Broadway Bound: Swept Away
What's next for the Avett Brothers musical?
If the acting thing doesn't work out, John Gallagher Jr. and Stark Sands could form an Avett Brothers cover band.
Their voices, currently on display in the musical Swept Away, in a potential pre-Broadway tryout at D.C.'s Arena Stage, give a distinctly Avett intonation.
In this unorthodox jukebox musical, the Avett songbook is reworked and repurposed for a late-19th-century shipwreck tale. Some songs are obvious choices, like the titular "Swept Away" for the rhythms of the sea or "Hard Worker" for the seaman's daily life (others are less undeniable), but it's clear how the Avett discography (especially their 2004 record Mignonette - which tells a very similar story), has inspired the show.
But the Avett Brothers don't just inspire poetry in us all, they forecast dollars and cents for the producers who have put their money into this Arena Stage production. After an Omicron-effected run last year at Berkeley Rep, they needed another out-of-town tryout to test the material before a run in New York. But the question must be asked: is it Broadway bound?
My answer: it should be.
While the show is inspired by the music and lyrics of Avett, the plot is reverse-engineered by Tony winner John Logan (Red), who has crafted a tale that follows a quartet of seafarers: the cranky Mate (Gallagher Jr.), the crusty Captain (Wayne Duvall), the naive Younger Brother (Adrian Blake Enscoe) and his pragmatic Older Brother (Sands). Many years after the wreck, as the Mate lies in a tubercular ward awaiting his death, the other three spirits haunt his visions and force him to tell us their story.
Despite being a 90-minute one-act show, Swept Away has two distinct halves with two different meanings of the phrase swept away. In the first half, it's about being swept away by adventure, far from your past life, all around the globe. The ship is populated by a stomping, swinging, spirited ensemble who make whaling expeditions seem like a real fun time. That's the adventure that Younger Brother is searching for, so he abandons his girlfriend (named Melody Anne...because Avett has a song called "A Gift for Melody Anne") and his farming responsibilities and sets off. The line "Everyone in this life deserves one frolic before he's done" rattles around in his brain. When Older Brother chases him down, he accidentally disembarks with the ship and is stuck with this crew of ragamuffins, led by the Mate and steered by the Captain. Everything is sing-songy and rhythmic, from their prayers to their seasickness.
The second half’s shipwreck is the "swept away" that you pay big bucks to see and the crash, brought to the stage by set designer Rachel Hauck (Hadestown) and lighting designer Kevin Adams, doesn't disappoint.
Tony winner Michael Mayer (Little Shop of Horrors) directs two totally different experiences for those halves. The first half is loud, brash, and swashbuckling. The aftermath of the tempest is quiet, meditative, lucid, and desperate.
And that quartet is directed to top form. Gallagher sounds so much like an Avett, although I kid, you have to wonder why they don't find an opportunity to put a guitar in his hands. He's been a fan of the band since his Spring Awakening days and you can tell that he has deeply felt many of these songs long before he sang them on stage. That poetic quality behind his voice matched with the brashness of his character is the kind of mariner lost at sea/lost in life stuff that authors dream of writing. The same is true of Sands (where is his guitar?), whose voice has arguably never sounded better.
The real revelation is Adrian Blake Enscoe (a banjo player - where is his banjo!), who shoulders the largest emotional burden in the show. He's us, the newcomer, the novice of this world. We feel his feelings, especially his pain. He's beautiful -and the heart of the piece.
Wayne Duvall anchors (I had to include at least one seabound pun) the show primarily in his acting, which is strongest in the second-half.
With all these pieces in place, is the show New York-ready?
Well, they are off to an excellent start after just two regional productions. They've acquired a decorated creative team and a near-perfect cast full of Broadway favorites. The Avett name will sell tickets (it definitely has at Arena, where many an audience member sang along - and got tripped up when lyrics were reworked and repurposed), although I'm not sure how long that name alone could sustain ticket sales.
Great reviews will help, but there are some things that need to be worked out before getting there. The shipwreck is a technical marvel at a regional house like Arena Stage, but I'm not sure would satisfy people's bang-for-buck with New York prices. The second half drags a bit (the dreaded "the second act has book problems" is in full effect) and needs to be tightened up to sustain what is essentially a full act. And Gallagher needs to play the guitar at some point - I'm not kidding. It feels essential.
Nothing needs to be changed, it just needs to be refined. With Broadway bows harder to pull off than ever before, it needs to be unsinkable (that's the last one) and it's not quite there yet.