"Swept Away", now playing at the Longacre Theater on Broadway is...frustrating. It's the kind of piece that annoys theatergoers, and especially industry insiders, to no end. A musical that seemingly came out of nowhere (it had a successful production at Arena stage just before opening on Broadway) with marketing that tells us less than nothing about the show except that the ocean is in someway involved. One hopes that it's vague origins equate to a "diamond in the rough" piece... that rare original musical that caught the attention of a talented, intelligent producer and got it's "big break."
Sadly, that's not what I saw at the Longacre.
Dig a little deeper and you'll find that "Swept Away" was simply a "bee in the bonnet" passion project of the lead producer. One need only look at the playbill bio of producer Matthew Masten for our illusive answers as to the genesis of this piece. To quote:
"Matthew Maston...has been developing "Swept Away" since 2014, when he reached out to The Avett Brothers' manager...to discuss the idea of an "Avett Musical.""
And that's exactly what this feels like. A musical group who wrote a collection of songs for no real reason whose material was then strung together by (the extremely talented) book writer John Logan, and then shepherded to Broadway by a producer who just really likes the Avett Brothers' work. If only such passion and resources were used on the dozens of brilliant new musicals who fall by the wayside every year for want of "a known IP" or a creative producer willing to take a chance on a piece that NEEDS to be seen.
Instead we get "Swept Away."
The plot can be summed up in one sentence: a motley 1800's whaling crew are forced to confront what they're willing to do to survive when four of them are stranded for weeks on a lifeboat.
What I've just written is more interesting and informative than anything found in any promo materials for the show.
And when we're focused on the "what they're willing to do to survive" part (for a grand total of about fifteen minutes), the show is interesting. For the first time all evening I saw people lean forward in their seats.
But the rest of the show is bad musical theater writing 101.
We only have four central characters, which you would think would mean we get to know them well, and care about them. But...not really. I can tell you a grand total of one sentence about each of them:
Mate is hedonistic and morally corrupt.
Big Brother is saintly, hard working, and content to stay with and care for his family.
Little Brother is good at heart but has wanderlust.
Captain...captains.
And we hear about those qualities over, and over and over again in song, after song, after song...
Until the ship sinks.
The real star of this show is set designer Rachel Hauck who not only built this show the set the 90's musical "Titanic" promised (and never delivered on), but created a captivating scene from the moment you first walk into the theater, through the end, including when we're asked to watch nothing but a small lifeboat for about an hour straight. We also get a bit of "4D" as it were, when we feel the wind on our faces and see the all too brief respite of rain falling on our survivors. She is aided by Kevin Adams' stunning lighting design. Indeed, the moment when the boat sinks got, by far, the most applause of the evening.
The show is helped by a talented cast who do everything possible to bring more than two dimensions to these two dimensional characters. If you took the same premise and presented it as a play written by, say, Tom Stoppard, it would be an amazing evening at the theater. As it is, they have to stop their dramatic process over and over again to break into folksy songs (WHY was this the plot assigned to music from a folk band?)
This show needed people who would say "no." It needed people willing to invest in a better project, and it needed all its extraordinary resources to not be thrown willy nilly at a piece that has no real reason for existing. There are hints of a good show here, but with a major overhaul - the most obvious element of which would be ditch the score (which is impossible, since that's why this show was created and given resources in the first place.) The Avett Brothers are good musicians and write well in their genre... but, at least based on this production, they are not dramatic narrative writers, nor is their style appropriate to this story in this setting. With the possible exception of "Satan Pulls the Strings", not a single song in any way advances the story. They feel more like background music for a film scene... but here all the action stops to listen... and there isn't much action in the first place. Something that wouldn't be a problem if there was any character development whatsoever ("Our Town" is a brilliant example of a show without much of a plot that nevertheless speaks to the heart of the human condition.)
I feel bad for all the artists involved in this show. I feel annoyed at the producers. I feel bad for the writers whose pieces were turned down in favor of this one. And I feel bad for the theatergoing audience who just want to see a good show...
John Davis
SWEPT AWAY is currently running at The Longacre Theatre on Broadway
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