s ta g e
Funeral Home
By
De bor a h hir s ch
A Little More Alive, at KC Rep, is pretty much DOA.
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don ipock
om is dead. The house is filled with acquaintances. So you head to the basement rec room and get high. Seems reasonable. But singing an upbeat pop song about smoking “Pot at a Funeral” — sample lyric: Pot at a funeral might seem unusual but so is today — while playing with an oversized childhood teddy bear and bouncing around on the furniture seems like maybe gilding the lily a bit. This is our introduction to at least one millennial’s state of mind in A Little More Alive, onstage at the Kansas City Repertory Theatre’s Copaken Stage. Nate (Van Hughes), a 28-year-old going on 15, lives at home with his dad, Gene (Daniel Jenkins), and was witness to his mother’s final illness. Maybe he’s letting off steam or indulging in denial, but the mood Hughes takes a swing at A Little More Alive. of this opening number doesn’t convince. The actors are capable, and they’re also fine “Pot at a Funeral” is just the first piece of singers. Jenkins, in particular, finds moments the puzzle that is this “world premiere new musical” (directed by Sheryl Kaller and writ- that allow him to briefly delve beneath the surface. But the musical jumps from song to ten by Nick Blaemire, who composed the song with little thread between, limiting such book, music and lyrics). “Stay 24 more hours,” opportunities for him and the rest of the cast. Nate pleads with Jeremy (Michael Tacconi), Several talented musicians (directed by Cian his younger and more successful brother, who wants to bolt home to another city. Jeremy has McCarthy) remain offstage and out of sight, playing songs that, despite some striking arthe right idea. The two-hour running time of rangements and a few that hit the mark, sound this play already feels like plenty. too similar over the course of the show. Home movies play at the back of the stage As is often the case with a Rep production, (video creation and projection design by Josh Lehrer), and we see the mother there. Gene, the star is the set (designed here by Wilson Chin). Configured in three tiers — the basealways behind the camera out of frame, documented the big events and minutiae of their ment, the living area and an upstairs — it’s visually appealing and splits apart to become lives. And as these survivors view the archive, a playground with hanging swings or a rethe remaining parent sees the past with difmote locale in Vermont (where a fifth charferent eyes than his boys, who carry an inexplicable anger at this man for something their acter, the too-cute Molly, portrayed by Kayla mother did. They discover just what when Foster, appears for two numbers). Video and set conspire best in Act 2’s “Driving,” when they find some letters in the attic — a cliché relied on here to set up the family dysfunction Hughes, Tacconi and Mendez sing on a bare stage with landscape whizpowering the plot. zing by behind them. The If only there were some ausensation of rootlessness thentic connections among A Little More Alive Through May 11 at KC Rep’s goes the furthest toward the characters. I tried but Copaken Stage, 13th Street making an impression, could find no reason to care and Walnut, 816-235-2700, some reason to give this about this family. It isn’t unkcrep.org thin, disjointed show any til the fifth number, “Nobody thought later. Tells You,” that the three men I’m not t h i s mu s iand a hanger-on hospice cal’s target audience, but I’d guess that the worker, Lizzie (Lindsay Mendez), express what 20-something set isn’t going to be fully satthe aftermath of this loss feels like. The delayed reaction may be Blaemire’s intention, but it’s isfied, either. When these family members finally express their joint sadness in “I Miss,” quickly followed by Gene’s “House to Myself,” it occurs too late in the game. Maybe with in which the middle-aged widower relishes some reconfiguring, this show, like the charbeing a bachelor and a slob again. acters’ relationships, can be put back together It’s all very flip — not taboo-busting enough and healed. to be edgy, not amusing enough to remember. The material is too inert to engage; even the show’s title fails to stick. E-mail deborah.hirsch@pitch.com
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