By Ron Fassler . . .
“Is it so hard to satisfy your senses?” are the first words we hear in the opening song from the iconic Melissa Etheridge in her biographical musical play, Melissa Etheridge: My Window which opened last night at Circle in the Square Theatre. Satisfaction, inner peace, and the search for love and tranquility pierce the heart throughout the many stories she tells over the course of a two-and-a-half-hour journey through her rock and roll life. With a lone guitar that she can often make sound like a full band, her musicianship and pride in her work have helped keep her on the path of an exceptional life as a rock and roller through many trials and tribulations. Her spirit guides us in transformative ways that had the opening night audience on its feet multiple times during the performance. And man, does she know how to pull sweet music out of a twelve-string guitar.
Confession: I may have been one of the few in attendance relatively unfamiliar with her songs. Still, being only four years apart in age, I could relate to much of what Etheridge went through as a child of the sixties and seventies. Falling quickly under a spell, her lyrics are chock full of emotion and hardly the stuff of cheap sentiment. On a bare stage, aided only by the evocative lighting design of Abigail Rosen Holmes and with projections by Olivia Sebesky, Etheridge lets us in on intimate details of her life without stooping to being maudlin. She stays focused, direct, and to the point, neither evasive nor oversharing. And what this delicate balance does is keep a certain emotional distance, which proves the right move. Credit to both Etheridge and her co-writer and wife, Linda Wallem Etheridge, who keep the show from becoming a confessional (even though what else can it be if one is being honest?) which is what is meant by controlling its equilibrium. Director Amy Tinkham, whose background is mainly in live concerts in large venues, allows for total simplicity here. Excellent work.
The first half of the show only takes us up to Etheridge releasing her first album at age twenty-seven. The personal tour of how she came to love music is captivating: first by learning the guitar as a small girl and composing her own lyrics and melodies, and later by figuring out who she was in order to be genuine in her storytelling. Born and bred in Leavenworth, Kansas, Etheridge takes us into her confidence with tales about guitar lessons from a teacher who is bitter over missing fingers on his good hand due to an accident, performing in prisons while still a teenager (“a captive audience”), dealing with an available father but an emotionally distant mother, and most importantly, the development over time from her early attraction to women and coming out as a lesbian. Her beautiful “Nowhere to Go,” in which she accompanies herself on piano, was written when she confessed to a local clergyman that she was gay after being rejected by her mother. Both story and song intersect and uplift in the precise way it should in any good musical.
The second part becomes more of a concert than the more dialogue-heavy first half, due to our being treated to the bulk of her output of hit songs. The story grows deeper, too, because it encompasses more than a couple of decades worth of trial and error in her love life—raising four children, as well as her well-publicized battle with breast cancer. In the course of finding her personal salvation, she discovers the benefits of cannabis and hallucinogens and even takes us on a psychedelic trip, which is when some of the projections felt like being transported back to a live concert at the fabled Fillmore East on lower Second Avenue in the good old days of rock and roll.
Mention must be made of the one person Etheridge shares the stage with, comedienne and actress Kate Owens. First appearing in a crew person’s overalls (with CREW stamped on the back of them so there’s no mistaking what she’s doing there), Owens could easily be taken for a real backstage staff member. But with each successive entrance, her real purpose becomes clearer. In various guises throughout the night, this gifted funny woman never wears out her welcome even if, in one instance, she damn near upstages Etheridge during a song.
During Act One, Etheridge launches into what she tells is among the first songs she ever performed in public: Cynthia Weil and Jerry Leiber’s “On Broadway.” And look at the old girl now. At the very start, Etheridge lets us know that she is going to tell us a story: “A story about hell and how I got here.” Here is now. And she’s finally in a place of contentment from which those stories are told. She’s an able host, a unique talent, and Melissa Etheridge: My Window provides the chance for us to peer through a life that makes for genuine theater. On Broadway, or any place for that matter, it doesn’t get better than that.
Melissa Etheridge: My Window. Through November 19 at Circle in the Square Theatre (1633 Broadway / 235 West 50th Street, between Broadway and Eighth Avenue). www.melissaetheridge.com
Photos: Jenny Anderson
