‘Hadestown’ – Written by Anaïs Mitchell. Developed by director Rachel Chavkin. Presented by the Hanover Theatre and Conservatory for the Performing Arts, 2 Southbridge St., Worcester through April 2.
by Mike Hoban
Worcester – Anyone who’s been to New Orleans in the spring and summer can tell you that it can be brutally hot and sweaty, but who knew that it would be such a great stand-in for Hell? Hadestown, the mythical underworld industrial “community” that serves as the setting and title of the Broadway hit, is unmistakably N’awlins, from Rachel Hauck’s set to the smokin’ hot band playing the blues and gospel-influenced score. The national touring company of Hadestown, winner of eight 2019 Tony Awards (including Best Musical) and the 2020 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album, came marching into Worcester (through April 2nd) and it’s every bit as good as advertised.
Hadestown is not your typical Broadway show and score, which is what makes it so refreshing. Instead of adapting a popular movie into a marginal entertainment to cash in on the built-in audience – as has been the case with far too many Broadway productions for the last few decades – Hadestown goes back to the original source, namely ancient Greece, for its inspiration.
This time it’s the tale of star-crossed lovers Orpheus (Chibueze Ihuoma) and Eurydice (Hannah Whitley), who are separated not by family feuds or politics, but by a lack of food and heat. The lovers meet and soon fall in love after Orpheus serenades the beautiful Eurydice with his unfinished masterpiece “Epic”, but love may not be enough to keep them together (sorry, Captain and Tenille). Orpheus is a brilliant musician and poet, but art don’t pay the bills, so the cold and hungry Eurydice literally makes a deal with the devil, Hades (the deep-voiced Matthew Patrick Quinn), the god of the dead and the king of the underworld. She goes to work in his foundry and she gets her needs met, but with a price tag she never bargained for. It’s hard to not make the connection between exploitative corporate behavior and Hades’ operation, and Hades reminds me a bit of Stavros Papantoniadis, the owner of Stash’s Pizza chain in Boston, now being held in jail on forced labor charges, except he’s tall, debonaire and handsome instead of dumpy and slimy. Orpheus follows his love to the underworld to rescue her, and the plot hinges on whether or not he’ll be successful. Hades and his love Persephone (the rafters-shaking Lana Gordon) are having their own relationship struggles, and how they work toward solving them may hold the key to Orpheus and Eurydice’s reunification.
The cast is first-rate, with some spectacular performances by the lead players, as well as Nathan Lee Graham (whom Boston audiences may remember as the 2016 IRNE Award winner for his superb work in The Colored Museum) as Hermes, the narrator. The supporting cast, which includes the Fates and the Workers chorus, is outstanding and executes the choreography (which is more movement than dance, but stunning and intricate no less) with gorgeous precision. The band is nothing short of brilliant, straight out of the French Quarter, and brings down the house at the opening of the second act with the insanely enjoyable “Our Lady of the Underground” led by Gordon’s astonishing vocals as Persephone. This is a show that lives up to the hype, and if you’re tired of the cookie-cutter musicals Broadway is pushing out these days, this will renew your faith. For tickets and information, go to: https://thehanovertheatre.org/event/hadestown/
