The Mystery of Edwin Drood
Music, Lyrics, and Book by Rupert Holmes
Directed by Scott Ellis
Where: Studio 54, New York, NY
When: Saturday, December 29, 2pm
Back in lower and middle school I was fascinated with a series of books called "Choose Your Own Adventures." You'd get to the end of a page and have either two or three choices telling you to turn to a certain page, allowing you to determine the outcome of the book. The Mystery of Edwin Drood playing in Broadway's Studio 54 theater is a "Choose Your Own Adventure" brought to real life. Unfortunately, despite the amusing aspect of the audience being able to choose multiple facets of the story for the actors to perform on the spot, a musical without great music is a bit of a bummer and that's the case here.
Charles Dickens' last novel was a murder mystery revolving around the death of a man named Edwin Drood, but the author died before he was able to finish his work. The play's book writer Rupert Holmes took this concept of an unfinished novel and ran with it, creating a musical set in a late 19th century music hall in England with a troupe of actors taking on the roles. During Act I, we meet Edwin Drood (played by female Stephanie J. Block as the troupe didn't have enough talented males to take on the role presumably) and discover that multiple people have reason to kill him. As Act II rolls around, the play comes to a stop at the exact point that Mr. Dickens failed to pick up his pen again and the troupe turns to the audience to determine Drood's killer, the person who will take on the role of the detective who will solve the case, and two lovers (simply because all plays must end on an up note and what's more pleasant than love).
This audience participation aspect is admittedly enjoyable...but the rest of the show, not so much. I can deal with the notion that this being set in a rowdy 1895 London music hall and that the story would be told in a straight-foward, tongue-in-cheek, and comedic manner in order to appeal to the masses at that time. I totally understand that premise and can get behind that. The fault isn't in the story, but rather in the music. There's really not a memorable song among the bunch and the songs really do nothing to advance the plot. Actors aren't given "wow" moments, but they aren't given nice reflective moments either. With no showstoppers or purposeful plot-driven songs, the whole thing fell flat.
The actors were okay, but I think the play itself just fails them from being able to give memorable performances. I don't really know anything about her except that she's a "theater legend" for winning multiple Tonys, but it was nice to see nearly eighty year-old Chita Rivera onstage still performing her heart out eight shows a week. Will Chase, who recently appeared on NBC's Smash, probably had the best role in terms of making an impact by song and he can belt a tune quite well.
It certainly doesn't help that the sound system made some of the singing nearly indecipherable (although some of that fault lies with the performers as well, particularly Jessie Mueller who as the Egyptian Helena Landless was incomprehensible...which is why it was even more of a shame when she was voted the murderer by our audience). Still, The Mystery of Edwin Drood simply didn't work for me. It's been well-received in NYC getting some of the best reviews of the season, but it proved to be a disappointment.
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