Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, MacEwan University Theatre Arts. Daniela Masellis (set design), costume design (Skye Grinde), sound design (David Bowden), lighting design (Ken Matthews). Photo by Brianne Jang, BB Collective Photography.
By Liz Nicholls, .ca
A black box theatre at MacEwan University (the Tim Ryan Theatre Lab) has been transformed into a red and black Russian cabaret — overhung with velvet draperies, twinkling lights, a glittering chandelier, imperial insignia of the old regime.
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And we’re sitting in clusters, some of us at cabaret tables, others tucked here and there in between. There is a “stage,” yes, a long scarlet gangway, up a stair or two, and a couple of other stages, too, for an assortment of musicians. But in Jim Guedo’s MacEwan University production of Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, the cast of 14 and the orchestra of eight (supplemented by actors who also pick up a violin, an accordian, a clarinet) only ever touch down on it briefly. They’re scattered through the club; they thread their way among us, always on the move, sitting next to us, dancing and singing, mingling.
I’ve seen the musical twice before in New York, once in a tent and once in a full Broadway theatre, sacked for the occasion with interlocking catwalks, to make that audience immersion possible. And this production, like those, feels like a party. I got a chance, unexpectedly, to experience it on the final weekend of a sold-out run.
I say ‘experience’ because we’re included in the storytelling of Dave Malloy’s boldly offbeat through-sung “electropop opera,” with its 19th century love story, and its wildly eclectic score, a mix of electronic rock, opera recitative, Russian folk music flavours.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, MacEwan University Theatre Arts. Daniela Masellis (set design), costume design (Skye Grinde), sound design (David Bowden), lighting design (Ken Matthews). Photo by Brianne Jang, BB Collective Photography.
The design (Daniela Masala’s set, Ken Matthews’ glowing lighting, Skye Grinde’s clever costumes, David Bowden’s sound design) embraces the audience in this intricate multi-optic enterprise. And so does Guedo’s theatrical and inventive stagecraft, which propels a story excavated from a 70-page chunk of Tolstoy’s door-stopper War and Peace.
The characters sometimes refer to themselves in the third person, or provide their own stage directions, all in song. And they’re playful about our involvement. In the catchy prologue number, they give us some advice. “You’re gonna have to study up a little bit/ if you wanna keep up with the plot/ cause it’s a complicated Russian novel/ everyone’s got nine different names.” The program has a centrefold family tree, with arrows, and relationships. “Mariya’s old-school, Sonya’s good, Natasha’s young, and Andrey isn’t here.”
Guedo’s cast of student actors (with students working the crew, too, under the mentorship of theatre pros) are about to graduate and emerge into the big bad world of professional theatre. And they throw themselves into the challenges, musical and dramatic, of this innovative musical at full tilt, with full commitment and then some: a talent scout alert.
At the centre of the complications is a love story that turns out to be the story of innocence lost. While her betrothed (Nathaniel Cherry as the dashing Prince Andrey) is away at war, beautiful young Natasha, unmoored by the heady whirl of Moscow society (as Lisa Kotelniski conveys so convincingly), is tempted into a ruinous affair with the callow married swaggerer Anatole, conjured in Liam Lorrain’s performance.
Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, MacEwan University Theatre Arts. Daniel Masellis (set design), Skye Grinde (costume design), David Bowden (sound design), Ken Matthews (lighting design). Photo by Brianne Jang, BB Collective Photography.
The Pierre of the title, played compellingly by strong-voiced Matthew Gregg in a top-drawer performance, is a depressed nobleman philosopher having a mid-life existential crisis in a sea of booze. Pierre’s scornful, amoral wife Helene (the striking Layne Labbe) is amusing herself with Natasha’s destruction. And there are notable performances by Ashlin Turcotte as Natasha’s friend Sonya (who gets the musical’s only real pop ballad, and nails it), Jaden Leung, Camryn Bauer, Marina Mikhaylichenko.
Some of the voices do seem more suited to the musical theatre idiom than the jagged and demanding operatic intervals into which Malloy’s adventurous score pulls them. But the characters spring, intensely, to life. And they’re surrounded by a zestful ensemble, including such exuberant figures as the troika driver Balaga (Kohen Foley), who flings himself manically through the pulsing number devoted to him.
Like the music and the costumes by Grinde which put jeans, 19th century military jackets and ballgowns together, the choreography by Anna Kumin finds a way to be both “historical” and contemporary. The party energy from characters who are also narrators is non-stop.
There’s something irresistible about this innovative musical, with its soulful ending. In a student production, full of emerging talent, the idea of the comet, that wrests something beautiful, life-changing, and hopeful from the imminence of total destruction seems to speak to our Moment.
Last performance Sunday Feb. 16. It’s officially sold-out. But if you have a chance, you might score a return ticket, in person at the MacEwan box office (1111 104 Ave.), half an hour before the show.
