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Heathers The Musical (c) Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade
Theater: Heathers The Musical
At New World Stages
The deafening cheers at the newly revived Heathers The Musical tell me an important characteristic about young audience members: They love their nostalgia, regardless of how pessimistic the original source material is. Heathers The Musical, which premiered at New World Stages in 2014 for a five-month stint, was adapted by Laurence O'Keefe and Kevin Murphy from the 1989 film that starred Winona Ryder as ordinary high school senior Veronica Sawyer, whose life changes when she is accepted into the most popular clique in school, the Heathers. This new production of the musical (back at New World Stages) originated in the UK, directed by Andy Fickman, hews close to the film’s plot, which has Veronica, now played with humor and ferocity by Lorna Courtney (who originated the titled character in & Juliet), also flirting with the outsider new kid, JD (Casey Likes, of Back to the Future), whose dark energy soon brings chaos to Westerberg High School, including, like, murder. Unlike the musical adaptation of Mean Girls, which also includes a plot of an outsider being adopted by the popular girls and would arrive on Broadway a few years later, Heathers The Musical goes down darker roads O'Keefe and Murphy don’t shy away from, making it closer in feels to the recent musicalize version of the film, Teeth.
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Heathers The Musical (c) Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade
To make the nightmarish material more palatable, the actors go broader, bordering on caricature, especially the three Heathers (all in primary colors): head Heather Chandler in red (McKenzie Kurtz) and her acolytes Heather McNamara in yellow (Elizabeth Teeter) and Heather Duke in green (understudy Kiara Michelle Lee doing a fine job). More down-to-earth and thus garnering most of our sympathies is Martha Dunnstock, Veronica’s childhood friend and ire of the cool kids, played and sung magnificently by newcomer Erin L. Morton. Also, Broadway veteran Kerry Butler, who plays various adult roles, is fabulous in her hippie teacher’s one big number, “Shine a Light.” But the show wouldn’t work without the committed performances from the leads. Courtney is both funny and vocally powerful as Veronica, while Likes as JD may not be as maniacal as Christian Slater in the film, but he does provide a more nuanced performance before all hell breaks loose. The young audience may mostly know the musical from its performance in the TV show Riverdale, so seeing the full production should be a lot of fun, murders and all.
Unicorns (c) Cohen Media Group
Film: Unicorns
In Cinemas on July 18
Is it a coincidence that we get two films in as many years in which a young, seemingly straight British man unwittingly finds himself sexually attracted to a non-white male drag performer? Unlike last year’s Femme, which had darker themes of white supremacists and revenge, Unicorns has a sweeter more (excuse the pun) fairy-tale sheen, until a rather devastating and tonally out-of-the-blue plot twist occurs in the third act. Until then, we follow nice, working-class mechanic Luke (Ben Hardy, who made quite the splash in the romcom Love at First Sight on Netflix), who barely gets out as he is raising his young son with his father. But Luke, like Alice, unexpectedly opens a door to Wonderland—in this case, a mostly Asian dance club—where he’s captivated by a sexy performer, only realizing he made a sexually confused mistake after flirting and kissing them. Aysha (Jason Patel) is a drag queen (as opposed to being transgender) who proudly declares “my pronouns are icon and legend.” He has a day job as Ashiq in a department store make-up counter. He is Indian and a Muslim, although he rarely talks about his family in Manchester. And he comes alive as Aysha, although many of the private parties he is hired to perform at are filled with closeted men with short tempers and frenemy relationships with some of the other drag queens. So, Aysha decides to hire Luke as her driver and bodyguard in the evenings she’s performing, and an uneasy friendship blossoms with Luke’s mind open to a world he never knew existed.
Unicorns (c) Cohen Media Group
The main problem is the aforementioned event that feels more like plot manipulation than something germane to the story, although to be fair, there are little hints throughout the movie that makes it somewhat plausible. But both Hardy and Patel infuse their characters with such humanity and genuine yearning that their relationship at every point in the film feels truthful. The other characters are either not as fleshed out or there just to be roadblocks, including the sudden appearance of Luke’s estranged ex and the mother of his son. The exceptions are Ashiq’s mother (Nisha Nayar), who doesn’t understand why her son doesn’t visit more, and Danny (Dan Linney), Luke’s friend, who seems to sense Luke’s proclivities before he does. Directors Sally El Hosaini and James Krishna Floyd do a good job creating each man’s world and the societal limitations of both to their possible romance. Although not a lot of Unicorns surprised me, the relationship at the heart of the film felt satisfyingly honest.
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