For me, the experience of seeing Beautiful: The Carole King Musical is marked by a lot of dumbfounded head shaking as I again and again think, wow, another landmark pop hit produced by King and Gerry Goffin (or, alternately, by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, King and Goffin’s best friends and the songwriting team they competed with in Don Kirshner’s 1960s hit factory in Times Square). From a powerhouse song standpoint, this is one of the best jukebox musicals going, where the chart toppers range from “One Fine Day” to “Natural Woman.”
For this show to really click, though, it needs a woman in the lead role who feels like, well, a natural Carole–down-to-earth, upbeat, yearning and with a voice that can deliver those early hits and the later solo numbers from Tapestry in a way that evokes King in a pleasing way. On this critical casting point, the production now onstage at the Paramount Theatre in Aurora really delivers in the person of Tiffany Topol. Her warm, welcoming performance displays the character’s growing confidence in her craft and the direction her life takes without ever losing her relatable charms as a woman who emerged from the relative anonymity of her songwriting for hire to become a bona fide pop superstar.
That’s really all you need to make this show–which boasts a stellar first act and a pretty good second one–worth seeing. But this production also boasts wonderful second-banana performances from Rebecca Hurd as the cool, overly confident fashion plate Cynthia Weil and Christopher Kale Jones as her neurotic lyricist boyfriend Barry Mann. Both are very funny, as is Ian Paul Custer as Donny Kirshner, the hard-bitten hitmaker with a heart of gold to go with his stack of gold records.
We see King sell Kirshner her first song at 16, the same age when she meets the older Goffin (C.J. Blaine Eldred). He sweeps her off her feet, writes killer lyrics and then turns into a philandering cad. Throughout their rise, the hits are performed by actors impersonating the Drifters, the Shirelles and other groups they sent to the top of the charts. A huge highlight on that score is Matt Thinnes, who earned sustained, rapturous applause during Friday’s opening night for his rendition of “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” as deep-voiced Bill Medley of The Righteous Brothers.
At moments when the plot drags a bit, the music always picks it up and moves the story along. By the time the cast performs a rave-up, clap-along version of “I Feel the Earth Move” after the curtain call, the only question is, which of these earworms will you be singing in the car on the drive home?
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical runs through June 16 at the Paramount Theatre.
For a full roundup of reviews of this show, visit Theatre in Chicago.
Photo by Liz Lauren
