Review: ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ at Marriott Theatre is another Elvis musical — and that’s all right
Review: “Heartbreak Hotel” (3 stars)
As a subject of jukebox musicals, Elvis Presley seems all washed up.
No insult to the lovers of The King, but the music of the Bard of Tupelo has been featured everywhere from the musical “All Shook Up” to the various iterations of “Million Dollar Quartet.” Characters based on his singular persona have shown up in “Bye Bye Birdie,” “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” “Little Shop of Horrors,” and lord knows where else. And that’s without counting all of the Elvis tribute shows out there.
So my expectations for “Heartbreak Hotel,” the new show at the Marriott Theatre, were limited, to say the least. This piece, which has a book credited to Sean Cercone (who spent his early career in Chicago) and David Abbinanti from an idea by Floyd “Million Dollar Quartet” Mutrux, has been knocking around for a while; I believe it also has gone under the title of “Elvis the Musical” as it made the rounds of regional operations.
Herein, one finds much of the usual jukebox structure. There are three Elvi (Tyler Hanes, Colton Sims and Charles Adler Bischoff at the Marriott, in decreasing order of age). We see Elvis loving his mom Gladys (Elizabeth Telford), his breakthrough at Sun Records with Sam Phillips (Jackson Evans) and then his struggles against the dominance of Colonel Parker (Rob Lindley), even as he tries to negotiate a love life, real and created for his image, that included flirting with Ann-Margret (Alexandra Palkovic) and negotiating the complexities of his six years of marriage to Priscilla (Amanda Walker). The show stops at peak Elvis, before the infamous Vegas years and the further breakdown of one of one of the most famous Americans ever to live. All of this, we know. Nothing here is all shook up.
So, early in the show, I started asking myself the most pertinent question: “Should a die-hard Elvis fan come and see this?” It was an inquiry prompted by seeing a group of guys in full-on fan attire. And by intermission, I was answering affirmatively.
That was mostly because I liked Hanes’ performance very much; star impersonations, or “interpretations” as actors prefer to think of them, are tricky beasts and have traps waiting at almost every turn. Hanes avoids them, mostly because he clearly is approaching this role from the inside out, burrowing into what he thinks made Elvis tick, not merely replicating the familiar externals. Good for him and good for the director, Deidre Goodwin. The other Elvi offer support in the same vein. Add to that a most interesting take on Colonel Parker from Lindley (not a role you’d expect him to play), that actually gives one of history’s more notorious managers an actual heart. Or so it seems here.
The other reason for picky old rockers to show up is that this company achieves some very powerful harmonics on many of those songs, utilizing Marriott’s immersive capabilities. Goodwin, alongside musical director Ryan T. Nelson, clearly spent a lot of time focusing on how this show sounds when the company sings and the result is very pleasing indeed. I like the vocal arrangements in the show and Goodwin, who actually dares to break Marriott’s famous circle and create a little staging area in front of the orchestra, gets performers out into the house as much as she can.
Add in a cool design surprise at the end from Collette Pollard, Jesse Klug and Tony Churchill and you have a show I deem worthy of The King’s subjects. And others who like these songs.
