Sweet Hereafter

I was at the Berkeley Theatre Thursday night for a musical called Life After by newcomer Britta Johnson, who did book, music, and lyrics. The story revolved around Alice (Ellen Denny) who was coming to terms with the accidental death of her father Frank (Dan Chameroy). Her older sister Kate (Rielle Braid) and mom Beth (Tracy Michailidis) had to cope in their own way. Meanwhile, a parade of condolence wishers made their way through from school mates, to neighbours, and business colleagues.

I was struck by the musicality of the work. First, kudos for sticking to a cohesive theme instead of the pastiche of different styles that  musical theatre works often use nowadays. Second, the lyrics and music seemed modern and fresh, somewhere between the rap verbal density of Hamilton and the verbatim naturalism of London Road. The inclusion of a small, but live, orchestra was also note-worthy.

But I felt Life After had too much plot and so seemed a bit scattered. I wasn't surprised during the talkback to learn that there was a lot of workshopping, and late into the production too, to expand it from the shorter version presented at the Toronto Fringe Festival. Along the way, it got a bit overstuffed. As such, I was not deeply invested in some of the characters to emotionally react to their big scenes. Overall though it was a good start for Johnson. It'll be interesting to chart her progress since she is the inaugural Crescendo Series artist for The Musical Stage Company and they have committed to staging her works for three years.