throughout the show, and
particularly at show’s end, when, yes,
Handel’s Messiah was sung by the entire
cast, Coram Boy does a fine job of inspiring
a new generation of theatre aficionados.
For those of us no longer fourteen, however,
Coram Boy requires a huge leap of faith.
Perhaps earplugs might have helped—for
visually, the show is quite stunning. The
lighting is evocative, and along with the
sets and costumes, 18th-century England is
recreated with boldly dramatic strokes. A
pipe organ hovers above the stage, flanked
by a chorus of twenty—and Handel’s music
punctuates the Dickensian drama unfolding
below. Mistaken identity, village idiots,
orphans and villains, nasty maids and absent
fathers, along with teenage pregnancy and
baby skeletons—it’s all here, fodder to keep
the interest of today’s WiFi youth.
But, alas, for those of us taken by the
graphic ad in the show’s advertising
campaign—a child with his arms outstretched,
his mouth open in awe, as an angel gazes
downward—there’s little in Coram Boy which
delivers on that promise of transcendence.
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