Review: In "The Last Five Years," love hurts as it hums along
Repost of Maura's review in Charleston City Paper
Marriage is one hell of a time warp. Whether it goes the distance or goes down in flames, it more often than not lingers in the frontal lobe for the long haul, drawing you back to moments grand or grim, coloring notions of future romantic love forever.
Perhaps that’s why the musical “The Last Five Years,” the fan favorite with music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown, continues to find productions and audiences, including one now up at Pure Theatre that plays through Nov. 30. Directed by Sharon Graci, the intermission-less, latest Charleston go at this seemingly perennially popular work here features musical direction by Misha Pekar, as well as an effective set designed by Madison Berry that allows for the various scenes and songs that propel the plot backward and forward (more on that in a minute).
While the trajectory of the married couple in this two-hander may or may not be built for the long haul, the work appears to be. It has been around a lot longer than the time logged in its title, debuting in 2001 at Illinois’s Northlight Theater, then enjoying an Off Broadway run the following year at New York City’s Minetta Lane Theater. It was thereafter adapted for a 2015 film featuring Anna Kendrick and Jeremy Jordan, and even kept chugging through the pandemic with a streamed production.
The star-crossed, singing sweeties are emerging novelist Jamie and foundering actress Cathy, who approach their sung stories from either end of their five-year interlude. Out of the gate, we see the dejected Cathy, waxing melancholic about the dissolution of her marriage by way of the opening number, “Still Hurting.” From there, she walks back that bond in tunes that alternate with those sung by Jamie, finding her way from failure to first blush of love.
Shift to Jamie and we see those titular five years from the get-go, fueled by the rapture of new love. He launches as a hot-and-bothered new paramour zestfully rhapsodizing about breaking his mother’s heart in “Shiksa Goddess,” and breaking the circle of his Jewish family’s marital expectations to instead fall in love with a gentile.
We then toggle back and forth through a soft parade of songs ping-ponging between Jamie’s rapidly accelerating ego propelled by the success of his novel and Cathy’s deflating sense of self in the face of career struggles and her husband’s self-love fest.
Jamie is portrayed by the versatile Manny Houston, who sings and also tickles on-stage ivories. So you know, Houston’s theatrical career seems to be in much better stead than that of the character Cathy. After cutting his artistic teeth on Charleston stages and at the College of Charleston, the New York-based performer has recently made his Broadway debut in Justin Pack’s “Illinoise.” A capable, charismatic entertainer with warm, engaging vocals, he lends requisite spark to the ever-confident husband.
As Cathy, singer songwriter Heather Rice brings similarly impressive bona fides to the show, having performed as an opener for Joan Osborne, Sheryl Crow and Lady A, and co-writing the song, “Like Make Believe” for Mark Bryan (of Hootie and the Blowfish fame). She provides a lovely, poignant counterpoint, even though the night I saw the show her pipes were reported to be a bit challenged by infirmity. Still, she held her own and matched Houston well as they manifest through music the heights and depths of their union.
On that music and book. I cannot say the work itself was particularly emotionally resonant for me, though the audience that night at Pure was moved to rousing applause. And it has been a crowd-pleaser for more than two decades, finding a following that might be truer than the story’s love turns out to be.
On a quick Wikipedia glance, it turns out the musical was largely autobiographical, and even seems to have caused a bit of litigious drama between the creator and his estranged wife when it was unleashed into the world. That could be the topic of a future work for Brown, if perhaps one with sharper teeth.
Still, with Houston and Rice’s pleasing vocals, the evening goes down much easier than did the courtship of Jamie and Cathy, with one number washing over you to the next. And its overall conceit of cracking a love affair, and flipping its chronology, poses provocative questions on the curious workings of the human heart, meted out in measures until it finally fades to silence.
PURE Theatre stages “The Last Five Years” by Jason Robert Brown until Nov. 30. Adult tickets $47, or find multiple chances to pay-what-you-will. Learn more at puretheatre.org.