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Regional Reviews: St. Louis My Heart Says Go
An admirable inner tension and a youthful defiance have gripping power in Jorge Rivera-Herrans' music and lyrics (with lovely additional arrangements by Geoffrey Ko), and in the book by Matt Hawkins. Tesseract Theatre co-founder Brittanie Gunn directs a remarkably strong cast in this sharp 90-minute story, part of the group's 2024 Festival of New Musicals. (The other half of the festival, still to come, is Cascade's Fire, based on the story of Antigone.) Highly experienced Larry Pry is the music director here, bringing great discipline and variety to all the singing, and choreography by Maggie Nold sweeps us into the story with simple flowing movement. The show is about a medical school student who throws it all away for a dreamt-of music career at the other end of the country. Kevin Corpuz plays the anguished, determined med student, Indigo. And rueful, hilarious Sarah Wilkinson is Clara, the girl he meets on a train ride, in a fresh new Gen-X variation on a story of breaking molds and finding one's self. The outstanding Clayton Humburg plays their boyish landlord in Los Angeles, adding terrific character and humor (and powerful song) to their shared scenes, and to their dreams of glory. Kelvin Urday is compelling as Indigo's father, who has slaved away to pay for his son's education. And professional Loren Goudreau creates another layer of heartbreak as Clara's addiction-prone mother. The songs lend great character depth, with not a breath or movement wasted. Victoria Pines has a lovely anthem about the search for self, in her role as a train conductor (she could actually use an extra verse here). Grace Langford is excellent as a surgeon, and mentor to Indigo, and in a variety of chorus roles. Kevin Hester gives realistic grit as Rob, a bartender eking out a living when Indigo and Clara first arrive out west. We meet him as he's collecting his own box of personal effects, having been thrown out of the same apartment the two younger characters will soon inhabit. The fast-paced story wraps up very nicely on an emotional level but is a little unclear when it comes to Indigo's day-to-day ambitions at the end. He opens and closes the show with wordy rap-style narratives about his dreams and perseverance, which are fast-paced but hard to absorb for someone like me, who's from the decades before Ritalin and Adderall. Still, his densely packed rants energetically capture the anguish of a generation. And, aside from these passages, most of the show operates on lovely melody and great singing. The delightful costumes are by Abby Pastorello, with a darkly comical sound design by Ryan Day. It's always like this, though, whenever you encounter a really impressive new work of art, already fully realized: suddenly you can't imagine a time when it didn't already exist. As if it had always been there, hovering just out of sight. My Heart Says Go, part of the KAF Incubator Program, and the Tesseract Theatre Company New Musical Summer Fest, runs through July 21, 2024, at the Marcelle Theatre, 3310 Samuel Shepard Dr., St. Louis MO. For tickets and information, please visit www.tesseracttheatre.com. Cast: Production Staff: |
