Broadway: "Dead Outlaw"

The classic template for a musical requires a strong-willed hero with a larger than life wish. "Kimberly Akimbo"--despite its oddness--could be a Richard Rodgers show. Kimberly wants to fight back against penury and parental neglect; by doing so, she will realize her ultimate dream to travel the world. She could easily be a soul sister of Maria the postulant, hoping to reform greedy children and discover her life's purpose before the 11:00 number.

If you're pursuing a massive wish, you're going to encounter enemies and tricksters. Kimberly is doing battle with her villainous father, who sort of (subconsciously) wishes that Kimberly were already dead. Of course the postulant Maria has to square off against a Nazi boy, who would murder her before allowing her to run off and open a little Northeastern American inn.

Big wishes, big enemies. These are the facets that lend urgency to a musical story.

So the musical "Dead Outlaw" is subversive. The protagonist, Elmer, doesn't clearly want anything. If he can't say what he wants, then nothing stands in his way. It's strange to see a musical comedy about a total failure. Elmer's story is poignant in part because no one--no one--other than the writer David Yazbek would think to put it on a Broadway stage.

In the early scenes, Elmer is just a kid, eager to avoid chatting with his weird aunt. We are conditioned to expect a big Disney-esque solo number--"Go the Distance" or "Part of Your World." Instead, the writers deliver a shock. Elmer's dad dies suddenly, and the "mom" has news: "You were never my child. Your actual mother had you at sixteen. She was unmarried. Unacceptable. We constructed a fictional story. Anyway, that woman isn't sixteen anymore; she can take care of you. I'm a widow, short on funds. Leave my house."

This isn't played in an epic or tragic way; the anvil just falls from the sky, and this seems true to life. Elmer doesn't get a few minutes to think about his trauma. He just becomes drawn to alcohol. In a crucial scene, he has a choice to build something like a respectable life. His reliable girlfriend says, "I love you." And it's this love--not an injustice, not a betrayal--that sends Elmer spiraling. He can't handle love. He drinks until he pukes, brags (falsely) about having killed a man, and ruins his own semi-stable reputation. It's a short hop from this bar scene to a botched train robbery and to an early death.

All is a subtle way of saying this: "Look how unsatisfying the standard Broadway template is. This is what an actual life resembles."

I didn't love the second half the way I loved the first half. After Elmer dies, his corpse travels all over the country. Various characters pay money for possession of the corpse, and they are just as outrageous and misguided as Elmer himself. They have half-planned schemes that fail badly. They lie to others, and they refuse to take some time to look in the mirror. So this is a musical about a theme; it's not a musical about a protagonist. The theme is this: We're all ridiculous.

I respect Yazbek's braininess; I just wish Elmer could continue to sing in the second half of the show.

This will open to glowing reviews; it will score a few Tony nominations; it will close quickly, because it's a bit too cerebral for Broadway. My prediction. In any case, it's worth seeing.

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