The Loudest One is Ours

We close our St. Louis production of Be More Chill just as the Broadway production has posted its closing notice for a little over a month from now. It's another reminder, as if we needed one, that this miraculous thing we create, this piece of deeply felt art that we all pour ourselves into, exists only for a while and then it's gone.

I often hear people say that's why theatre is so special. Call me a cynic, but I look forward to the day when we have real-life holodecks and we can literally relive opening night of Company and Show Boat and Hamilton.

Over and over and over again.

Also, I'm going to keep watching bootlegs...

We are all so grateful to The Joes (Iconis and Tracz) for writing Be More Chill, to superstar producer Jennifer Ashley Tepper (the hardest working woman in show biz; did I mention she also writes book?), who shepherded the show along, to Charlie Rosen the show's incredible orchestrator; this incredible team who gave us the greatest gift possible, an exquisite, exciting, surprising piece of musical theatre heaven to work on and share with our audiences.

We will miss the universe of Be More Chill terribly, but it brings me great comfort to know that this beautiful, unusual, thrilling piece of theatre will have a long, healthy life in regional productions, in community theatre and school productions, and through its massive volume of fan art, fan covers, and fan forums (fora?). I can think of only a couple shows that have created that intensity of passion in their fans -- Rent and Hamilton.

A huge part of the fun for me during this process (as always) has been exploring, thinking about, and writing about this show, its structure and form, the show's textual themes, its many surprises and secrets, the opening number, and the relationship between the musical and its source novel. So much there to think about.

I also got to interview four members of the BMC team for my Stage Grok podcast -- composer-lyricist Joe Iconis (nicest guy ever), Jennifer Ashley Tepper (my theatre hero), orchestrator Charlie Rosen (a true genius), and actor Katlyn Carlson (super cool and super talented). I've never been able to get so many perspectives on a single show. It was really fun talking to all of them.

We knew the response to this show would be intense, but we had no idea what was coming... Only a few shows in our 28-year history have been met with enthusiasm like this -- honestly, maybe no other show of ours has reached quite this level...

The critics embraced us completely...

“Productions like this are exactly what contemporary theatre needs.”
– Tanya Seale, BroadwayWorld

“One of New Line’s best productions in recent history.”
– Kevin Brackett, ReviewSTL

“A startlingly fresh musical that avoids cliché to tell an exciting and at times very funny story about modern teenagers with a sci-fi twist.”
– Paul Friswold, The Riverfront Times

“Teen angst has rarely been so entertainingly outrageous.”
– Calvin Wilson, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“The powerful connection between actors and theatergoers is electric and palpable.”
– Lynn Venhaus, St. Louis Limelight

"This is a perfect New Line show, and how Scott Miller managed to present it so soon after its Broadway opening is a wonder."
– Judith Newmark, All the World’s a Stage

"the regional premiere run at New Line is truly special."
– Jeff Ritter, Critical Blast

“A spectacular production. . . A total blast.”
– Tina Farmer, KDHX

We created a "Who's Your Squip?" wall in our lobby, much like they did in New York. The idea is to decide, if you had a squip, what person/character would the squip take on. At first, I chose Bob Fosse, but then I thought having him in my head all the time might be really oppressive, so I chose John Waters instead. I wasn't sure if people would participate, but our squip wall grew every night of the run. Here's a video documenting our great squip wall on closing night...

And the responses from our audiences on Facebook were overwhelming. Here's a few of them...

"Saw the production of Be More Chill last night. We knew all the songs ahead of time and were so excited to see it performed live. It was over our expectations! Amazing singers, actors, performances. Definitely worth visiting this theatre and group -- we’ve just learned about it and will be back. And for now? We get to spend the next week with all BMC songs stuck in our heads (no complaints)"

"Tonight's performance was fantastic. I taught high school for 31 years and I have a 21 year old son whose life revolves around music and performing -- and finding his way to know himself. Needless to say, I feel like the actors captured the angst/humor/passion/confusion of high school -- with a sci-fi twist. I loved every minute of the show. Kudos."

"After seeing this production at New Line the other week, I'm pretty sure I've listened to the original cast recording about a dozen times. I think I've changed my mind on what song I like best about four or five times. Too many good ones to choose from! Also, I'd love to hear a recording made from your cast, they did such a great job."

"New Line Theatre’s production of Be More Chill was so much fun tonight! We are truly so fortunate to have so much great art in this city."

"Can’t stress this enough. Be More Chill with New Line Theatre is tremendous! The voices. The actors. The music. The musicians. What an absolute joy of a show!"

"It was wonderful. Thank you for bringing it to St. Louis!"

"My son saw it twice! Great show."

I was very surprised that a dozen or more people talked to me during our run who had seen the show off or on Broadway, and preferred our production. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that our actors are literally a few feet from the front row, and our little blackbox theatre has only eight rows when we set it up this way. Just the fact of that intimacy makes any great show funnier, more intense, more powerful, more emotional, more honest.

I did see the off Broadway production, but have not seen it on Broadway. I know it's a terrific production with a really strong cast, but I think maybe this is a story that works better away from the pressures of the commercial theatre. I think the physical circumstances of our production lent us a little extra up-close magic.

It's really wonderful to find a great piece of theatre, put together a great production with a bunch of brilliant theatre artists, and then share it with audiences who fall in love with it. After all, despite all the cool things I found in the text and music, this really is just a story about surviving being Different.

And it's a thriller!

Everyone who helped create our production did extraordinary work -- our designers, tech staff, musicians, actors...  Musical theatre is the most collaborative of all art forms, and that's a big part of why I love it so much. (I'll never understand the companies who hire a computer instead of a band. Sorry, but that's not live musical theatre. The band is performing as much as the actors are!)

I am so grateful to all the New Liners who worked on Be More Chill, but I have to offer a few special thanks -- to Dowdy, who I trust more than anyone else I've ever worked with, and who directed this show with incredible creativity and artistry and confidence; to Jayde Mitchell (Jeremy) who worked his ass off, and who embraced every direction we gave him; and to Kevin Corpuz (Michael) and Grace Langford (Christine), two of our up-and-coming New Line stars, both of whom are wildly talented, super easy to work with, and extraordinary onstage.

Grace will be playing the female lead in both Cry-Baby and Head Over Heels next season, and Kevin will be Bobby Strong in Urinetown! Keep an eye on these two!

This whole cast rocked, the band (ably led by new New Liner Marc Vincent) rocked, and I really could not be prouder or happier. And New Line's bank account is reeeeally happy...

I love my job!

Long Live the Musical!
Scott

C-C-C-Come On, C-C-C-Come On, Go Go!

Be More Chill has one of those perfect, textbook opening numbers that accomplishes way more than you notice at first. Like Company, High Fidelity, Urinetown, Bat Boy, Next to Normal, Robber Bridegroom, Hands on a Hardbody, and so many other shows, Be More Chill's opening, "More Than Survive" is so much more than just a first song. It establishes style, tone, pacing, the show's central musical and textual themes, and all the major characters.

The show begins with a short musical prelude, some key-bending horror music, capped off with a short musical phrase that will later accompany the words, "Helps you to be cool, it helps you rule..." It's a musical foreshadowing of the show's central conflict -- except the phrase stops before the final note, and jumps into the first scene.

But that music is in our heads now...

The music turns to a four-note musical phrase that will return throughout the show. As I wrote in another post, this figure is almost familiar; it's almost Disney's Little Mermaid vamp, but it's been complicated by turning one note in the phrase dissonant, creating a tritone, a musical interval often associated with darkness, evil, even the Devil himself. The music is telling us that Jeremy's life is just a normal fucked up teenager's life, not right, not comfortable, not happy -- and that something really fucked-up is heading our way...

Just by changing that one note in the phrase, the music tells us subconsciously, even before we hear any words. that Jeremy's world is out of balance, and the action of this story will be about putting his world into balance.

And the first words of the show are the "C-C-C-Come on!" that will return throughout the show. Here, it's Jeremy impatience for porn to load on his computer. By the end of this opening number, that same chant will be the students impatience for the final bell to ring at the end of the school day. By the end of the show, that phrase will come to be the characters' invitation to the audience to follow Jeremy's example and find their own path.

Similarly, at the end of the school day, the chant will be finished off with a string of "Go, Go, Go, Go..." urging the clock's hands toward the bell. At the end of the show, the exact same chant will be telling the audience to now go out and put their own lives on the right path.

Only after this subliminal foundation has been set does the song gives us concrete info. Jeremy introduces himself and his problem (social failure) in the first verse, to music that will become Jeremy's "Dork Theme" (my label).

And then we segue into underscoring and the show's first bit of dialogue, which introduces Jeremy's father and the very odd relationship they share -- as well as his father's lack of pants. Here it's just a joke; we'll soon learn it's much more than that.

In the second verse, we find out that Jeremy is almost paralyzed by two things -- dread of continued social failure, and an inability to make decisions. We don't know this yet, but the Squip is going to solve both problems.

Now on the school bus, Jeremy lays out another repeating musical theme to this lyric:

I don't want to be a hero;
Just wanna stay in the line.
I'll never be a Rob De Niro;
For me, Joe Pesci ls fine.

He wants to be a nobody. Or at least, he doesn't aspire to anything more. Also, songwriter Joe Iconis is telling us that pop culture references are part of the fabric of this story. The section ends with:

I don't want to be special, no, no...
I just want to survive.

And that's his problem. He doesn't expect or even hope that his life will get any better. He's stagnating, not growing.

The opening continues into some more underscoring and dialogue, and we meet most of the other characters and we see an illustration of Jeremy's shitty social status. The underscoring is the main theme from "Smartphone Hour" -- it's a kind of "Gossip Theme," but we don't know that yet... And the dialogue also sets up the sexually charged social world at this school.

We return to the opening's main melody and Jeremy tells us his only real goal here is to "remain unseen." So much is set up in this opening that will soon change.

And then we meet Christine and the romantic "Christine Theme." But then Christine speaks and Jeremy falls apart and he goes back to his "Dork Theme." He tells himself:

Accept that you're on of those guys
Who'll stay a virgin till he dies.

Yikes! (There are a lot of references to death and suicide in this show!) Finally we meet Michael and the music changes drastically. Jeremy's music has been a kind of driving, relentless pop-rock, but when Michael arrives, the music swings for the first time. Michael is listening to Bob Marley, so the music slips into a Jamaican reggae groove to mirror the music we don't actually hear in his headphones.

This very short musical section tells us a lot. It tells us the Michael doesn't share the same "music" (literally and metaphorically) as all the other kids. He has his own music, his own voice, because he already knows what Michael must learn -- to follow his own path. As soon as Jeremy speaks again, the music turns back to that regular beat and the dissonance of the beginning of the number.

Jeremy and Michael share some dialogue and we get some information about their relationship. We learn more about Jeremy's feelings and the romantic "Christine Theme" returns, this time with all the students singing along -- in Jeremy's head. This moment tells us that in this story, the other characters will sometimes play voices in Jeremy's head. That's important for us to know.

The music stops for just a second, just long enough for Rich to humiliate Jeremy in front of everybody else. And Jeremy returns to his "Dork Theme." He sings:

I'm never gonna be the cool guy;
I'm more the one who's left out.
Of all the characters at school, I
Am not the one who the story's about...

That last line is fascinating because it tells us so much about Jeremy -- he can't imagine being the Hero, being the Protagonist. But to the audience, it's a funny meta-moment since we already know we're here to see a story in which Jeremy is the protagonist.

The last section of this opening number turns to driving rock eighth notes, as Jeremy pleads with the universe to help him "more than survive." Maybe he's not content with his life after all. Maybe he does aspire to something more. And as the rest of the cast joins in, maybe we get the hint that all of them, even the Cool Kids that Jeremy envies, all really feel the same way underneath.

In one of my favorite asides in the show, Jeremy sings:

If this was an apocalypse,
I would not need any tips
On how to stay alive.
But since the zombie army's yet to descend,
And the period is going to end,
I'm just trying my best
To pass the test
And survive.

In other words, Jeremy can handle himself against zombies in a video game, just not against humans in the real world. All he wants is to "pass the test" of social acceptance. Weirdly, his skills in the video game universe will essentially help him Save the World at the end of the show. Also, he doesn't know if yet, but he doesn't have to "pass the test" -- because measuring up to other people's measure is the Great Mistake that Jeremy makes. He only has to measure up to his own measure, to be a happy and complete person.

The "C-C-C-Come on!" theme returns, as a structural bookend to the number (and eventually, the show as a whole!), and it invokes that feeling of impatience that fuels our teenage years; and despite Jeremy's protestations, we see that Everybody's Wants the Same Thing.

By the time his opening number is over, we know quite a bit about Jeremy and his major relationships -- with his father, with Michael, with Christine, and with the brutal high school social scene. We've also heard all the important musical themes that will be used throughout the score, we've gotten a taste of the the pop culture references that will permeate the story, and the wry, irreverent humor that is the language of this world.

If the audience doesn't already know the story, they think at this point that this is a romantic musical comedy, that ultimately Jeremy will find himself through the love of the Right Girl. But that's not where we're headed, or to be more accurate, that's not how we're headed. Jeremy has to go on a painful (literally and metaphorically) Hero's Journey -- by himself. It's self-knowledge that Jeremy lacks and must find -- by himself.

Soon after Michael arrives to Save the World at the end (oops! spoiler alert!), Jeremy comes to the self-awareness he lacks in the opening. And significantly, the finale ends the same way the opening ends. In the opening, all they want is the end of the school day; in the finale, they're urging all of us to learn what they've learned -- we each have our own path, and we each have to find that path on our own.

The opening ends with a driving chant, "Go, go, go, go..." The Act II finale ends instead with one "Go" on a big, choral chord that rises and grows, and while there is dissonance within the chord, it grows into a final, perfect, major chord, no dissonance, no complication.

Jeremy's okay. He's grown up, or at least taken his first steps in that direction. He has learned to focus on others instead of himself. He's learned about sacrifice. And he's learned the most important lesson of all:

And there are voices all around,
And you can never mute the sound.
They scream and shout;
I tune them out,
Then make up my own mind.
. . .
And there are voices in my head...
So many voices in my head...
And they can yell,
And hurt like hell,
But I know I'll be fine.
Might still have voices in my head…
There are voices in my head…
But of the voices in my head,
The loudest one is mine!

Those "voices" -- peer pressure, the culture, and other social forces, won't go away -- the trick is to make sure you own voice, your own path, is the one you follow. The final invocation of the "C-C-C-Come on, Go!" chant finishes the show, and it takes on powerful meaning.

We realize by the end that this chant has changed over the course of the show; it's "grown up" with Jeremy. It first accompanies Jeremy's impatience for computer porn, then the students' impatience for the end of the school day, then Jeremy's impatience with his nonexistent social confidence, then porn again, then at the end of Act I, it becomes the Squip's seduction, to which Jeremy succumbs.

But here at the end of the show, it's a demand, a command, the equivalent of the iconic "Just Do It."

The show, the characters, the actors are all imploring us to live our lives actively rather than passively, to let our own voices be the loudest ones. It's not all that different from "Let the Sun Shine In" at the end of Hair, begging the audience to bring light back into the darkness. In Hair, it's advocating for communal action; Be More Chill advocates for personal, largely inner action.

That's not a lesson for teenagers. It's a lesson for all of us. Which is why Be More Chill is so universally loved. When I talk to audience members after performances, so many of them talk about how "honest" and "real" the story and the characters feel to them -- despite the sci-fi elements.

We're all Jeremy, one way or another. We all have voices in our head that steer us wrong, that tell us we're not good enough. The Squip is a metaphor, and by the end, we all get it. Following someone else's path always leads to problems. We each have to find our own way, and to do that, our own voice must be the loudest. Christine acknowledges at the end that what the Squip offers is very seductive, but it's not a real life.

We close the show next weekend, and we will all miss it terribly. But it will stay with us, not just the joy and the amazing response from audiences and the press, but also the deeply honest, thoughtful, subtle story, that has something to teach us all.

Long Live the Musical!
Scott

It's Just So Universal

I finally started reading the Be More Chill novel, and I LOVE IT.

Though lots of small things are different from the musical, all the big arcs are pretty much the same -- although the ending is totally different (by necessity). It's been fun spending even more time with Jeremy, Michael, and the gang. Plus the novel is full of "Bonus Features"...

For instance, I was reading the novel and got to a reprint of a Yahoo News item that Jeremy sees online about the Squip... What?

Let's pause here for a second...

Sometimes reading the source novel is incredibly helpful; sometimes it's not. When New Line produced Sondheim's Passion in 1996 (am I really that old?), I watched the source movie, Passione d'amore (The Passion of Love), which is really wonderful and really fucked up. Sondheim and Lapine had stuck pretty close to the movie, so it was interesting to see but didn't tell me much new. Then I read the autobiographical (!) source novel by Iginio Tarchetti. It's a wild, incredibly entertaining, often disturbing ride, but it was a blast to read. Plus, I found virtually nothing that was at odds with the musical, and so much that enhanced and added to the information the musical gave us. It really helped us in concrete ways.

Reading Ragtime was like that as well.

Then again... I read the Sweet Smell of Success novella while we worked on that show, and while it's an amazing book, it's really only a jumping off place for the show. Lots of things are different, and most notably, the novella's plot starts near the end of the musical's first act. So reading the book was fun, and a little helpful with time and place, atmosphere, tone, etc., but I had to understand that the show was a different animal. That was also true of reading The Once and Future King while working on Camelot. In the novel, Lance is ugly, after all...

Weirdly, the book Pal Joey is actually backstory for the musical Pal Joey. And the musical Man of La Mancha explores only a few small sections from the sprawling novel Don Quixote (one of my favorites!), much like South Pacific does.

The Be More Chill novel falls on both sides of this question (not a surprise for this show), which is why I waited to read it till after we opened. I do feel like I'm getting to know these characters better, particularly Jeremy and Michael, but I also know that the story we're telling is the stage musical, not the novel.

Meanwhile, I'm also learning so much about BMC from audiences members and other fans. I happened upon a Be More Chill Wiki site, and there are lots of cool tidbits there...

Two things that really struck me...

First, the Squip says something repeatedly in the show that (as a non-gamer) baffled me: "Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, A." Finally someone explained it to me. Here's how the mildly addictive Be More Chill Wiki puts it:

For those who don't know, the Konami code is a cheat code or a command that has different effects depending on the game in question, most commonly used in Konami branded games and few Nintendo games. It was also called the "Contra Code" or the "99 lives code." The exact code is: Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A. Though the Squip's little code is: Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, A.

Okay, mind blown.

Also, I found this: "Joe Tracz claims that it is unknown if the Squip's motives were to take over the world, but the Squip does wish for everyone in the world to own a Squip (Tracz compares this to how Apple wants everybody to have their products)." Again, that's interesting...

Here's the big mind-blower so far. I'm reading the novel and I get to a Yahoo News item that Jeremy reads online:

Sony Hints at Next Generation of Wearable Computers

Just as the Segway Human Transport system was introduced to the world as clandestine, heavily-funded “IT” technology, digital designers and futurists are now buzzing about “SQUIP” as the next great leap forward in human lifestyle enhancement. SQUIP is being developed by Sony (SNE).

“It’s a simple device that will redefine how computers operate within our society,” says Harvey Dinglesnort about SQUIP, which Sony refuses to comment on directly. Mr. Dinglesnort reviews high-end devices for a variety of publications including The Sharper Image(SHRP). “They’re keeping close tabs on it because it really will be a sensation when it is released.”

What is known about SQUIP is that it involves microcomputers that can be implanted—or ingested—into the human body. Devices like the VeriChip, fromApplied Digital Systems (ADSXE), already provide this functionality, but VeriChip implantation is a surgical procedure (albeit an outpatient one) involving a needle large enough to dose an elephant. SQUIP is said to be much smaller and easier to “install” due to the fact that it does not employ conventional microchip structure.

“Sony is going consumer with quantum computing,” Mr. Dinglesnort explains. “Scientists have been researching for years the prospect of building a computer based not on the binary system, where a piece of information is either a one or a zero, but on a ‘qubit’ system, where a piece of information can be a one, a zero, or a sort of in-between state that collapses into a one or zero when it is observed closely.”

The quantum computer is of interest to researchers because of its staggering data-processing capabilities, exponentially surpassing those of current CPUs. It has been discussed for projects ranging from large-scale materials fabrication to time travel. But Sony seems to have simpler plans.

“What they have said is, ‘Let’s not worry about all the great things quantum computers can do. Let’s just make a simple one and take advantage of the fact that it can be tiny, and try to manufacture a sort of ingestible Palm Pilot,’” Mr. Dinglesnort says. Consumer models are a long way off. But the prospect of SQUIP has futurists drooling and investors lining up…

Yikes. We know this isn't exactly the Squip's backstory onstage, because in the musical Michael searches the internet but can't find anything at all about the Squip -- which makes him suspicious. (Also in the novel, Michael's is a serious horndog with a thing for Asian women, and his brother actually took a Squip!)

I said we know that this isn't the Squip's backstory in the musical, but we don't know that. The only thing we know is different is that, in the musical, there's nothing about it on the internet; but it is from Japan, it's incredibly high-tech (nobody made this in their garage), and there are a lot of them.

This backstory does make sense in the context of the musical...

How does that help us? It's just another piece of "reality" that helps this fictional world feel real and complete to the actors, which makes it feel real and complete to the audience. After all, acting is really just about acting naturally, logically, in fictional circumstances. So the more the actor knows about the world she's inhabiting, the more convincingly she'll do that.

One thing that really struck me as I read the novel is how much had to get left out -- and yet it really doesn't feel like the musical is missing much at all. The Joes (Mssrs. Iconis and Tracz) did a masterful job of combining multiple similar incidents into one, combining similar characters into composites, etc.

People talk about how much gets left out by necessity when a 300-page novel is adapted into a 90-minute film, but the transformation is even more extreme when a novel is transformed into a stage musical. The script of a musical is -- by necessity -- the most compact kind of storytelling, and therefore, the most difficult. The book of a musical gets so little stage time, because singing takes much longer than talking. Music slows down time in a musical. Though not as grotesquely as a lot of opera does. What might take 30 seconds to say in dialogue may well take a minute and a half, or two minutes, or even more, to express in song.

Considering all that, it's genuinely astonishing to me that only small things are different between the novel and the musical, that the Joes told this story in all its fullness and complexity, despite the form's inherent restrictions and its limits on time and space. That's some damn fine writing.

And when big things are different in the story, it's so clearly a choice made to enhance the emotional content of the story; after all, musical theatre is one of the most emotional forms of storytelling, since it uses the abstract language of music, alongside the concrete language of words.

For instance, in the novel, Jeremy has somewhat emotionally absent, shitty parents. In the musical, Jeremy's mother has left and his father is trapped in his deep grief. That's a much more intense set of circumstances, which needs the emotional intensity of music to tell its story. When people ask me, I always tell them that the thing that makes a great story into a great musical is the intensity of emotion; musical theatre's great super power is its ability to portray deep, complicated, and intense emotion far better than spoken words alone ever could.

The Joes (Iconis and Tracz) took an inherently emotional story, and with only minor adjustments, turned it into an incredibly emotional story, with very high emotional stakes. That's what great musical theatre does.

One other thing I've learned as we worked on and now run Be More Chill -- people's reactions to it are almost never rational; they're way more emotional (and so, dare I say it, irrational) than I expected. Though almost all our reviews were pretty much raves, some of them made a point of dismissing the material.

I don't know how to break it to them, but we can't make a great show out of not-great material. It doesn't work that way.

Several of the reviewers talked about how the characters were all stereotypes, but then went on to explain in detail how they aren't stereotypes; and likewise, these same people declared our story derivative and predictable, and then they go on to talk about all the unexpected twists and turns the story takes. My favorite review quote along those lines was, "There are definitely relatable aspects, but there’s not much here that hasn’t been done before, and better."

Really? Because I'm trying to think of another musical about young people that appears to be a romantic musical comedy at first, but soon morphs into a dark sci-fi thriller, that deals with peer pressure, bullying, teen depression, suicide, the over-medication of kids, absent parents. Actually I'm trying to think of another musical that applies the Faust legend to kids. (No, not Little Shop, since Audrey and Seymour are at least ten years older than these kids, despite the usual miscasting, and they exist in a completely different time, place, and storytelling style.)

Also, part of the genius of Be More Chill, and the reason that literally millions -- let me repeat that, MILLIONS -- of people connect to this show so powerfully, is that the characters at first seem to be stock character types, but every one of them proves to be much more complicated than that -- exactly as it is in real life. Early in the show, when BMOC Jake talks to Christine about how her play affected him, the show blows up the jock stereotype...

JAKE: Hey. You were in that play last year.
CHRISTINE: You mean Romeo & Juliet?
JAKE: Yeah. you were that girl who died!
CHRISTINE: You mean Juliet?
JAKE: Yeah! That was depressing.
CHRISTINE: Thanks ...
JAKE: But. .. you were good. I'm Jake.
CHRISTINE: I...know.
JAKE: Cool... Can l say something stupid? When 1 saw you die in the play last year. .. That was like the saddest I'd felt in a long time. It was like everything in my life, all the pressure I feel to be the best, at everything, all the time ... Suddenly felt so small. And then, when you got up at the end for your victory dance ...
CHRISTINE: Bow, it's called a bow.
JAKE: Right! I remember thinking, "l 'm glad that girl's not dead ... before I ever got the chance to know her." Stupid, right?
CHRISTINE: That's ... not stupid at all.

This is one of my favorite moments in the show, because the stereotypical jock is revealed to be a real person, with real emotions he doesn't fully understand, and the audience realizes they can't assume anything about any of these people. This jock has just discovered the magic of theatre and he is fully embracing it. Maybe high school and college kids recognize this basic truth even more readily because they're in the midst of living through all that...

But then again, aren't we all...?

Every show we produce teaches me a lot -- about the show, about humans, about life, about storytelling, but this show is also teaching me about preconceptions. When I ask people after the show why they think the show is having such massive success, both adults and kids tell me pretty much the same thing -- it's because the show is fiercely, deeply honest and authentic. This is not a silly story about silly emotions; this is not a story of stereotypes and cliches; no, this is a story about the incredible complexity of human relationships, and the social context that we all create that can lift up or beat down anybody, popular or not, smart or not, loved or not.

And almost everybody I ask, from current high school kids to seniors, says this story mirrors their own high school experience in a thousand ways, some obvious, some very subtle. The word lots of people use about the show is "honest." I couldn't agree more. You never hear Iconis and Tracz in this dialogue or these lyrics; you hear the authentic voices of high school kids.

I went through all those emotions in high school (forty years ago!), and today's high school kids are telling me they're going through all these exact same emotions today, which leads me to believe not a lot has changed when it comes to the way people treat people. Myself, I had an awesome time in high school, but I know many (most?) people are still carrying various traumas from high school around with them. And that baggage will color how they experience this story.

Yes, there are other musicals about teens -- great musicals, some of them -- but there's nothing else like Be More Chill. And if you think there is, you're not paying attention. I agree with RFT reviewer Paul Friswold, who wrote:

New Line's Be More Chill is a startlingly fresh musical that avoids cliche to tell an exciting and at times very funny story about modern teenagers with a sci-fi twist. . .

As good as Joe Iconis' songs are (and the New Line band, led by Marc Vincent, plays them very well indeed), Joe Tracz' book is equally compelling. An off-hand factoid about stagnating human evolution dovetails quite tidily with the Squip's motivations for disseminating more of itself through the school. This is the real menace of life lived by remote control, and everything in Be More Chill hinges on someone "just saying no" to technology-laced drugs. For all its charms and honesty about the bad decision-making of high schoolers, Be More Chill's gripping conclusion proves that not everyone takes the easy way out. It takes only one brave teen armed with a fondness for retro '90s culture to stop the madness. Uncoolness never looked so good.

I agree -- startlingly fresh. The funniest part of this is though several reviewers thought there was nothing new here, no one even mentioned Faust. They (incorrectly) think Be More Chill isn't that different from Heathers or Mean Girls, but apparently they don't recognize the story's actual source.

BroadwayWorld reviewer Tanya Seale called our show, "one of the coolest, freshest comedic musicals in years. . . It features modern-day teen characters who speak modern-day lingo, who dress in modern-day fashion, and who cleverly and intriguingly use modern-day technology onstage." I'll leave you with the end of Tanya's review...

I can't even begin to convey just how refreshing it was to see an audience respond so enthusiastically to musical theatre. It was almost as if the teenagers in the house were calling out, "Thank you! You see us!" Productions like this are exactly what contemporary theatre needs to cultivate new audiences and Be More Chill certainly delivers on that tall order.

The adventure continues.

Long Live the Musical!
Scott