Grey Gardens (musical)

Grey Gardens is a musical with book by Doug Wright, music by Scott Frankel, and lyrics by Michael Korie, based on the 1975 documentary of the same title about the lives of Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale ("Big Edie") and her daughter Edith Bouvier Beale ("Little Edie") by Albert and David Maysles. The Beales were Jacqueline Kennedy's aunt and cousin, respectively. Set at Grey Gardens, the Bouviers' mansion in East Hampton, New York, the musical tracks the progression of the two women's lives from their original status as rich and socially polished aristocrats to their eventual largely isolated existence in a home overrun by cats and cited for repeated health code violations. However, its more central purpose is to untangle the complicated dynamics of their dysfunctional mother/daughter relationship.

Storyline

The first act depicts the characters in their heyday and is a speculative take on what their lives might have been like when they were younger, when Little Edie was 24 and Big Edie 47. The second act is set 32 years later in 1973 at the decaying Grey Gardens estate and hews closely to the Maysles Brothers' documentary in its portrayal of them in their later years, when Little Edie is 56 and Big Edie is 79. While the first act is almost entirely fictional (the central event, the engagement between Little Edie and Joseph Kennedy, never happened), the second act takes much of its dialogue and action directly from the film. The same actress who plays Big Edie in the first act plays Little Edie in the second act.

Productions

The musical opened Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons on February 10, 2006 and ran through April 30, 2006. Directed by Michael Greif with choreography by Jeff Calhoun, it starred Christine Ebersole, Mary Louise Wilson, and John McMartin. It received mixed reviews, but attracted particularly good reviews for Ebersole and Wilson. It earned five Lucille Lortel Award nominations and twelve Drama Desk Award nominations.

Christine Ebersole received the Obie Award, Drama Desk Award, Outer Critics Circle Award, a Special Citation from the New York Drama Critics' Circle, and the Drama League Award for Performance of the Year (2006) for her dual roles of Edith and Edie Beale in the Off-Broadway production.^[1]

The show opened, with revisions, on Broadway on November 2, 2006 at the Walter Kerr Theatre and closed on July 29, 2007, after 307 performances and 33 previews. The production was nominated for 10 Tony Awards in 2007, winning three, including awards for both Ebersole and Wilson in leading and featured actress categories, respectively.

According to an article in Playbill on November 21, 2007, composer Scott Frankel said there were no plans for a national tour based on the 2006-07 Broadway production, but "Dramatists Play Service, Inc. is handling the show's licensing to stock, amateur, university and resident theatres. Independent productions, which started playing in those markets in 2008."^[2]

In the spring of 2013, a three month run was mounted in Seattle as a co-production between the 5th Avenue Theatre and ACT Theatre, starring Patti Cohenour and Suzy Hunt.

In August 2015, a three week production was held at the Bay Street Theater, Sag Harbor, New York. Directed by Michael Wilson, the cast featured Betty Buckley, Rachel York, Matt Doyle (Joe/Jerry), Simon Jones (Major/Peale), Howard McGillin {George Gould Strong), James Harkness (Brooks Sr./Brooks Jr.), Sarah Hunt (Young Edie), Gracie Beardsley (Lee), and Dakota Quackenbush.^[3][4] Buckley and York star in a production at the Ahmanson Theatre, Los Angeles, California, again directed by Michael Wilson in July and August 2016.^[5]

International productions

The Australian premiere was a limited run from November 25 to December 4, 2011, presented by The Production Company at the Arts Centre Melbourne Playhouse. Directed by Roger Hodgman, the cast featured Pamela Rabe and Nancye Hayes. The Australian production was nominated for the Helpmann Award for Best Musical in 2012.^[6]

The Canadian premiere was presented from May 2–19, 2012 by Fighting Chance Productions in Vancouver, BC at the Jericho Arts Centre. The cast featured Cathy Wilmot (Big Edie - Act One/Little Edie - Act Two), Lucas Blaney (Joe Kennedy), Ranae Miller (Little Edie - Act One), Sue Sparlin (Big Edie - Act Two), Jack Rigg (Major Bouvier), Carman J. Price (Gould), Hal Rogers (Brooks), Angela Cotton (Jackie Bouvier) and Emma Cawood (Lee Bouvier) with direction and musical staging by Ryan Mooney and music direction by Caitlin Hayes.

A Japanese production opened on November 7, 2009 at Theater Creation in Tokyo and closed on December 6. The production then toured other Japanese cities, including Osaka and Nagoya.^[7]

A Brazilian production opened on March 15, 2013 at the Sala Municipal Baden Powell in Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro, performing 32 times and closing on May 5, 2013. With musical translations, adaptations, and production by Jonas Klabin with additional musical translations by Claudio Botelho, directed by Wolf Maya, musical direction Carlos Bauzys and Daniel Rocha. Starring Soraya Ravenle, Suely Franco, Carol, Puntel, Guilherme Terra, Sandro Christopher, Pierre Baitelli, Jorge Maya, Danilo Timm, Raquel Bonfante and Sofia Viamonte, with Mirna Rubim substituting Suely Franco during the last couple weeks. there were an approximate total 9.000 spectators. ^[8]

The Brazilian production was nominated:

• 3x to Cesgranrio Award (best light design for Luiz Paulo Nenen, best set design for Bia Junqueira, best actress for Suely Franco)
• 3x to APTR Award (best set design for Bia Junqueira, best supporting actress for Suely Franco, best production by popular vote Jonas Klabin (Oz))
• 1x to Shell Award (best actress for Suely Franco

The production's set design was also selected for exhibit at the Prague Quadrennial 2015, Bia Junqueira was one of the set designer selected to represent Brazil.

London

The musical will premiere in the UK at the Southwark Playhouse from January 7, 2016 to February 6. Directed by Thom Southerland, the cast stars Sheila Hancock and Jenna Russell.^[9]

Documentary

A documentary from Independent Lens, Grey Gardens: From East Hampton to Broadway, about the making of the musical, was screened on October 18, 2007, at the Hamptons International Film Festival Long Island,^[10] and was later shown on television on PBS stations.

Cast

The original Broadway characters and cast:

Song List

≈ denotes new songs written for the Broadway production.^[11]

Songs omitted in the Broadway production: "Toyland," "Body Beautiful Beale," "Being Bouvier," "Better Fall Out of Love," "Tomorrow's Woman," "Peas in a Pod" (Reprise).

Reception

The Broadway production was received enthusiastically by critics. Time Magazine named Grey Gardens the No. 1 best show to come out in 2006.^[12] In reviewing the Off-Broadway production, Ben Brantley, reviewing for The New York Times, wrote "A blend of gentle compassion and acute observation, Ms. Ebersole's performance is one of the most gorgeous ever to grace a musical." However, he also noted that the musical "tilts perilously toward cheap celebrity camp." with a "very long and finally tedious first act."^[13] Stephen Holden of The New York Times wrote that the musical "brings to mind two phrases seldom linked nowadays: 'Broadway musical' and 'artistic integrity'... the songs, with music by Scott Frankel and lyrics by Michael Korie, sustain a level of refined language and psychological detail as elevated as Stephen Sondheim's. The score is a meticulously fashioned piece of musical theater that gains in depth the more you listen to it."^[14]

Recordings

The Off-Broadway cast album was released on August 22, 2006.^[11]

The Original Broadway Cast album was released on March 27, 2007 through PS Classics.^[11][15] It was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.

Awards and nominations

Original Broadway production

Notes

References

• Grey Gardens, the Musical
• Production: Grey Gardens Working in the Theatre video from the American Theatre Wing, November 2006

External links

• Grey Gardens at the Internet Broadway Database
• Off-Broadway listing at lortel.org
• GREY GARDENS: From East Hampton to Broadway site for Independent Lens on PBS
• East of Doheny, production company
• Grey Gardens Online Information Website