We round up the reviews for the new musical based on SE Hinton’s novel (later adapted into a film by Francis Ford Coppola) now playing on Broadway.
The Guardian: *** “The Broadway musical version, with a book by Adam Rapp and Justin Levine, tries very earnestly to tap the vein of uncut yearning and pent-up frustration, with a light touch of Americana sound and a heavy emphasis on small-town dreams. Everyone involved, including executive producer Angelina Jolie, seems to be approaching the project in good faith to the legacy of the original (and Francis Ford Coppola’s 1983 film), with genuine curiosity in wringing something new (and lyrical) out of these repressed teenagers and now old-timey slang.”
Variety: “There’s a baleful, country sound to the score, by the folk duo Jamestown Revival (Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance) and Levine (who is also credited with music supervision, orchestration and arrangements) suited to the Oklahoma setting and an aching desire to escape it.”
New York Post: “But the shrewdness of director Danya Taymor’s production starts with how brilliantly cast it is, from top to bottom. By the end of the opening song, called “Tulsa ’67,” we have somehow already met and grown inexplicably fond of every single Greaser.”
Time Out: *** “I suspect that a lot of people will like The Outsiders more than I did. But to me, its approach misses the central thrust of Hinton’s story. Her point was that kids who might be dismissed as juvenile delinquents are teenagers like any others, with complicated feelings and dreams. But in the musical, they mostly seem neither juvenile—Grant is a terrific singer, but he doesn’t sound remotely 14—nor delinquent. Rapp and Levine add cuss words to the dialogue, but otherwise their version scrubs the Greasers clean.”
Theatre Mania.com: “Not everything can be laid at the feet of the director. While there are some instant classics in the score (“Stay Gold” is particularly lovely), one can feel the composers working hard in lesser numbers (like “Friday at the Drive-In”) to blast through exposition and move the story forward using unmemorable vintage pop pastiche. They seem bored by the assignment, and consequently so are we.”
Exeunt NYC.com: “I really liked these individual creative choices (the lighting and sound design throughout were exquisite), but when the show falls more into traditional Broadway number territory, I wanted to throw something. Do we need a useless upbeat number about the drive-in? No. Do we really believe Cherry when she says her now-dead-ex was a good person inside. Why are you even telling me this? Socs are people too. But I’m not sure we need to “both sides” this.”
Entertainment Weekly: “But, where music fails, brilliant staging speaks. With every beating that Ponyboy takes — and, dang, does that poor boy take a walloping during the musical’s two hour runtime — sound and lighting designers Cody Spencer and Brian MacDevitt, respectively, ensure that theatergoers feel each and every punch through loud, ear-ringing white noise and blinding flashes of light.”
New York Theater.me: “In this new iteration of “The Outsiders,” then, the young cast shines as an ensemble, acting, singing and dancing their pants off – or anyway, their shirts off; as in the movie, there’s a pretend-casual display of beefcake.”
Stage and Cinema.com: “The music and lyrics by Jamestown Revival (Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance) and Levine (who is also music supervisor and orchestrator) offer a different sound from other Broadway musicals. The score — made up of American roots music — is filled with heartfelt ballads and duets, often accompanied by guitar. There are memorable company numbers too, my favorite being the glorious “Great Expectations.” When Ponyboy expresses in song what he’ll bring to being a future writer (“And in his memory, I’ll stay gold”) it also speaks for the creative team and performers, as this production is pure theatrical gold.”
Theatrely.com: “What makes The Outsiders so brilliant is director Danya Taymor at the helm of the ship. Her swift yet intuitive direction is stunning and the team she has surrounded herself with both onstage and behind the curtain is a match made in heaven. Taymor’s ability to hone her storytelling while marrying it with a contemporary theatre gaze is a pure delight on stage, and we should be so lucky to experience whatever she cooks up next.”
To find out more about the production visit: https://outsidersmusical.com/
