Theatre review: John & Jen

A chamber musical by Andrew Lippa (music and lyrics) and Tom Greenwald (book and lyrics,) John & Jen was the composer's first musical, premiering in 1993. Originally set between 1952 and 1990, Guy Retallack's production in the Little at Southwark Playhouse is the debut of a rewritten new version: With the protagonists' personal lives sometimes being buffeted about by world affairs, the action has been moved forward to strike familiar notes to a new generation. So John (Lewis Cornay) is now born in 1985, and the action takes us all the way through 2020 Zoom calls to an ending slightly in the future*. Five or so years older than him, his sister Jen (Rachel Tucker) is old enough to know he's going to have a tough time, and swears to protect him from life, and particularly from their abusive father. In the first act we see their close relationship growing up, but as a teenage Jen has the chance to go to university and escape their family, she leaves John behind as well.

By the interval John is dead, and Jen blames herself; in the second act Cornay plays a different John, Jen's son, named after her brother and representing an opportunity to get things right this time.

Musically (as well as the new book and lyrics, it's been re-orchestrated by Lippa and Jason Robert Brown) this is the kind of show I don't have a huge amount to say about; I think there's something old-fashioned in my taste in musicals that likes the music to, at least every so often, resolve itself into a big number with a beginning, middle and end. John & Jen is more the kind of musical where the singing is purely a storytelling device, so while the band and singing are excellent (with perfect sound balance for once, every word audible - see it can be done) I can't say I came out of it with any desire to listen to any of the songs again.

Which makes the story and characters all the more important, and this is where things hold up OK, but not more: The opening act is an interesting enough, if very speedy, run through the ups and downs of the sibling relationship over the years, but since the publicity makes it very clear what the show's premise is, we know it's very likely that John 1 will be dead by the end of it. It means you're that bit ahead of the action and just waiting to see how things go wrong, although I did like the way designer Natalie Johnson uses costume as foreshadowing, increasingly dressing John in military colours. The second act works better as we can watch the repercussions, and it turns out Jen hasn't just named her son in tribute, but sees him as some kind of do-over she'll remake in her brother's image. A helicopter parent who doesn't understand why John 2 isn't THRILLED that all his Christmas presents are hand-me-downs from his dead uncle, it looks like her attempts to stop history repeating itself may be what causes it.

In fact I thought we might be in for some kind of bleak, fatalistic replay of the first act where whatever Jen does she'll lose the people she loves in some sense or other, but things are a bit more optimistic than that, the show largely sentimental but enjoyable. For the most part the fact that the story's been bolted onto a different time period, with the central event moving from Vietnam to Iraq, isn't too noticeable - the most jarring moment for me was probably when Jen moves to Canada, and John 1 claims it's because her new husband is a coward who's trying to flee the war - obviously a sentiment that makes more sense in a war that actually had conscription. The time shift works in making the show feel more current at times, but I don't think the attempts to draw in the zeitgeist of the nineties and noughties really get enough time to have any impact. On the other hand I sometimes think about the fact that in the eighties and nineties American culture (and by extension much of the background to my childhood) was absolutely dominated by Vietnam, because it dominated the minds of the generation of filmmakers who were taking over Hollywood at the time. So I'm undecided on how much I like the idea of freeing the story from a specific framework that was overused at the time, or whether it would work better if left in the context in which it was originally created.

John & Jen by Andrew Lippa and Tom Greenwald is booking until the 21st of August at Southwark Playhouse Little Theatre.

Running time: 2 hours including interval.

Photo credit: Danny Kaan.

*a bold move given the last couple of years, who knows how that will age? "Going to Columbia University in 2022? Just before it was entirely devoured by wasps? What a tragic ending!"