In The Rocky Horror Picture Show, the otherworldly Frank-N-Furter famously proclaimed that, “In just seven days, I can make you a man!” Naturally, despite the wishes of many an angst-filled youth, this song lyric finds little correlation with reality. In the award winning Falsettos, currently being presented via a Court and Timeline Theatre co-production, lyricist-composer William Finn and co-book writer James Lapine show just how difficult the road to adulthood really is.
Thus, this merging of “March of the Falsettos” and “Falsettoland,” two well received one-acts, juxtaposes the tangled sexual revolution of Marvin (Stephen Schellhardt) with his son Jason’s (Charlie Long on opening night) awkward path to his bar mitzvah. Of course, Jason’s journey is complicated somewhat by personal matters. Marvin has left his wife Trina (Sarah Bockel) for a vibrant young man named Whizzer (Jack Ball). Trina, meanwhile, eventually becomes involved with Mendel (Jackson Evans), Marvin’s therapist. Both occurrences, naturally, give the shell-shocked youngster much to grapple with.
Finn’s musical score, which comprises all of the show’s major dialogue, matches these plot circumstances with songs that brim with heartache, humor and beauty. Musical theater magnificence is found in “I’m Breaking Down,” Trina’s hysterical lament over losing Marvin as she, confusedly, begins reaching out to Mendel. Bockel triumphs in this moment, providing standing ovation-worthy excellence.
In the other direction, the exquisitely questioning “What More Can I Say?” and “What Would I Do?” emerge as two of the most potent love songs ever written. Other numbers succinctly convey the confusion and hope that Marvin and Jason feel as they stumble their way into their own versions of true adulthood and discover what being part of a family really means.
Inspired by this musical creativity, director Nick Bowling creates brightly and with a full-rounded joy here. Even when the show’s 1981-based second act reaches heavy algorithms as (the then unnamed) AIDS virus rears its murderous head, Bowling finds ways to puncture the light with dark. Finn even assists in this by introducing Charlotte and Cordelia (Sharriese Hamilton and Elizabeth Stenholt), a cute and happily committed lesbian couple, into the mix.
With a helpful perk from Amel Sancianco’s character-specific costuming, the cast as a whole magically embellishes all that Finn and Bowling have offered them here. Schellhardt, a venerated Chicago theater mainstay, reaches career heights, displaying all of Marvin’s honest yearning and occasional selfishness with articulation and grace. He is met, full force, by Ball, who provides Whizzer with an impishly warm glow. Long’s Jason is also a spectacular feat, combining age-specific clumsiness with a strong professional presence. Supporting them, all the others shine as well. Ultimately venerating the show’s theme, they offer proof that the familial, in all its messy gloriousness, can be life’s greatest reward.
Falsettos runs through Dec. 8 at The Court Theatre, 5535 S. Ellis Ave. More information is available at www.courttheatre.org.