HISTORY LOVES COMPANY
Drummond: Listen to this: Genesis 4-16. “And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the East of Eden. And Cain knew his wife”! Where the hell did she come from?
Avi aside, History Loves Company is about the anonymous nobodies who never got their names in the Bible. “We’re not the movers and the shakers of the world,” says one. “We’re the moved and the shaken.” Arielle and her clan–led by an assertive fellow named Romer, who claims to be on good personal terms with the clan god, a tree branch called Akhna–wander around on the outskirts of biblical history, surviving floods, droughts, earthquakes, a stint of slavery in Egypt, and lots of other misfortunes before finally making their way to the edge of some promised land or other. There they pause, encouraging their grown-up children to cross the next river while they settle into their golden years to enjoy the inner peace they’ve finally achieved.
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Thomas M. Ryan’s turntable set is desert-simple except for the Egyptian-tomb scene–the better to show off Nancy Missimi’s splendid costumes, which trace the characters’ improving lot over the centuries. Yeston’s songs, bright and enjoyable if generally forgettable, are given superb energy and gloss in David Siegel’s arrangements and Jeff Lewis’s musical direction. But–ironically for a show based on the Bible–what History Loves Company sorely lacks right now is a good book.
Jamie Dawn Gangi as Christine, baritone Larry Adams as the Phantom, Stephen R. Buntrock as Raoul (Christine’s suitor, virtually forgotten by the end of the show), and Kathy Taylor as the opera-house caretaker Madame Giry sing splendidly, and the ensemble sound glows in Sivak’s gorgeous duets, trios, and choruses. But dramatically, Phantom did what I never thought anything or anyone could do: make me wish I was listening to Andrew Lloyd Webber.
