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"Rooms: A Rock Romance," the Candy Project's third small-cast contemporary musical, used bold staging, strong singing, an engaging story and a musically satisfying score to lift a Wednesday preview audience.
The show, playing at the Bancroft Street Market for two more weekends, looks like a hit. Yet it stopped short of emotionally engaging that preview audience as deeply as it might have.
The script by Paul Scott Goodman and Miriam Gordon tells the story of Ian (David Rubio), a shy, reclusive guitarist and songwriter in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1977. His life is changed forever when a stranger named Monica (Jaimie Pruden) commissions him to write a song for a friend's bat mitzvah.
Brassy, confident Monica, is everything Ian is not: driven to find fame and fortune as a singer, and ready for WIT (Monica-speak for whatever it takes) to get there. That includes prying Ian out from behind his black bedroom door.
"I got everything I need right here," Ian responds. "My records, my guitar, my lava lamp."
The bat mitzvah song hilariously outs Monica's friend as bisexual, and Ian and Monica soon are on their way to London, forming a punk-rock duo called The Diabolicals and snagging a recording contract. When EMI buys their record company, it's a ticket to New York.
Ian doesn't want to go — he's petrified of flying and tired of punk rock — but by then the partners have become a couple. Soon her driving ambition and his drinking are tearing them apart.
While Rubio and Pruden are strong singers (both are vocal majors at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln), their vocal styles are markedly different. His is a softer, warmer sound, sometimes overpowered by her brassy tone and strong vibrato — qualities that suit her character.
While the story has a huge emotional arc for both characters to play, more nuanced acting would help us connect more with these characters. His introversion and inebriation, her inner conflict and moments that call for tenderness didn't always register as fully as they might have.
Still, they're easy on the eyes, and Rubio, in particular, radiates a warmth that gets you rooting for Ian. He does some nice guitar picking, a skill he learned for this show.
The audience is seated along opposite walls, with the playing area between them. Director Daena Schweiger does a fine job of staging, with one caveat: As the actors sing to one side, their words are sometimes lost to the other. Even in this small space, body microphones might be needed.
Music director Zachary Peterson leads a tight five-piece combo, and balance with the singers was generally good. Jennifer Pool's layered costumes allow for quick changes behind walls at either end of the playing area, a necessity with a cast of just two.
The show runs 90 minutes with no intermission. It contains adult themes, including discussion of sex, abortion, drugs and alcohol use.
Contact the writer:
402-444-1269, bob.fischbach@owh.com
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