December 2 Marie Christine

Abstract Consider this: an unpalatable new musical— decidedly not musical comedy— from some of the theatre’s top talents, with a provocative theme; a pessimistic outlook; unconventional music (at least by Broadway standards); strikingly modern staging and scenery; and a bunch of characters so unappetizingly drawn that you wouldn’t especially want to go to dinner with them. A recipe for exciting, groundbreaking musical theatre that will shake up the form and convert the pagan nonbelievers? Or is it a recipe for disaster? The show I am describing, obviously, is Michael John LaChiusa and Graciela Daniele’s Marie Christine. But no; I am speaking of Jason Robert Brown and Harold Prince’s Parade. Well, actually not; I was referring to Stephen Sondheim and Prince’s Merrily We Roll Along, or perhaps Sondheim and Prince’s Pacific Overtures. Although if truth be told, I was really, truly, actually talking about Sondheim, Prince, and Michael Bennett’s Follies.