John Mellencamp Community

Music stronger than plot in 'Ghost Brothers'
Review by Andrew Hughes, In the Bend

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This Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2013 photo shows Eric Moore, as Dan Coker, center, during a dress rehearsal of the musical "Ghost Brothers of Darkland County" at the Indiana University Auditorium in Bloomington, Ind.
Photo courtesy of Michael Conroy/ AP

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Retooled by original director Susan V. Booth from its 2012 premiere production at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, Stephen King and John Mellencamp's "Ghost Brothers of Darkland County" musical opened a Midwest tour Thursday at Indiana University Auditorium.

The current production takes chances with its mix of mediums -- traditional musical and 1930s and '40s radio drama in its staging -- and features an evocative, soulful score by Mellencamp that, in several places, joins the best of his work as a songwriter.

But, despite the opening-night audience's standing ovation, "Ghost Brothers" still has some flaws, all of them in King's libretto, although his surprise ending deserves praise.

Set on two nights separated by 40 years, "Ghost Brothers" takes place at the McCandless family's cabin at Lake Belle Reve, Miss., and tells the near-parallel stories of two sets of brothers, Jack and Andy in 1967 and their nephews, Frank and Drake, in 2007. In each case, a girl, Jenna and Anna, respectively, is only the latest cause for strife in their feud-ridden young adult lives.

Jack and Andy's younger brother, Joe, summons his sons and wife to the cabin in 2007 to finally tell them the truth about the night one of his brothers shot the other in a game of "William Tell" and then committed double suicide with Jenna by leaping from a nearby cliff. Ten at the time, Joe was the only witness to all three deaths.

Jack, Andy, Jenna and Dan -- the cabin's caretaker, who also died there under mysterious circumstances -- appear on stage as ghosts in the present -- their tattered-sheet coats serve as a shorthand visual for their otherworldly status but also make for an effective symbol of how worn out their trapped spirits have become -- and as people in 1967.

Lingering in their midst is the malevolent The Shape, swathed in red light and, as played by Jake LaBotz, a charismatic figure with a droll delivery -- "I get bad reviews (in church). True artists usually do." The Shape's "Lounging Around in Heaven" effectively mixes humor and philosophy in lyrics that LaBotz delivers with a jaunty, unrepentant self-assurance.

The scenes alternate between the past and the present, and the narrative's non-linear form works well in how King and Mellencamp tell the story, with the two eras feeding into each other and, at times, overlapping.

That's particularly effective when Frank and Drake mirror Jack and Andy's shoving of each other in a key flashback -- obviously, the present repeats the past -- and then give a compelling, dramatic performance as a quartet of the dark rocker "Put Me in the Ground."

Booth and the production team employ a mostly minimalist approach to blocking and realism as they partially simulate an old-time radio broadcast -- Jesse Lenat has a deliberately exaggerated down-home charm as the narrator.

When the actors do engage in dramatic interpretation, however, it pays off well in such tension-driven scenes as the feverish buildup to the "William Tell" game and Bruce Greenwood's dazed tour of the cabin as the adult Joe.

As for the libretto, although King successfully has some self-aware fun with popular phrases, at other times, it comes off more as cliché than clever, while a reference to Flannery O'Connor just misses its mark.

But, more importantly, Andy and Jack's story simply is more compelling than Frank and Drake's, and that makes the latter pair of brothers' squabbles feel like padding at times, something that eventually creeps into Joe's hesitation to finish his story. It begins to feel like stalling by the writers, not the character, and underscores the fact that until King throws in his surprise ending, it never seems as if there's much at stake in the present-day narrative.

After 35 years of writing songs from a single point of view, be it first person or third person narrator, Mellencamp proves himself adept at writing for multiple voices within the same song to use these numbers to advance the story within the dramatic relationships of the characters.

With musical direction by T Bone Burnett ("O Brother, Where Art Thou?"), members of Mellencamp's band -- guitarist and band leader Andy York, percussionist Dane Clark, keyboardist Troye Kinnett and bassist Jon E. Gee -- perform the music live on stage and do so with the intimate familiarity and sensitivity you'd expect from musicians long-accustomed to his playing music.

For the most part, the songs resemble Mellencamp's recent, blues-influenced writing on the superb albums "Life, Death, Love and Freedom" and "No Better Than This," and aside from the critical roles they play in "Ghost Brothers," several of them could stand alone.

Among the song and musical performance highlights, Kate Ferber unleashes an aggressive, hell-raising performance on "Jukin' " and then turns tender and soulful for the spiritual "Away From This World" as Jenna; Greenwood's weathered voice gives "How Many Days" an appropriately weary and anguished tone; and Eric Moore uses his big, gospel-infused voice to fill "Tear This Cabin Down" with judgment and pain.

Despite its flaws, "Ghost Brothers" is entertaining, fun and often engrossing, and it features one of the best scores of any musical written. With more revising and editing of the libretto, it could become a popular repertory, regional and community theater piece with its minimal set, props and special effects demands coupled with Mellencamp's music and King's ghost story.

Especially for fans of King and Mellencamp and theatergoers who enjoy live radio dramas or using their imagination, when the tour reaches South Bend's Morris Performing Arts Center on Nov. 5, it deserves to be seen in what is likely still a developmental but enjoyable stage.

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