Review of: 13 the Musical

There’s an awful lot of talent on the stage of the Jacobs Theatre in the current show 13. There are 13 gifted adolescents with an onstage band comprised of 13 year old musicians. The candy-colored pop-up set and costumes are by David Farley who did such extraordinary work on the recent revival of Sunday in the Park with George. The show is choreographed by Broadway wunderkind Christopher Gattelli (South Pacific, Alter Boyz) and the musical direction is by Tom Kitt, composer of the disarming Next to Normal. Finally, there’s the music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown a Tony Award winner for Parade. 13 is upbeat, energetic and eager to please. So why does it feel so bland and generic?

13 tells the story of thirteen year old Evan Goldman (Graham Phillips) who is about to celebrate his bar mitzvah. Uprooted from his native New York City to rural Illinois due to his parent’s divorce, it’s the classic displacement tale of wanting to be popular with the “cool” kids at school. As the sophisticated outsider, Evan needs to have the hippest bar mitzvah party in order to feel accepted (by a group of kids who are having their first exposure to Jewish customs no less).He is at first befriended by two other outsiders (read nerds), the bookish Patrice (Allie Trimm) and Archie (the show-stealing Aaron Simon Gross) who suffers from muscular dystrophy.

The high school is filled with the usual archetypes: Brett, the dumb, blonde jock (Eric M. Nelsen), his attractive cheerleader girl friend Kendra (Delaney Moro) and of course Kendra’s ‘best friend’ the scheming Lucy (Elizabeth Egan Gillies). The rest of the student body is of the quirky-perky persuasion. In order to recruit guests to his party, Evan finds himself playing Cupid to the love machinations of his fellow students. Archie secretly lusts for Kendra (as does Evan), Lucy wants Brett and of course Patrice has the hots (unrequited, of course) for Evan. These intrigues come to their climax in the one enthusiastic, show stopping number of the evening “Getting Ready” which takes place at the local Cineplex (expertly staged by director Jeremy Sams).

Brown acquits himself skillfully with songs than range from power ballads to rock-a-billy blues (the wonderful acappella “Bad Bad News”). Yet his message that for self-acceptance it’s better (in the long run) to be outside the mainstream rather than in the status quo doesn’t really register as anything exciting. It’s also not helpful that an another musical this season, the off-Broadway Saved, covered the same territory with much more interesting results (dealing with much edgier material such as same–sex attraction and born-again Christianity).

Ultimately, there’s nothing terribly wrong with 13 but there’s nothing terribly right either. One feels like a bit of a troll for not liking the production more (especially when it practically screams out for admiration). 13 feels like a nice sugar rush that ends up leaving you with a slight headache.

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