By David Gordon
No, it's the other one! It's the original "Frankenstein," not "Young Frankenstein," the newest Mel Brooks musical. This is the "Frankenstein" which opened recently at the 37 Arts Theater, which harkens back to the source material-Mary Shelley's 1818 novel. The popular favorite of high school reading lists around the country, it's the "Frankenstein" that everyone knows and loves. And it's a musical. It's a dark, dreary musical written in the style of the Broadway composer everyone loves to hate, Frank Wildhorn.
"Frankenstein" the musical, is mostly faithful to Shelley's novel. Told through the flashbacks of Captain Robert Walton (a character who appears in the first and last minutes), the man who discovered Victor Frankenstein (Hunter Foster) near dead in the Arctic, the show retains the structure Shelley so desired, through letters from the various characters. Frankenstein's mother dies, so he goes from Geneva to Ingolstat to try and figure out how to reanimate dead bodies. And he does, eventually creating the Creature (Steve Blanchard), with disastrous results.
It's as serious a musical as they come, and therein lies the problem. It takes itself too seriously. This is a "Frankenstein" minus the horror of all the movies, the Gothic suspense of the novel and a green Creature with bolts through his neck. Blanchard, last seen under twenty pounds of prosthetics as the Beast (of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast") is a lumbering, grunting Elephant Man. His tattooed Creature on steroids, in leather pants and an open leather jacket, looks like he spent a few hours too many at the gym. One wouldn't want to run into him in a dark alley-or the ice caps of the Arctic.
Yet despite the all the time-traveling and location jumping, the musical, by Jeffrey Jackson (book and lyrics), Mark Baron (music), Gary Cohen (original adaptation) and Bill Fennelly (direction) goes absolutely nowhere. What could be a compelling piece is bogged down by a holey plot, a ballad-heavy, uneven score, dreadfully slow pacing and heavy handed direction.
Though the cast tries their hardest, this is one musical they cannot reanimate. With shows like "Urinetown" and "The Producers" under his belt, Hunter Foster has proved himself to be Broadway's go-to guy for musical comedy. Yet his dynamic tenor is wasted, his usual presence and flair absent.
The bare-bones staging works for the most part. Thom Weaver's dark and gloomy lighting sits well on Kevin Judge's set of multiple metallic staircases. Michael Clark provides set projections, from polar ice caps to Gothic mansions, but they look like something out of "The Sims."
Yet there are some redeeming factors, mainly the performances of Christiane Noll as Elizabeth, Victor's fiancee, and Mandy Bruno as Justine, the governess who is hanged for the murderous rampage of the Creature. Unfortunately, they alone are not enough to warrant a full-fledged recommendation. Perhaps one should check out the other "Frankenstein."
Hunter Foster plays the infamous role of Victor Frankenstein, the man who succeeds in figuring out how to reanimate dead bodies and creates the Creature (Steve Blanchard). However, both fail in the attempt to reanimate the musical, currently playing off-Broadway. (frankensteinthemusical.com)