Several long years of waiting finally ended last weekend when Stageworks officially moved into its new home in the Channel District of Tampa. But if the move is a legitimate reason for excitement, Stageworks' first show in the new space is decidedly not.
Listen To My Heart is a mostly soppy collection of love songs by David Friedman, and the lyrics are somewhere between Hallmark greeting cards and the Delilah show. Friedman's world is that overly familiar one of loves that solve everything, dreams that must never die, white knights come to rescue maidens, and problems that are blessings in disguise. The five performers who intone the many offerings are topnotch, and Freidman himself — who plays piano and occasionally sings — is a wonderfully warm figure.
But these songs seem to have been nurtured in a world that never knew Cole Porter, Bert Brecht, John Lennon or Sid Vicious. In Friedman's view, the main evil threatening humankind is loneliness and the panacea is romance, so buy someone a dozen roses. As to neuroticism, mean-spiritedness, smelly underarms and cocaine addiction, well, not in these precincts, buddy. And don't look for gender confusion, sex addiction or Prozac-induced erectile dysfunction. The world of Listen To My Heart is sincere and oh-so-hackneyed. Love hasn't been this simple since Opie was born out of the forehead of Andy Griffith.
There are a few exceptions. "If You Love Me, Please Don't Feed Me" is an amusing cri de coeur from a young man who doesn't want high cholesterol, and "I'm Not My Mother" is an impassioned protest by a woman who's done everything to distance herself from Mom. "Catch Me" is a poignant song by a suicidal lover overlooking a tempting river, and "My Simple Wish" is a very funny song about wanting "to be rich, famous and powerful." Finally, "If I Were Pretty" is a bittersweet offering by a woman who wouldn't mind being noticed by Donald Trump.
All of these are up-to-date, far from cliché, and psychologically credible. If all the songs in Listen were of this quality, the show might be a wise and worldly success.
But the majority of these songs are more like "My White Knight," with its references to "a man with his heart on his sleeve and the future in his eyes" who "doesn't wear a suit of armor" but "lives his life with honor." I'm not saying that such knights don't exist — only that they've been done to death by centuries of love poets, and Friedman needs to Make It New if he's going to break through to a modern audience.
Or consider "What I Was Dreamin' Of" — in which a woman tells us that "when I first met you I knew you were the one for me... And now we live here in this house up on a hill... making love as lovers will." What can you do with such a song? What it describes is no doubt the experience of some billions of lovers, so it's "relatable" by just about anyone who's ever loved. But it's also unimaginative and exasperatingly empty of contemporary content.
As are all the other many songs about finding true happiness in the arms of an unexpected lover ("Never say never to a trick of fate") or feeling kinda lonesome in the absence of one's pookie ("I now hold my pillow as I once held you"). So "don't give up the ship even when you know it's sinking." And don't be dismayed "when the gift of trouble is put under your tree." And so on and so on...
There's not much of a set in Stageworks' still somewhat rudimentary-looking black box — just some platforms along the three walls and Friedman's piano at center stage. Slides are projected against the back wall to provide an environment for each song, and director Karla Hartley gives us just enough physical action to illustrate the relationships in each of the tunes.
The five actors — Alison Burns, Heather Krueger, Lulu Picart, Fred Ross and Craig Sculli — are excellent vocalists, and Friedman plays each lovely melody with great sophistication. I may have doubts about Friedman as a lyricist, but he'd probably make a terrific best friend — there's genuine earnestness in all his songs, even the most trite. I mean, who would be surly enough to contradict "We Can Be Kind"?
Anyway, congratulations to Anna Brennen and Stageworks: You did it, you've finally arrived! Listen to My Heart may not be a winner — but your new space is. At last, a home of your own!
Let's have some fine times there.
