Ever since David Bowie came onto the scene big time, as a quasi-alien rock star with the rock ‘n’ roll game-changing album, “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars” in 1972, in which he blurred the lines between man and woman, most everything that he has touched, if not in reality, certainly in perceived memory—has turned to gold. Chalk it up to his chameleon-like ability to successfully ride the ever-changing waves of time. No performer, not even Madonna, once the Queen of Reinvention, has gone through as many iterations—so many alter egos, each of which influenced a multitude of artists while allowing the original to remain a top-drawer talent. Though Bowie kept a low public profile ever since he experienced pains in his arm and shoulder while performing at a festival in Scheeßel, Germany, in 2004—it was a clogged artery which led to an emergency angioplasty—his reputation, unlike that of many artists whose disappearance is barely noticed, seems only to have grown in stature. While his touring schedule was virtually nonexistent during the next decade he wasn’t exactly comatose. Bowie continued to write songs and sporadically perform, mostly in New York City where he lived with his wife, Iman. “Blackstar,” his 25th album, was released, not coincidentally, on January 8, 2016, the date of his 69th birthday. The reviews, many heralding the coming of a “new” Bowie, have been stellar. If that is not enough to light up the sky, the musical Lazarus, a 13-song (some old some new) Bowie-driven musical with a book by Irish playwright Enda Walsh, best known for winning a Tony in 2012 for his stage adaptation of the movie Once, is currently running at the New York Theater Workshop in New York City through January 20th. For the record, Lazarus sold out in a matter of hours. Based on the 1976 Nicolas Roeg movie, “The Man Who Fell to Earth,” which, in turn, was based on Walter Terris’s 1963 sci-fi novel of the same name, Lazarus stars Michael C. Hall, best known from the TV series “Dexter.” Hall plays alien Thomas Newton, the same character Bowie played in movie. Also starring is Cristin Milioti (Grammy Award winner, and Tony nominee for Once) and Sophia Anne Caruso. The plot for those newbies unfamiliar with “The Man Who Fell to Earth,” book or movie, is relatively simple. Newton, an extraterrestrial, comes to earth with the intention of getting water for his dying planet. He starts a bunch of companies, becomes super rich, and builds a spaceship to return home. The government finding out he is an alien holds him captive in a locked luxury apartment where he spends his days alone drinking gin, watching TV, eating Twinkies, and pining for his outer space family and the return of Mary Lou, the earthling who loved and left him. This is how we find Newton—sprawled out on the floor of his apartment—when the play begins. Though alone, certainly in his own head, and not always even there, Newton is given to hallucinatory visions. In the reality of the stage, he is at the center of a swirling tsunami of people, coming and going, real and imagined, each with his or her own dramatically captivating story. Though the set is relatively bare (a bed and refrigerator, mostly filled with gin, are the only stationary furniture), the characters are surrounded, and the audience bombarded, with an electrifying series of sonic sounds, video projections which often echo what is happening on stage, a seven-piece band seated behind a scrim, and 10 compellingly quirky characters, all beautifully realized. Elly (a wonderfully intense performance by Cristin Milioti), recently hired by Newton to be his personal assistant, eventually falls in love with him, much to her husband Zach’s (Bobby Moreno) dismay. At one point, she describes Newton perfectly. He is “sorta sad, sorta unknowable in the way that you imagine rich, reclusive, eccentric men to be.” Eventually, hoping to become his lover, she attempts to transform herself into Mary Lou—Newton’s lost love, by donning a blue wig. Also, appearing, disappearing, and appearing again and again, is the ethereal, and beautifully voiced, Sophia Anne Caruso who, in the program, is billed as Girl. Appearing to know all about Newton, her mission is to help him return to outer-space world. It is a double-bind, as Newton’s mission is to help free the Girl (who just might be an apparition) from her limbo state. Bowie’s lyrics in “Life on Mars?” “now she walks through her sunken dream to the seat with the clearest view and she’s hooked to the silver screen,” fit like a glove to her character. All the men in the play, in somewhat subsidiary roles, also are coming and going, coming and going. Michael Esper (last see on Broadway in The Last Ship–he always seems to show up unannounced at people’s apartments)- plays Valentine, a sinister, knife-wielding character who eventually gets to bury his knife in human flesh. Appearing to be Newton’s only friend, this from their business days, is Michael (Charlie Pollock) last seen on Broadway in Violet). Michael appears to be the only truly sane character. Adding spice to the proceedings—they just might be working for the government— is a Supremes-like group (with nobody playing Diana Ross). Ostensibly, Krystina Alabado, Krista Pioppi, and Brynn Williams, billed as Teenage Girls 1, 2, 3, are government agents. Also making an appearance and a particularly harrowing departure are Lynn Craig and Nicholas Christopher. Here they are caught in series of lurid embraces, seeming just short of copulation. The play, if not for the star-turns of actors Michael C. Hall, Cristin Milloti, and Sophia Caruso, who do most of the singing and acting, is as close to being an ensemble piece as possible. Yes, all the acting and singing is letter-perfect good. But it is Hall, on stage for all two hours, channeling what appears to be the heart and soul of Bowie himself, that holds us prisoner. No doubt, his short stint on Broadway in Hedwig and the Angry Inch, another totally demanding role, has served him well here. If the truth be told, and here I am telling it, wonderful performances aside, the brilliance of Lazarus resides in the hands of visionary director Ivo van Hove (his production of A View from the Bridge is currently represented on Broadway at the Lyceum Theater) and the play’s technical staff: Jan Versweyveld (scenic and lighting designer), Tai Yarden (video design), Brian Ronan (sound), Henry Hey (music director), An D’Huys (costumes), and Anne-B Parsons. It is a rarity when the all of the production values come together so astonishingly as to conjure up a sense of wonder, one that takes us to another world.
