Theater Review By Carole Di Tosti . . . .
Playwright David Adjmi (The Evildoers, Stunning and Other Plays), has struck platinum with his astounding Stereophonic, a hybrid comedy/drama/musical, currently running at Playwrights Horizons through December 17. With terrific original music and lyrics by Will Butler, Stereophonic is about a five-member rock band and studio engineers working at an accelerated pace to record an album at two California sound studios in the mid-1970s.
Will Butler, the Oscar-nominated and former member of the Grammy-winning indie rock band Arcade Fire, has written striking songs for Stereophonic, some which we never hear in their entirety. A few are soulful love ballads that reflect the emotional yearning of the band members. Others reference the hidden obstacles lurking around the corners of success, which challenge who the rockers are and who they intend to become in the masquerade of money, fame, and commercialism.
Finally, there are a few powerful songs that underscore the raw emotions of anger and hurt, stirred by betrayal and loss that couples Reg (Will Brill) and Holly (Juliana Canfield), and Peter (Tom Pecinka) and Diana (Sarah Pidgeon), experience in their relationships. Clearly, the stresses of working in close quarters to exceed the results of their previous album exact a personal toll. Even the laid-back drummer Simon (Chris Stack), faces the threat of divorce and losing his family. All sacrifice emotionally for their art. And some of them question whether the pain and suffering are worth it.
As the band collaborates to create a dynamite second album, company reports indicate they may be on the eve of a stratospheric success. Thus, tensions skyrocket under the pressure of “being the best,” which autocratic musician, vocalist and producer Peter insists upon. The closer they get to their goal, the more relationships strain and conflicts explode.
Throughout, drugs and alcohol become a panacea to quell the rough edges of sleep deprivation and stimulate a frenzied work environment. The cocaine, supplied by overworked engineers, Grover (Eli Gelb) and Charlie (Andrew R. Butler), keeps the band working at a frenetic pace. Ironically, drug use intensifies the arguments but floods the band’s creative juices.
Eventually, the emotional lodestones become too heavy to bear. When the couples make decisions to live apart from each other, the problem becomes whether they can celebrate their well-deserved laurels together or must break up before their race has been won and the desired success has been achieved.
A tour de force, Stereophonic runs over three hours with one intermission. Yet, Adjmi’s dialogue and complications are so organically constructed, intimate and authentic, that the action never languishes. The only section where Stereophonic may have been streamlined concerns some dialogue in the clashes between band member couples. But it is a minor glitch in a fantastic production.
Thanks to Adjmi, director Daniel Aukin and the sensational cast, whose acting chops and vocal talents are non-pareil, the compelling forward momentum of the band’s creative dynamic resonates with powerful immediacy.
The stunning production mesmerizes and enthralls in its presentation of the division between the musicians’ mystical artistry, which is always front and center, and the unseen technological engineering, whose artful techniques enhance the overall effect and impact of each recorded song. This division of the two different realms of making music is beautifully manifested in David Zinn’s scenic design, Jiyoun Chang’s lighting design and Ryan Rumery’s sound design.
Aukin’s vision of Adjmi’s themes of art, music, sacrifice and suffering heightens the importance of sound engineers. They must have skill and expertise in the control room. Also, they must have the personalities to suffer through and cope with artistic personas. Thus, the stage is divided into two sections. The upper level reveals the sound studio protected by glass, where we see and hear the musicians perform in a fascinating, theater verité style, as they stop to revise tempos, add pauses, and evolve riffs.
Downstage is the massive control panel where the engineers sit mostly with their backs to the audience and work to serve, manipulate, and stoke the musicians’ extraordinary talent and heightened emotional states. With Aukin’s superior staging, we can track both worlds, feeling we are in their midst, interactively participating in music creation.
Though band members treat Grover and especially the shy Charlie as “lesser lights,” without their efforts the band’s unique identity and glorious sound wouldn’t exist. Therefore, in the production’s arc of development, Adjmi gradually uncovers the engineers’ centrality to the creative process and the band’s success. It is especially funny and poignant to witness how the engineers moderate the emotional infantilism of the “high-strung” musicians to get the recordings in top shape.
Stereophonic ends on a high point that Adjimi, Aukin and the superb ensemble have been working toward slowly and relentlessly. Whether the band will ever collaborate again to achieve more amazing work remains a delicious ambiguity. Meanwhile, Stereophonic’s actors and technical team have treated the audience to an electrifying evening of music creation as one would imagine happened in iconic recording studios like Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Alabama or Abbey Road in London, perhaps, without the histrionics.
Additional praise goes to Enver Chakartash’s period costume design which is interesting and variable, and Tommy Kurzman’s accompanying wig and hair design. Special kudos to Music Director Justin Craig.
Stereophonic. Through December 17 at Playwrights Horizons (416 West 42nd Street between Ninth and Tenth Avenues). www.playwrightshorizons.org
Photos: Chelcie Parry
Cover Photo: Eli Gelb and Andrew R. Butler
