I’m not sure just how it was that I never saw The Who’s Tommy until Stray Dog Theatre’s current production. So I came in as a neophyte, especially since I really wasn’t a fan of The Who back in the day. The show is a fantasy that lends itself to lots of variations and interpretations.
In fact, the official versions of it have dissimilarities, from the original double album to the film. the movie and even the earliest productions of it as a live rock opera. So the flexibility is part of the tradition. This is Stray Dog’s second production of it; the earlier one in 2011 was steampunk Goth in style.
There’s a great deal to be said for director Justin Been’s current version, starting with the scenic design of Josh Smith, modern and non-representative, all in white and tones of gray. All the better to show off Tyler Duenow’s lighting, which is quite remarkable, sometimes perfectly psychedelic and other times putting to great use color and smoke, and Been’s own projection design. Music director and keyboardist Jennifer Buchheit and the band are center stage, perfectly appropriate. I send a nod out to the appearance of a French horn in the mix. Its mellowness adds just the right touch to at least one number, and it turns out that in an earlier version, there’s actually a song about a character’s French horn.
It’s early in World War II in England. A young couple fall in love and marry. Captain Walker (Phil Leveling) goes off to war, leaving his bride (Kelly Howe, in her SDT debut) alone and pregnant. Before the child is born, she is told her husband is missing and presumed dead. After the war ends, she’s rebuilding her life with her son Tommy, and being wooed by another man. But her husband is alive and returns to their home to find her in the other man’s arms. A fight ensues in front of the little boy, escalates unexpectedly and the husband kills the boyfriend. “Don’t tell what happened,” they instruct the child, but the husband is arrested, tried and found not guilty. It’s around this time that they realize that the child – who presumably has been developing normally until then – seems to be blind, deaf and mute. They repeatedly have him assessed by various doctors, clinics and, um, alternative therapies, as we’d term them today.
Somewhere in the years of this, while in the care of his none-too-gentle cousin Kevin (Tristan Davis) and his pals at a youth club, Tommy ends up at a pinball machine. For those of us who have had “Pinball Wizard” as an ear worm ever since they started to read about the show – this is when It All Happens. It turns out he’s a whiz at pinball, indeed, a, uh, wizard. (Nobody seems to point out that this means he actually isn’t blind, apparently.) And this changes his life, he becomes a celebrity, a cult figure. At some point, his mother breaks a mirror at their home in her frustration over his still-automaton-like behavior and KA-POW!, he’s cured. This only increases his fame. He leaves home for an independent life. What he does with the fame, what he learns about himself and how he reconciles the two are the conclusion of the show.
Tommy is played by three actors as he ages. The adult Tommy, who also acts as a narrator is Kevin Corpuz, doing a bangup job. The pre-school Tommy is Alora Marguerite Walsby. Alora is, to be sure, adorable, but also manages to keep the expressionless, staring-straight-ahead-face so important to the role. Leo Taghert plays Tommy around age 10, and does a fine job, plus he sounds great. Howe and Leveling hold up their end of things well, and several of the supporting players, like Davis’ skeezy Kevin and Cory Frank as creepy Uncle Ernie stand out.
Most of the color in the show comes from the aforementioned lights and Eileen Engel’s costumes, so it’s no surprise that the pinball machine is mostly glass with a white frame and little fairy lights inside. But it’s difficult to recognize unless one is familiar with the story – or at least that song – and it’s often hidden in a huddle of actors. A few audience members I overheard were confused about the whole thing and couldn’t identify the machine onstage, regardless of how central to the story it is.
There’s no credit given for sound design; Jane Wilson is the audio engineer. One was not blasted out of one’s pew by the sound levels, which was very appreciated. But as the evening went on the chorus’ singing was rather blurred, which may have added to the pinball confusion; it makes the story’s details much harder to grasp. Other than that, the sound was far more than satisfactory.
A very different Tommy, certainly. If a very different sort of pinball machine than those some of us remember is the only thing to kvetch about, on the whole, it’s a very positive experience.
The Who’s Tommy
through October 26
Stray Dog Theatre
2336 Tennessee Ave.
314-865-1995