In Rachel Zegler and Ben Platt, the show has finally found its ideal performers.
Photo: Playbill/YouTube
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For the last five years, and the five years before that, and, yes, the five years before that, I have been in search of a perfect production of Jason Robert Brown’s The Last Five Years — the story of a doomed relationship between a successful young writer and a struggling actress, recounted in song by both the husband (Jamie, who starts at its romantic beginning) and the wife (Cathy, who starts at its devastating end).
I discovered the show in a manner that may be familiar to some: A friend who had used the musical’s songs for auditions told me about it. I was in a serious yet still burgeoning relationship at the time, and she thought I’d be interested in the plot. She was right. The two of us blasted her CD of Norbert Leo Butz and Sherie Renie Scott in our college-dorm suite almost daily, trying to piece together exactly why Jamie Wellerstein and Cathy Hiatt couldn’t make it work and who was more at fault. I wanted to see the show performed live but harbored little hope of that ever happening. Brown’s ex-wife had sued when it was produced Off Broadway, and he had decided — for legal reasons or because the piece was too personal — not to mount it again.
But, six years after my first listen, Brown changed his mind and an Off Broadway production arrived at Second Stage. I watched it rapt — like a couples counselor finally seeing her patients in person after years of stilted phone calls. I went back less than a year later for a concert version with the same cast (Betsy Wolfe and Adam Kantor) at 54 Below. Two years later came a film (starring Jeremy Jordan and Anna Kendrick) that I’ve seen at least three times. And less than a year ago, I bought myself a ticket and cringed my way through the long-awaited and much-derided Broadway iteration starring Adrienne Warren and Nick Jonas.
Through all these viewings, I’ve gleaned a critical truth about this show: The stronger singer gains the audience’s sympathy. Therefore, for the show to truly succeed in leaving the audience in a state of ambiguity about the relationship, both leads must be megawatt talents. For a variety of reasons (mostly having to do with fame), that particular breed of even-enough casting hasn’t happened with any of the revivals I’ve managed to see here in New York.
Radio City Music Hall on Monday evening; my playbill at last year’s Nick Jonas-starring production.Photos: Courtesy of the author.
Radio City Music Hall on Monday evening; my playbill at last year’s Nick Jonas-starring production.Photos: Courtesy of the author.
With my friend Rory (left) — a fellow Last Five Years connoisseur — at a screening of the film in 2015 followed by a talk-back with Jason Robert Brown (center).
Photo: Courtesy of the author
Then, on Monday night, I went to Radio City Music Hall and watched Ben Platt and Rachel Zegler finally achieve Last Five Years nirvana. It felt a little strange to watch a story so small and so human on the same stage where the Rockettes perform their kick line, but I quickly adjusted, getting lost in the familiar melodies and refrains. Thousands of L5Y superfans — as well as more than a smattering of hard-core Zegler and Platt stans — sat in perfect silence, eyes fixed on the stage and the two large screens flanking it. Platt’s and Zegler’s voices flawlessly alternated from song to song, reaching the rafters with heartbreak and humor, yearning and love. In Platt’s thoughtful care, Jamie’s prominent Jewishness, which is often under- or overplayed, came off genuine and warm, adding new depth to the musical and making his character — even when he cheats — sympathetic. Though his “Shiksa Goddess” could have been funnier, he was a perfect Jamie in every other number, particularly in his devastating penultimate song, “Nobody Needs to Know.”
Zegler, meanwhile, was completely dazzling; her Cathy had an exuberance and complexity that made it obvious why Platt’s initially insecure Jamie had fallen hard so fast. She is far and away the greatest Cathy I’ve ever seen, and her voice is among the very best in musical theater right now. I’m still thinking about her rendition of “Summer in Ohio,” which included vocal choices that somehow made the notoriously challenging song — a popular showcase for auditioners looking to show off their skills — even more stunning.
I’m much older and more cynical than I was when I first listened to The Last Five Years, and going in, I didn’t expect the story to hit the way it had before I had kids, lost a parent, made it through 16 years of marriage (and counting), and learned that there are worse things than two 20-somethings in love breaking up. But from my perch in the second mezzanine, the original fascination and rapture I encountered in my dorm came flooding right back. It may have taken a quarter century, but The Last Five Years has, at last, been successfully revived. The proof: It’s been 48 hours since the curtain call and I’m still humming the tunes to myself and quietly mulling over whether Cathy and Jamie’s marriage could have somehow been saved.
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