Bushnell opening nights traditionally start at 7:30 p.m. The Tuesday opening of “Motown the Musical” was reportedly changed so the cast and crew could take a few more precious minutes to ready themselves after traveling to Connecticut from Lansing, Mich., where the show had performed on Sunday afternoon.
What an image that conjures! Actors playing Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, The Temptations, The Supremes, The Four Tops, The Contours, Marvin Gaye, Martha and The Vandellas, The Marvelettes, Mary Wells and other Motown icons streaming off the tour bus and hitting the stage with moments to spare and much to prove, just as their real-life counterparts did on those legendary multi-act Motortown Revue tours of yore.
“Motown the Musical” has the energy and commitment of a hardworking band. A whole bunch of bands, in fact, beginning with a tense, high-intensity showdown between the Temps and the Tops. But the show, which plays at The Bushnell through Sunday, March 27, before hustling on to Toledo, is much more than a few stacks (or is that Stax?) of hit records.
“Motown The Musical” motors through 25 years of some of the most magical and influential music of all time with a fluid grace and style all its own. At times it behaves like the musical “Memphis,” dramatizing the harsh social issues behind the making of revolutionary popular music. Its Vietnam War pastiche mimics the psychedelic dysphoria of “Hair.” Other times, it’s as joyous as one of those rousing R&B/gospel melodramas that tour through the state. It’s got the familiarity of a jukebox musical without the rote routines of a tribute band. The theatrical flair, full-bodied choreography and canny recreations of well-known pop hits actually fuel a compelling plot about appealing, fabulously talented and occasionally unhinged human beings building a major cultural institution amid massive changes in the world at large.
The hits just keep on coming, so fast and fleet-footed that it’s a relief to have them broken up by scenes that show how Berry Gordy Jr. built Motown from a dream, a storefront and a community. If “Motown the Musical” was simply an unrelenting stream of song-and-dance numbers (as mesmerizing as some of those can be), it would be exhausting and empty. Indeed, when an act is introduced but not neatly integrated into the storyline, a fate that befalls the Jackson 5 in the second half of the show, you feel the drag no matter how cool it is to see “ABC” and “The Love You Save” performed live.
Not that the script is a paragon of dramatic depth or suspense. Many of the scenes begin by lowering expectations for what turn out to be turning points in Motown history. When Smokey Robinson (played with high-voiced, good-natured, laid-back charm by Jesse Nager) announces that he’s written a follow-up to his Mary Wells smash “My Guy,” he is mocked mercilessly by his Motown colleagues for calling it “My Girl.” A tremendous Temptations rendition of the tune sets them straight. Likewise, when Gordy tells Diana Ross that her debut as a solo act, following her separation from The Supremes, will be with “a waltz,” the diva’s in a state of disbelief — until the song is unveiled as “Reach Out and Touch,” delivered in the show as an extended audience-participation choral love fest.
The 26-strong cast juggles over 100 different roles, a whirlwind quick-change ensemble that may have (to pull one player at random) Rashad Naylor soloing as Jackie Wilson (the legendary vocalist for whom a young Gordy penned the hit “Reet Petite”) in one scene, then fading into the background as a Four Top or Contour or Jackson, spouting a few lines as songwriter Brian Holland, then re-emerging for a goofy moment as Rick James (whose “Superfreak” is far from the only number in the show that will have you marveling “That was Motown too?!”).
Only four performers get to stay in the same character all evening, though they have at least as many costume changes as their comrades in the ensemble. Allison Semmes plays Diana Ross as a winsome, trusting teen who matures rapidly into a strident, self-aware woman with star power to spare. Nager’s Robinson is a sounding board for the other characters, a non-threatening presence that can somehow genially withstand all the turmoil he witnesses; the character seems like an unflappable best-buddy sitcom stereotype until Nager starts to sing and all this unbridled emotion pours out. Rodney Earl Jackson, Jr has the tricky role of Marvin Gaye, who’s angry, sultry, drug-addled and sexy all at once. Muse not only rises to this challenge, at Tuesday’s performance he was the first one to succeed in getting the audience to clap and sing along. (It was a pretty guarded crowd that night; it’s easy to imagine the weekend audience getting more into the spirit of things.)
It’s Chester Gregory as Gordy who must carry the show, singing several solo numbers that dispense with supporting vocals and the ensemble entirely. Some of these are tunes written expressly for this show, and Gregory puts them across with a fervor that lifts them to the level of the more familiar songs. It’s a commanding role, but one that must also convey fragility and depression. Gordy is shown to be a flawed, quick-tempered workaholic who can’t sustain a relationship, yet becomes revered as the father figure in a vast musical enterprise that’s frequently referred to as “family.”
So add “family saga” to all the other genres that “Motown the Musical” fits into its frenzied, multi-styled, medley-mad dance mix. It’s remarkable for a show that proclaims “It’s What’s in the Grooves That Counts,” and which could so easily coast on its endless medleys of hits, to care so much about characters and stories and structure, and also work every angle it knows to be a full-on crowd-pleaser. Signed, sealed, delivered, it’s yours.
“MOTOWN THE MUSICAL” is at The Bushnell, 166 Capitol Ave., Hartford, through March 27. Performances are Tuesday at 8 p.m., Wednesday and Thursday at 7:30 p.m., Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m. and Sunday at 1 and 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $25.50 to $121.50. Information: 860-987-5900, bushnell.org.
Editor’s Note: This review has been updated to reflect a casting change. The role of Marvin Gaye is being played by Rodney Earl Jackson, Jr.
