The new Broadway musical “Once” doesn’t have a swinging chandelier, tap-dancing showgirls or brand-name stars. There’s only one set — and it doesn’t levitate.
The show wins its standing ovations the old-fashioned way: with a love story, great songs, compelling characters and inventive stagecraft.
At this point in Broadway history, this feels downright revolutionary.
“Once” is based on the Irish indie movie of the same name, whose song “Falling Slowly” won an Oscar in 2008. The flick’s cult rep was further secured when on-screen leads Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová — who also wrote the score — fell in love in real life.
Like the film, the show tracks the short, bittersweet relationship between two Dublin musicians. A struggling singer-songwriter, the dejected Guy (Steve Kazee) is about to pack in his guitar when he meets Girl (Cristin Milioti), a Czech immigrant who happens to play the piano.
The two quickly realize that they can make music together, but they tiptoe around the issue of romance because others lurk just outside the picture frame — Guy’s lassie moved to New York; Girl has a husband somewhere in Europe.
Adapted by Enda Walsh (“Misterman”), the show describes a hesitant romance that feels lifted from a 19th-century novel, with potential lovers who don’t express their feelings directly.
Director John Tiffany (“Black Watch”) wisely didn’t try to re-create the movie’s various locations, and set the action entirely in a semi-circular pub. As at New York Theatre Workshop, where the production originated in December, the audience can go onstage and buy drinks before the show — while the ensemble throws a live jam — and during intermission.
Which brings us to another great idea: All the cast members play their own instruments, reinforcing the idea that music is an integral part of the characters’ lives.
Even more impressive, the ensemble doesn’t miss a beat when it simultaneously plays and steps out to the impressionistic choreography by Steven Hoggett (“American Idiot”).
But this would be all moot if we didn’t root for the central couple.
Their characters may be named Guy and Girl, but Kazee and Milioti make them real individuals. Theirs are careful, sensitive takes on people who aren’t that easy to play.
As written, Guy is a passive, mopey romantic, but Kazee’s mix of vulnerability and low-key strength gives him dignity.
Milioti has an even bigger challenge as the quirky Girl, who dispenses dry Czech humor dressed like an Iron Curtain urchin. Long an off-Broadway treasure (“Stunning,” “The Little Foxes”), Milioti makes her character much more than the “manic pixie dream girl” of a Hollywood rom-com.
Guy’s songs have “heart and soul,” Girl tells him. She might as well be describing this gem of a show.