Smithereen Productions follows-up last month's endearingly funny production of Spike Heels this month with a surprisingly intimate production of the rock musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Staged in the Carte Blanche Studio Theatre, the production has the feel of a local band playing at a bar in Bay View somewhere . . . even with the house completely packed as it was this past Saturday, it felt like a very close look at a very, very complex character.
In many ways, John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask's Hedwig isn't a rock musical so much as it is a rock concert that has mutated into a monologue. The story in question is delivered almost entirely by the main character--played here with admirable emotional dexterity by Jordan Gwiazdowski.
This is Gwiazdowski's final performance as a Milwaukeean and it's one hell of a swan song. John Cameron Mitchell gives the lead a towering challenge and Gwiazdowski does an excellent job with it. Aside from the considerable challenge of looking appealingly androgynous in a way that boldly straddles the sexes, Gwiazdowski is challenged to bring a presence to the stage that is both untouchably goddess-like and touchingly vulnerable. He has to seem both victim and victimizer. It's a deeply, deeply dichotomous character. The mood of the piece switches gears so quickly and so fluidly. that all the dichotomies have to more or less be onstage at the same time. And that's a hell of a challenge . . . and it's a challenge that Gwiazdowski handles with more than enough poise to also effectively tackle the vocals in music that poses its own difficulties.
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Stephen Trask's music and lyrics are a slightly incogruous mix of styles. There's something in the back end of Gwiazdowski's delivery of the lines that sounds hauntingly similar to David Bowie . . . which is no coincidence as the music itself is inspired by Bowie's work. (Bowie co-produced an L.A. production of the show a while back.) There are also songs and moods that are reminiscent of considerably more aggressive styles like Iggy Pop and the Dead Kennedys. (On one of the heavier pieces in the show, one can hear a subtle Jello Biafra-esque quality to Gwiazdowski's vocals.) More than just glam rock, there are elements of the show that feel VERY hardcore punk. As Gwiazdowski dramatically walks offstage into the final fade-out, he's nearly nude. The stage is littered with the emotional train wreck that just took place. It's a great ride from beginning to end.
The band here couldn't be better suited to this kind of musical. Colleen Schmitt and the musicians from T.I.M.: The Improvised Musical have a canny sense of stage theatrics that serves the production well. It may have seemed like an obvious choice to show's director Jacob Bach, who is also responsible for T.I.M., but they work with the material beautifully. Having performed together pretty intensively, they band comes to the production with a kind of familiarity that feels appealingly organic . . . just like a good rock show should be . . . Jacob Bach, who probably has one of the coolest-looking credits I've seen in a program lately "(Director, Producer, Wig Master)," has done an excellent job putting together something that feels both toweringly epic and deeply, deeply intimate.
Smithereen Productions' staging of Hedwig and the Angry Inch runs through May 11th at the Carte Blanche Studio Theatre on 1024 South 5th Street. For ticket reservations, visit Brown Paper Tickets.com
