Musical Review—“The Life” at Encores

The Life

Music by Cy Coleman; lyrics by Ira Gasman

Book by David Newman, Ira Gasman and Cy Coleman

Adapted and directed by Billy Porter; choreography by AC Ciulla

Performances March 16-20, 2022

New York City Center, 131 West 55th Street, NYC

nycitycenter.org

The cast of The Life (photo: Joan Marcus)

When it got to Broadway in 1997 after years of workshops and an off-Broadway production, the musical The Life—set in the sordid Times Square of the late ’70s—was seen as a clunky stew of cutesiness and moralizing, sleaze and sympathy, with songs not up to composer Cy Coleman’s best.

So Billy Porter’s decision to revamp The Life for Encores and for our current climate is not surprising. The biggest change is that Queen, the Times Square prostitute caught between her drug-addicted lover, Fleetwood, and the imposing pimp, Memphis, who runs the area, is now a trans woman. This adds another layer of subjugation to a character who’s an outsider desperately looking for a fresh start.

Porter has also split Jojo, the would-be pimp who plays both sides between Fleetwood and Memphis, into two roles, with the new half the older, wiser narrator who recounts the unfolding events from the perspective of four decades and comments on what happened and why, not only among these people but also in the wider culture. 

That means, for example, that we see the infamous Daily News headline from 1975, “Ford to New York: Drop Dead,” early in the show. But it’s at the beginning of act two, when both Jojos—and the ensemble—don Reagan and Trump masks and sing about the similarities between these two presidents, 40 years apart, who did nothing about a plague that would kill many Americans, where Porter channels his righteous rage.

Although it comes across as heavyhanded, almost glib in its elated anger, and threatens to derail the entire show, it doesn’t, mainly because of the uniformly excellent cast Porter has assembled. Alexandra Grey (Queen) and Ken Robinson (Fleetwood) play off each other wonderfully, while Erika Olson has a dynamic presence as Mary, a newbie from Minnesota who becomes Fleetwood’s new meal ticket. Mykal Kilgore (young) and Deston Owens (old), capture well the two sides of Jojo. 

Best of all are Antawyn Hopper as the menacing Memphis and Ledisi as the hooker with the heart of gold, Sonja, whose powerhouse voices soar above everyone, especially in their spotlight numbers, Memphis’ “My Way or the Highway” and Sonja’s “The Oldest Profession.”

The Encores Orchestra performed superbly under conductor James Sampliner, whose arrangements tended toward more soulful and disco-ish than the originals, which was definitely permissible in this context.