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and the answer was: so old.
Comparisons to Pat fromSNLs Its Pat!
and the child impersonator inOrphanare not wrong.
And, sorry, but Im sort of into it?
Yet the actual content of the musical is distressing, messy, full of psychological manipulation and passive aggression.
Because dear little Evan has certainly done something awful.
The letter that starts Dear Evan Hansen is actually written by Evan himself as a therapy exercise.
Can Evan produce more evidence of his nonexistent friendship with Connor?
If he teams up with computer wiz Jared (Nik Dodani), he can.
The cynicism guillotines through you, top to toe.
And he has so much pain to plumb!
That magnetic, musical pull toward Evan is at work in Chboskys movie version.
Not that the movie isnt tryingto seduce us.
Even at Evans, though, the colors are luscious, deeply shadowed greens and blues.
Amy Adams, on the other hand, suffers beatifically.
Levenson and the rest have cut some songs, reordered others, and rejiggered the ending.
Theres something to think about there: the dominance of artworks made by adults that amplify extreme teenage sorrow.
Are we hungry for an emotional scale we can no longer reach?
Did any of us actually get over our adolescence?
And thats why Im grateful for the un-teen, undead face of Ben Platt.
Its fine,fine,to make art that does this!
We do draw sustenance from one anothers blood.
