THE fun of covering Broadway is that, just when you think you’ve got the lay of the land, out of no where comes a show to shake up the terrain.
A year ago, the buzz was all about “Young Frankenstein.” And then big Stew (“Passing Strange”) and little Lin-Manuel Miranda (“In the Heights”) emerged to claim their raves and Tony Awards.
“Legally Blonde” is the commercial favorite – but the Tony goes to “Spring Awakening.”
Jukebox musicals are dead? Hello “Jersey Boys.”
My pick for this season’s terrain-changer: “Fela!” – choreographer Bill T. Jones‘ new dance musical that’s flying under the radar off-Broadway at 37 Arts. It opens Thursday.
What sounds like yet another pretentious installment of Cirque du Soleil is in fact a dynamic show about Fela Kuti, the Nigerian composer, performer and Black Power activist who died of AIDS in 1997.
His Afrobeat songs, which make up the score, include “Sorrow Tears & Blood,” “Water Get No Enemy” and “Zombie,” which aging New York hipsters will remember from their clubbing days in the ’70s and ’80s.
Broadway insiders are barely aware of the show; the only Fela they know is “The Most Happy Fela!”
As for their knowledge of African music – well, it probably doesn’t extend much beyond “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”
But a couple of theater owners are starting to pick up the scent. The Roundabout has checked out the show as a possible booking for Studio 54.
The owners of Circle-in-the-Square also have been spotted at 37 Arts, grooving as best they can to the Afrobeat.
If “Fela!” does make the move, then “Billy Elliot,” poised to pirouette away with the season, is going to have a rival at Tony time.
For starters, the charismatic lead, Sahr Ngaujah, will be in the hunt as Best Actor. This is one “unknown” who won’t be unknown much longer.
And Jones will give “Billy Elliot” director Stephen Daldry and choreographer Peter Darling a run for their money.
A legend in the avant-garde dance world, Jones, 56, won the Tony last year for his choreography for “Spring Awakening,” his first foray onto Broadway.
“My lawyer says I should do more Broadway shows,” he says, laughing. “I was offered ‘The Lion King,’ but I turned it down. It was a cartoon.
“When I was offered ‘Fela!’ I thought: This isn’t someone offering me another ‘Porgy and Bess.’ You know, I always get offered folkloric work, some moving story of black suffering. And I am not interested in those things.
“But here was a story of someone who was so troublesome, so lively, so toxic in his blend of ambition and wildness that I couldn’t resist.”
The musical charts Fela’s meteoric rise as a composer and performer – HMV ranks him No. 46 on its list of the 100 most influential musicians of the 20th century. He clashed repeatedly with Nigeria’s brutal dictatorships, which jailed and tortured him. Soldiers murdered his mother, also a political activist, by throwing her out a window.
Budgeted at well over $1 million, “Fela!” can’t make any money at the snug 37 Arts.
First-time producer Stephen Hendel concedes the musical has been designed to travel.
“Obviously, we’d like to get good notices,” he says, “and if we do, we’d certainly be interested in exploring Broadway. We’ve tried to create as compelling a piece as we can. Whether it’s commercial or not, who knows? We just decided to go for it.”