REVIEW: ‘Camelot’ returns to Broadway with updated book by Aaron Sorkin
Photo: Camelot stars, from left, Phillipa Soo, Andrew Burnap, Dakin Matthews and Jordan Donica. Photo courtesy of Joan Marcus / Provided by LCT with permission.
Lincoln Center Theater and director Bartlett Sher have made it their mission to revisit some of the most important and beloved musicals of the 20th century. Their previous collaborations include South Pacific (unforgettable), My Fair Lady (grand and exquisite) and The King and I (sweeping and romantic). Now comes Camelot, the Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe show, which for this 2023 revival has an updated book by Aaron Sorkin.
This Camelot hits its mark, even if it fails to reach the same heights as those previous LCT-Sher productions. Helping this tale of passion and governance is an excellent cast, in particular Phillipa Soo as Guenevere and Jordan Donica as Lancelot. These two performers are pitch-perfect singers who command the stage and are in full control of who their characters are, understanding intrinsically their present predicaments and aspirations for the future. It is a joy to behold their voices and their characterizations.
Andrew Burnap has the Herculean and unenviable task of holding much of the narrative on his shoulders. As King Arthur, he’s tasked with the central arc of the near-three-hour musical, but as the character is rendered by Sorkin (and even by Lerner and Loewe), he’s somewhat uninteresting. There’s a Luke Skywalker feel to his youth and inexperience, and let’s be honest, Han Solo and Princess Leia were always more fun and more engaging to watch. Burnap offers a humorous, at times heartfelt, yet complicated portrayal that seems to fit under the category of “doing the best with what he’s given,” but Arthur needs more to be the effective center of Camelot.
Amongst the ensemble, it’s always appreciated to see Dakin Matthews on stage, this time in the dual roles of Merlyn and Pellinore. There’s a slyness and mystery about Taylor Trensch’s Mordred and Marilee Talkington’s Morgan Le Fey, so much mystery in fact that it feels like these two deserve their own musical.
The songs are easily recognizable to musical theater aficionados, and they sound beautiful and fitting on the thrust stage of the Vivian Beaumont Theater, where Camelot continues through September in an extended run. “If Ever I Would Leave You,” “Camelot,” “The Lusty Month of May” and other selections heighten the emotions of the proceedings, making the audience care about these creations on stage and what may become of them amidst war, strife and dynastic power.
Jennifer Moeller has dressed the cast in muted costumes that teeter between the modern and the medieval. Michael Yeargan’s sets are simple, but amplified and complemented by digital projections that help fill the space of the gargantuan theater.
Perhaps it was inevitable that this Camelot would fail to reach the same heights as the previous LCT-Sher productions. One could make the case — and this reviewer does — that Camelot is simply not as quality a show as the others. That’s sacrilegious in some corners of the theater industry, but the characters of Camelot are unable to elicit the same feelings as the leads in South Pacific, My Fair Lady and The King and I. Also, Sorkin seems to have done a rather large rewrite of the book, which was originally penned by Lerner. There’s an obvious modernization to the storytelling, with some winks to 21st-century political struggles, but Sorkin’s words don’t fly off the stage, never adding a great deal of pathos and poetry to the pageantry on display.
Still, Camelot on the page is better than most, and this Camelot on the stage is better than most. A team of well-meaning and obviously talented performers and creatives can’t take away the power of Lerner and Loewe’s original creation, which itself was based off T.H. White’s book, The Once and Future King. The musical is deserving of a place in the canon of musical theater history, and this revival tries something different by adding some interpretive choices to see if the show can better speak to a modern-day audience. Not every update works, and the added humor clashes with the general malaise of the story, but the heart is still present and true. Figuring out what will happen to Guenevere, Lancelot and King Arthur is still great fun and stirring.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Camelot, directed by Bartlett Sher, features music by Frederick Loewe, lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and a book by Aaron Sorkin, originally based on Lerner’s book. Starring Andrew Burnap, Phillipa Soo, Jordan Donica, Dakin Matthews, Taylor Trensch, Marilee Talkington and Camden McKinnon. Running time: 2 hours, 55 minutes. Currently playing at the Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center. Click here for more information and tickets.
