He doesn’t offer definitive diagnoses, treatments or prognoses, but he does ensure that moments don’t pass without contemplation and human-to-human interaction. Masks and vaccine cards are required, of course.īyrne, a successful solo artist and former vocalist for the Talking Heads, has crafted a 100-minute evening of original songs and classic hits, all of them dissecting and commenting on the fabric of American society. Its return engagement had been delayed because of COVID-19, but it’s now earned a rightful spot amongst the marquees, this time at the St. The stirring song cycle, featuring infectious rhythms and moving lyrics, first played Midtown Manhattan in 2019.
NEW YORK - David Byrne’s American Utopia is back on Broadway and better than ever. Photo courtesy of Matthew Murphy © 2019 / Provided by BBB with permission. As Byrne and his band trade verses, relay-style, giving identity to each of the dead and beckoning the audience to say the name, American Utopia demands a reckoning on its way to the promise of its own.Photo: David Byrne’s American Utopia features, from left, Jacquelene Acevedo, David Byrne, Mauro Refosco, Chris Giarmo, Angie Swan and Bobby Wooten III.
Monáe, Byrne tells us, loved the idea of a “white man of a certain age” singing the song – “Hell You Talmbout” – that presents a roll call of men and women of color killed by police. Never more so than with a song that comes near the end of the show, which Byrne introduces by noting he got special permission from its author, Janelle Monáe, to cover.
It’s a message, bluntly stated by Byrne more than once, that few messengers could pull off, but somehow this awkward man with the robot moves and eccentric voice does just that. Weaving the classics with the new, American Utopia emerges as a complete, consistent work, as Byrne ties them together with purpose: No visible wires, no props to distract, the show seems to call for a dismantling of the barriers, walls and distractions that keep human beings from connection. The solid offering of Talking Heads songs – “This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody),” “I Zimbra,” “Slippery People,” “Once in a Lifetime,” “Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On),” “Blind,” “Burning Down the House,” “Road to Nowhere” – are performed faithfully to the originals while sounding as fresh as they did on first listen. Stand-outs include “Every Day Is A Miracle,” “Gasoline and Dirty Sheets” and “I Dance Like This,” with a chorus that seems to answer another of the long-standing questions around the man: Pumped through an excellent sound system, much of the set list is drawn from his latest album, a terrific collection co-written, almost entirely, by Byrne and Brian Eno. While the Byrne of Rhode Island School of Design attends to the show’s look, Byrne of CBGB doesn’t let the music get short shrift. His new show, he suggests, is intended to give the people what they want (the compelling dancer Chris Giarmo practically stages a side show, his face coated in Dylan’s Rolling Thunder white and always in motion with eye rolls, head shakes and tongue pokes). In one song introduction, Byrne notes that humans like to watch other humans even more than they like to look at colorful bags of potato chips. Enclosed within three silver beaded walls, exposed in a flood of white light or dwarfed by tall shadows, Byrne and his marching-band-style ensemble scuttle about the set in choreographer Annie-B Parson’s constantly shifting formations of rows, groupings and chess piece moves. The starkness of American Utopia is Byrne’s latest method of shrinking his head, demanding our focus where he wants it: On 12 barefoot human beings, each in an identical normal-sized gray suit (Byrne, like late-career Bowie, seems perfectly comfortable sharing the spotlight with his past, tossing his body in Burning Down The House contortions, his hand at one point manipulated by dancers into the famous arm chop). No cables connecting guitars to amps (in fact, no amps), no mic stands, no monitors, no props (once he ditches the rubber brain that accompanies show opener “Here”) and not a stick of furniture save a momentary small desk at which Byrne makes his introduction – I can’t imagine the flourish isn’t intended to remind of Spalding Gray, the late monologist and central figure of the downtown renaissance that gave rise to The Talking Heads – and, later, a solitary light-bulb-exposed floor lamp carried onstage but slinking off by itself once usefulness expires. He has eliminated all but the necessary from his stage. American Utopia (no credited director but Alex Timbers listed as production consultant) finds Byrne still exploring concepts of perspective and stagecraft in determining where, exactly, he wants his audience to focus.
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