Wait a minute, Doc, are you telling me you built a Broadway musical out of a blockbuster movie where someone builds a time machine out of a DeLorean?
The way I see it, if you’re going to build a musical out of a movie where someone builds a time machine out of a car, why not do it with some style?
“Back to the Future: The Musical” has plenty of style — although most of that style was pulled directly from the 1985 Robert Zemeckis’ film. What the show doesn’t have much of is substance. And maybe that’s just fine.
If you go to the theater to see works of art by Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim, or Jeanine Tesori, “Back to the Future” is unlikely to impress you. If you have no idea who Bernstein, Sondheim, or Tesori are but adore the movie, this show will likely thrill you — and may be be your first step toward loving musical theater.
Everyone at Wednesday’s performance at the Citizens Opera House — “Back to the Future” runs until July 20 — appeared to know and adore the film. But if you haven’t seen it, the movie follows teenager Marty McFly after he jumps from 1985 to 1955 in that time-traveling DeLorean and has to manipulate his parents into falling in love to make sure he isn’t erased from existence. The musical uses all the key plot points while editing out a handful of outdated stereotypes. It also uses most of the memorable music from the film.
Composer Alan Silvestri’s wonderfully melodic and anthemic theme from the film is here. Huey Lewis & the News’ “The Power of Love” and “Back in Time” and Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” are also here. What’s missing are fresh songs that can stand up to the film’s music. Silvestri and songwriter/producer Glen Ballard (Alanis Morissette, Aerosmith, Kelly Clarkson) wrote new material for the musical, but none of it is all that engaging.
In fact, all the best bits in the musical have been pulled from the movie. The songs, the plot, the characters — the performances are first rate, but the actors depend deeply on the movie’s performances to inform their own — and of course the DeLorean.
Highly technical musicals can sink under their own weight, see the injury-riddled flop “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” “Back the Future” is stunning in its technical achievements. The lights, smoke, video screens, levers and pulleys that went into recreating the movie’s groundbreaking special effects were worth every penny. And they also made the whole thing feel a little like a big-budget Universal Studios tour.
So why even build a Broadway musical out of a blockbuster movie where someone builds a time machine out of a DeLorean? If you’re a fan of “West Side Story,” “Company,” or “Fun Home,” you probably can’t answer that question. But if you’re a fan of Marty McFly, Doc Brown, and Huey Lewis, the answer is, “Why not?”
“Back to the Future” is paint-by-numbers and also very entertaining. It has nothing to say the movie didn’t say and it’s a wonder to behold. It won’t become a classic but, great Scott, it will take you back in time to when you first fell in love with the movie.
For tickets and details, visit boston.broadway.com
