Weather 
Our local production and the takeaway message of five Tony Award-winning KIMBERLY AKIMBO (including Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, and Best Original Score) – whose National Touring Company opened Tuesday for a very short run at Broward Center – are perfectly aligned. Namely: Life’s short. Make the most of every day while you can.
The musical is the brainchild of David Lindsay-Abaire (book & lyrics) and Jeanine Tesori (music) – the same dynamic team who brought us Shrek the Musical. And while completely readdressed and reimagined, with a new script that adds greater dimensionality to the characters and music for emotional depth, its origins lie in Lindsay-Abaire’s 2001 Off-Broadway play, Kimberly Akimbo, written in 2000. With an unusual plot (to say the least) based on the joys and challenges faced by a teenage girl who suffers from progeria – an extremely rare and incurable genetic disease in which her body ages at four-to-five times the normal rate, giving her the outward appearance and physical attributes of an older woman in her sixties by the time she’s 16, when she’s also likely to die.
An obvious choice for a tragic opera … but as the subject of an entertaining and uplifting musical? Hell, yes! (Oops, now I must contribute some coins to “Kimmy’s curse jar.”) Lindsay-Abaire and Tesori have managed to pull off what many would consider the impossible by gifting their central character, Kimberly Levaco, with incredible spunk, imagination, dreams and resilience. In many ways, despite some typical teenage stresses and vulnerabilities, she’s also the most mature member of her highly dysfunctional family.
Maybe learning to deal with her condition for all those years of looking like an adult, and maybe being treated as such by strangers, helped her develop mature coping skills far beyond her actual age. Kimberly can let go and forgive in a way most adults can’t (when time is limited, why bear a grudge?), take charge of a difficult situation, keep a wry sense of humor, and never lose her delight in everyday achievements and social connections.
While the odds of contracting the disease where a young person is trapped in an older person’s body is 1 in 5 million, composer Tesori feels that, emotionally, everyone can relate. Like in the case of his grandmother. “When my grandmother was in her eighties,” he says, “she would look at the mirror and she would say, ‘God, I’m so surprised I’m not 12.’” “It’s about how we stay the children we were.” He felt it was also a story with the right, rich balance of tragedy and comedy, beauty and absurdity. Because “That’s what life is, so much of the time.”
The setting of Kimberly’s story is “1999. Before kids had cellphones. Somewhere in Bergen County, NJ.” Which might explain why, in this social media-free world, the awkward new girl in town has no issues with mean girls or bullies. Instead, the show opens with her joining her school’s oddball, creative social set at the town’s regular Saturday night haunt – the somewhat rundown (their “Birthday Pa ty” sign is missing an “r”) Skater Planet ice rink. Where real teens (at least they look really young!) sing and dance and, at times, even slide wearing ice skates whilst vocalizing about their personality issues, discomfort, love problems, and wishes to live in a larger, more exciting city.
Opening number “Skater Planet” introduces us to the show’s teen characters, beginning with Kimberly – deftly and exuberantly played by Ann Morrison, who’d starred in dozens of Broadway and West End productions. Here Morrison pulls off a doubly impressive performance by utilizing the full range of her experienced, vocal talent for musical numbers while maintaining a childlike speaking voice and awkward-teen physicality and facial expressions throughout the show. We gain insight into Kimmy’s inner life when she sings:
“It’s Saturday night and I’m the new girl
So I get to start from scratch …
Sure, tonight I’m getting looks
But tomorrow they might see me
(I’m always getting looks)
They never really see me.”
She doesn’t know it yet, but she’ll soon be included and “seen” by her fellow group of misfit nerds who “avoid the mall where all the action is” to stay with their self-described insecure peers. Here’s how they view themselves and their social position.
“Nothing is what it should be (is right)
I’m too awkward
I’m too bright
I’m too anxious
I’m too polite
We’re too chipper, we’re too loud
We don’t blend into a crowd
We’re too weird in every way …”
Nonetheless, “weirdness” tends to be linked to creativity and the foursome, each of whom has a crush on someone in the group who doesn’t love them back, are excited about performing as Dreamgirls in their interschool choir competition. But the school says it can’t fund their request for flashy sequined outfits. How they manage to get the money for their fancy getup (after being convinced to commit mail and check fraud by Kimberly’s con-artist Aunt Debra) is both a shocking and hilarious topsy-turvy episode in Kimberly’s life, complete with life altering repercussions!
I don’t want to give away too many surprises (and there are plenty – many, as one might not expect, weirdly positive). Suffice it to say that Aunt Debra, played with boastful, loud amorality by Emily Koch, can also sing up a storm. We get to enjoy her voice often as she joins members of the Levaco family – but especially in her frenetically humorous signature song, “How to Wash a Check.” Nuff said.
Debra’s crew of, at first, woefully incompetent workers are finally whipped into shape by their desire to defeat the choir from West Orange. Yes, Debra had recruited her “staff” from Kimberly’s skater classmates Delia (Gabby Beredo), Martin (at my show Regene Seven Odon stood in for Darron Hayes), Teresa (Skye Alyssa Friedman), and Aaron (Max Santopietro). Doing an excellent job of whipping dancers into shape was dance captain Darron Hayes.
Seth is a key new figure in Kimberly’s life – first friend and later amenable romantic partner (they bond over his love of anagrams, her love of books, and a shared intelligent curiosity). Seth’s vibrant portrayed by Marcus Phillips exhibits alternating layers of nerdy eagerness, hesitation, and conflicting moral emotions. His solo, “Good Kid,” ponders whether always being the good twin was worth it. “Being good – what has it got me? My brother goes to rehab, and I study twice as hard,” he sings while deciding whether or not to join Kimberly and classmates in Debra’s illegal, money “laundering” scheme. In the end, it’s Seth who drives the getaway car to the bank to cash their ill-gotten gains from which they set out on a first and last (for Kimmy) exciting road trip together, starting at New Jersey’s “Great Adventure” theme park and heading all the way south to Disney World, Florida.
Why didn’t Kimmy just take off with her family? She did ask her parents first (for once wishful thinking got the better of her), but the timing made it simply impossible. Her ready-to-pop-any-minute mom, Pattie, can barely get around with her cartoonishly large “beachball” of a belly. Not to mention two fully bandaged hands and arms to treat her “carpal tunnel syndrome” before the baby’s born. Kimberly is smart enough to wonder at her mom’s impulsively joining the kids on the ice in her condition and, sure enough, next time we see her, one leg is bound up in a splint after her fall. Mom Pattie is played with tenderness, cluelessness, and supreme naiveté by Laura Woyasz. At first, I can’t figure why she puts up with her useless, drunkard of a husband. But as is the case in many very-young marriages, they share a young lovers’ bond, and both love and care for Kimberly while (they can’t help it) still wishing she’d turned out normal.
Pattie borrows a video recorder from a neighbor to record a truly touching song for her unborn child, in case she dies. The song begins with “Hello Darling, it’s me, your mother.” Husband Buddy is surprised that she’s pondering her death, as she is healthy, but given the unfair “death sentence” of her only older child, it’s understandable. Then when Pattie’s not around, Buddy surreptitiously turns on the recorder to tape his own message. In “Hello Baby,” Buddy strongly advises the child to live life to the hilt, and pursue his or her dreams for as long as possible before being ensnared by family responsibilities. Now we get an inkling about Buddy’s inner torment, and why he’s often such a (pardon my French) f-ck up. Buddy was played with beautiful candor, bravado, bluster and emotion by understudy Benjamin Camenzuli (who stood in for Jim Hogan) on opening night.
Reflective of the pre-Y2K timeline, simple, realistic set design included solid back walls that were swiftly lowered and raised into place. Kimberly’s colorful, somewhat messy teen bedroom, with tons of clippings and posters tacked to her wall was apropos, while snowfall and an expansive skateable ice rink reflected the creative talents of scenic designer David Zinn, lighting designer Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew and video design by Lucy Mackinnon. Sarah Laux’s costume design with hair, wig & makeup design by J. Jared Janas brought us directly back to the 1990s. All scenes benefitted from the sure hand of director Jessica Stone and production stage manager Shawn Pennington, backed by music supervisor Chris Fenwick and choreography by Danny Mefford. And perhaps most essential of all, my compliments to music director (conductor/keyboard 1) who led the live band that played nonstop, delighting us with the musical’s uniquely upbeat and evocative, award-winning score.
