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    Review: In ‘The Gospel According to Heather,’ the Messiah Has Homeroom

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    A lonely high school student discovers she may be a divine messenger in Paul Gordon’s half-baked new Off Broadway musical.“Do you like Kierkegaard?” As flirtatious chit-chat goes, this one sets 17-year-old Heather (Brittany Nicole Williams) apart. You can also see why the jock she’s asking (Carlos Alcala) just walks away. Sadly, this is par for the course for Heather, a pescatarian brainiac who is ostracized by classmates at her Ohio high school for being a “freak,” and quietly stifled at home by a loving but clueless widowed mother (Lauren Elder).How our heroine suddenly gains popularity is at the heart of “The Gospel According to Heather,” a musical by Paul Gordon (“Jane Eyre,” the Off Broadway success “Daddy Long Legs”) that recently opened at Theater 555 in an Amas Musical Theater production directed and choreographed by Rachel Klein (“Red Roses, Green Gold”).The title gives an inkling as to what suddenly improves Heather’s standing: She is revealed as a Messenger, with the disciples and the powers that go with the role. As it turns out, understanding 19th-century Danish philosophers is not the only miracle Heather is capable of. She can also heal the severely injured and bring the occasional hamster back to life. The presence in the cast of Katey Sagal (“The Conners,” “Sons of Anarchy”), the veteran TV actress, almost qualifies as another of those unaccountable surprises.Sagal plays Agatha, a sarcastic woman who uses a wheelchair and whom Heather likes to visit at a senior center. Sagal makes the most of a handful of lines, and then becomes the center of a major 11th-hour twist.Heather’s elevated status leads to new headaches, and she can’t decide if she wants to be an anonymous normie or if the change might have rewarding aspects — the show uneasily tries to navigate satire (of conservative fearmongers), whimsy (those crazy teens!) and spirituality (there is more to the show than a Messenger).What is certain is that Heather is attracting attention from friends and foes alike. The populist podcast host Booker (Jeremy Kushnier) definitely belongs to the foes camp, but it’s unclear at first where the strapping Zach (Carson Stewart) lands.It was probably not a great idea for Gordon to name his main character in a way that triggers memories of the cult movie “Heathers” and its extremely fun musical adaptation from 2014 — especially since like this show, they center on a bright, alienated Ohio girl who falls for a mysterious boy who tends to enter her bedroom through the window. This is not a comparison this show should encourage.The book lacks coherence, but Gordon’s score is frustrating for a different reason: It actually has potential. The production kicks off brightly with “My Name Is Heather Krebs,” a jaunty tune with a couple of solid melodic hooks that suggests there might be more nuggets to come; alas, too many of the numbers sound tacked on or unfinished. If only a teenage Midwestern messiah could come to the rescue.The Gospel According to HeatherThrough July 16 at Theater 555, Manhattan; amasmusical.org. Running time: 1 hour 40 minutes. More

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      Review: In ‘Romeo & Bernadette,’ It’s Off to Brooklyn for This Tale of Joy

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      In this sweet, spoofy romp of a musical comedy, Romeo awakens from a 400-year slumber and follows a Juliet look-alike to Brooklyn.Cutting a lovelorn swath through 1960 Brooklyn in search of his Juliet, Romeo Montague is as charming as ever, with his courtly manner and his embroidered speech so different from the local patois.He didn’t die at the end of Shakespeare’s play after all; he was merely asleep for 400 years. In “Romeo & Bernadette,” Mark Saltzman’s sweet, spoofy romp of a musical comedy, Romeo (Nikita Burshteyn) awakes in modern fair Verona and spies a young woman who is the very image of his lost sweetheart.She is not Juliet Capulet but rather Bernadette Penza (Anna Kostakis), a tough-as-nails Italian American vacationing with her parents. He pursues her, she rebuffs him, he threatens to throw himself off a bridge — always so dramatic, our Romeo — and she stops him by agreeing that she is, in fact, Juliet. When she flies home to Brooklyn, and to her thuggish fiancé (Zach Schanne), Romeo follows.In this fish-out-of-water romantic fantasy, money and passports prove no obstacle to a guy from the 1500s, though some of Romeo’s old troubles pop up in 20th-century guises. His new best friend, Dino (Michael Notardonato), is the son of a mafia don (Michael Marotta) — and all three of them get caught in a clash with another mob boss, Bernadette’s father (Carlos Lopez).“Again my love suffers in a war between two families!” Romeo laments, but this time he is intent on a happy resolution.Directed and choreographed by Justin Ross Cohen at Theater 555, and presented by Eric Krebs in association with Amas Musical Theater, this is a first-rate production of a show that could easily teeter on the edge of cheesy. It delights in cartoon mobsters and cares not a whit for hipness — unlike, say, “& Juliet,” the West End jukebox musical that imagines a different fate for Romeo’s beloved, or “Fat Ham,” James Ijames’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Hamlet” reclamation at the Public Theater, both of which have a much higher glamour quotient.With “music adapted from classic Italian melodies,” as the program credit puts it (many of the tunes are by Francesco Paolo Tosti; music direction is by Aaron Gandy), and witty period costumes (by Joseph Shrope), “Romeo & Bernadette” feels fond, familiar, escapist: theater as merry comfort food. The appeal of that — especially in this time of relentlessly dire headlines — is not to be underestimated.The one real clunk in the works is the framing device. The musical begins at a Brooklyn Community Players performance of “Romeo and Juliet,” whose corpse-strewn ending leaves an English major (Ari Raskin) in tears and her uncultured date (Notardonato) worried that his chance of scoring with her is doomed. So he spins the tale of “Romeo & Bernadette” as the story of “the real Romeo.” His inventiveness might come off as more plausible, and less mansplainy, if we hadn’t seen him barely paying attention to the play.Still, inside the story he weaves, Burshteyn makes Romeo an absolute darling, with an ingenuousness that parents swoon over. It is no spoiler to say that Bernadette eventually recognizes him as a gentler version of a man than her violent fiancé will ever be.The protean Troy Valjean Rucker is a standout in multiple roles, including a florist who delivers a rib-tickling Shakespeare pun. Judy McLane brings depth to the role of Camille, Bernadette’s mother, who yearns for the glory of her distinguished ancestry and, in the show’s most realistic scene, warns her daughter of the danger of committing to mafia life. The fine cast is rounded out by Viet Vo as Lips, the Penzas’ bodyguard.Street violence, men and boys killing one another — these things are part of “Romeo and Juliet.” But in ancient Verona, knives are the weapons of choice. “Romeo & Bernadette” is not “West Side Story,” with carnage on the stage; there are no deaths, and goodness wins. But there are guns and the sound of gunfire, which is when you may feel brutal reality intrude.Welcome to America, Romeo.Romeo & Bernadette: A Musical Tale of Verona & BrooklynThrough June 26 at Theater 555, Manhattan; romeoandbernadette.com. Running time: 2 hours. More

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      5 Things to Do This Christmas Weekend

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Best of 2020Best ComedyBest TV ShowsBest BooksBest MoviesBest AlbumsAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyweekend roundup5 Things to Do This Christmas WeekendOur critics and writers have selected noteworthy cultural events to experience virtually.Dec. 24, 2020, 11:03 a.m. ETTheaterLet Them Entertain You, Pandemic-StyleTelly Leung, with Joe Goodrich on piano, in a number from “Sondheim Unplugged,” which premieres on Saturday.Credit…Ordinary SundayIn the fantasy version of a December evening, we would sweep in off West 54th Street, down the staircase and into the cozy, enveloping glamour that always makes Feinstein’s/54 Below feel like it’s ready for its close-up. We would slide into a booth and order a little something lovely. Then the long-running cabaret series “Sondheim Unplugged” would begin — one more shimmering perk to spending the holidays in New York.Happily, the pandemic version of “Sondheim Unplugged” is quite nice, too: elegant, consoling, peppered with deadpan humor. Shot on five cameras and streaming on Saturday at 8 p.m. Eastern time (and then available on demand from Sunday to Jan. 9), it’s an hour of Sondheim hits and obscurities, sung by Broadway performers, with only piano for accompaniment. High points include Telly Leung’s heartstring-plucking “Being Alive,” Lucia Spina’s seethingly angry “Could I Leave You?” and T. Oliver Reid’s exquisitely regretful “Good Thing Going.” Tickets to access the performance are $25 at 54below.com. Pour a glass of something bubbly and enjoy.LAURA COLLINS-HUGHESDanceEnding 2020 CalmlyA scene from Jordan Demetrius Lloyd’s film “The Last Moon in Mellowland,” which is streaming until Dec. 31.Credit…Jordan Demetrius LloydIf you need a respite from holiday activities, or some space to reflect on the past year, consider spending time with Jordan Demetrius Lloyd’s dreamy, entrancing short film “The Last Moon in Mellowland.” Lloyd, a Brooklyn-based dance artist, transitioned into making work for the screen when theaters shut down in March. Part of Issue Project Room’s “soft bodies in hard places,” a series organized by the curator Benedict Nguyen and timed to planetary events (like a new moon or a solstice), “Mellowland” draws the viewer into a 20-minute meditation that loosely traces the arc of a day. Lloyd describes this world as a place that “viewers already remember,” and there is a calming familiarity in its rhythms and repetitions, as the camera rests on a spinning ceiling fan or two dancers at the ocean’s edge.With performances by Lloyd, Breeanah Breeden, Ariana Speight and Demetries Morrow, and dramaturgy by Stephanie George, the film, which was released in November, is available free through Dec. 31 at issueprojectroom.org/event/last-moon-mellowland.SIOBHAN BURKEGospelAn Empty Hall Full of SpiritThe Harlem Gospel Choir will perform a livestream from Sony Hall on Friday.Credit…Simone di LucaOn the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday next month, the Harlem Gospel Choir will celebrate 35 years as one of the country’s leading contemporary gospel groups, and a globally recognized ambassador for the genre. During any normal year the choir would do a world tour at least once, and whenever it wasn’t on the road, the group would play a Sunday brunch each week at Sony Hall near Times Square, joined by a full band, bringing the sounds of praise to a mix of devotees and tourists.The group will return to (an empty) Sony Hall on Friday for the first time since March, for a special Christmas Day performance at 5 p.m. Eastern time, doing its part to sustain the spirit of communion at a social distance. Tickets to view the livestream cost $25 and can be purchased at sonyhall.com. Archived video of the performance will remain available to ticket holders through Jan. 1.GIOVANNI RUSSONELLOKIDSShe’s Got the BeatClockwise from top left, Emily Lang, Alexis Aguiar, Cassandra Barckett, Brian Criado, Lexy Piton and Jamiel Tako L. Burkhart in the Amas Musical Theater production of “Hip Hop Cinderella,” which is available on demand until Jan. 31.Credit…Jim RussekForget magic and fairy godmothers. The title character of “Hip Hop Cinderella” needs rap and rocket science.Charmingly played by Alexis Aguiar, she masters both in this 35-minute space-age adaptation, which streams on demand on Stellar through Jan. 31. (Tickets are $15-$25.) Presented by Amas Musical Theater in association with HipHopMusicals.com, the show still pits Cinderella against a scheming stepmother (Lexy Piton) and stepsisters (Cassandra Barckett and Emily Lang), but the prize isn’t a royal marriage. Instead, a prince (Jamiel Tako L. Burkhart) intends to crown the winner of a hip-hop ball and rap contest. With the help of her loyal robot (Brian Criado), Cinderella, a.k.a. Ella C, just might get the galaxy’s groove back.Conceived by Linda Chichester and David Coffman and directed by Christopher Scott, this production incorporates clever graphics and even a little space shuttle footage. The show, which features a book by Scott Elmegreen and music and lyrics by Rona Siddiqui, will also amuse adults when the stepmother makes a familiar-sounding complaint: “That competition was rigged!”LAUREL GRAEBERComedyThe Ultimate Kosher ChristmasJudy Gold will headline Kung Pao Kosher Comedy, which will livestream on Zoom and YouTube Live Friday through Saturday.Credit…M. Scott Brauer for The New York TimesFor the first time in its 28-year history, Kung Pao Kosher Comedy, a.k.a. “Jewish Comedy on Christmas in a Chinese Restaurant,” is online, which also means you needn’t go to San Francisco to enjoy the shows.The headliner is Judy Gold, who appears regularly on “The Drew Barrymore Show” and published a book this year, “Yes, I Can Say That: When They Come for the Comedians We Are All in Trouble.” Also performing is Alex Edelman, whose piece about attending a neo-Nazi meeting in New York, “Just for Us,” earned him a nomination for best show at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2018.Kung Pao Kosher Comedy’s founder, Lisa Geduldig, hosts the events, which air on Zoom and YouTube Live at 8 p.m. Eastern time on Thursday and Friday, and at 5 p.m. on Saturday. Tickets to access the broadcast are $25-$50 and available at cityboxoffice.com.SEAN L. McCARTHYAdvertisementContinue reading the main story More