The thing about vampires is that they’re so entrancing and beguiling that they distract you from the truth. But even they can’t hide their undead nature forever, particularly if you spend time with them.
And so it is with The Lost Boys. It dazzles with set and immaculate beams of light cutting through so much theatrical haze that it makes the Phantom of the Opera’s subterranean lair seem like somebody merely just lit a cigarette. The performances are all to a person incredibly strong- the vocals are their own special effect. The opening twenty minutes are an incredible feat of theatrical storytelling.
And then at some point, I thought to myself, “here’s another ballad sung in a perfectly framed beam of light” and “these lyrics aren’t saying anything,” and, eventually, “why is any of this happening?” It all felt like sleight of hand to distract from the fact that this is a very thin show. And then act two just confirmed it: it rushes like it’s trying to get the union musicians home before they’re owed overtime. We also start getting distractingly campy ensemble choices- Draculas wearing sunglasses and dancing Elviras, a rainbow banner of generic superheroes, a phalanx of knockoff Rambos. These are all suggested to be from the mind of our young, comic book-obsessed vampire hunters, but that’s never really set up as a device and they distract from the midtempo ballads they’re unleashed on. It feels like Michael Arden and co realize that the audience won’t be distracted by spinning plates forever and so they feel the need to start juggling.
The final confrontation has some neat tricks but ultimately is so anticlimactic that it feels like they blew the budget before they finished devising ways to finish killing off the undead.
It’s ultimately all veneering around material that is simply very middling. It’s not particularly even bad. It’s just fine. There are good individual songs, but the score ultimately just starts feeling monotonous. The book is extremely thin (there are several sizable stretches that are mostly all song with few spoken lines). There’s obvious push on the lyrics to carry exposition and motivation, but they’re mostly just poetic vibes and so we’re left with the barest whisp of things to go on.
The set is a three-level unit set that’s transformed by smaller set pieces and lighting. It is far more convincing as an abandoned ironworks than it is a boardwalk or anything else, though.
As I said, the performances are all really strong. Ali Louis Bourzgui is incredibly and effortlessly compelling. Shoshana Bean indeed makes breakfast and dinner. She’s wonderful and sounds phenomenal, as always.
so yeah. It’s a mixed bag. It’s not a disaster, it’s not even bad. It’s just doing so much that I feel exhausted.
The show is long. It started about 8:10 and, booking it out of the theater, I was on the street at 10:58. No tech holds or issues (aside from a very loud audio pop in act two that visibly startled Shoshana Bean and seemed to throw her off in that scene).
Also worth noting that I got to the Palace at 7:45 and it took about ten minutes just to get into the theater, through that godawful bottlenecked lobby, and into my seat.
"...everyone finally shut up, and the audience could enjoy the beginning of the Anatevka Pogram in peace."
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