Theater: "The Band's Visit" Charms On Second Visit; "Junk" Is Subprime

JUNK ** out of ****

Well heres an easy review to write. I can just copy word for word the rave I printed when The Bands Visit opened in December of 2016. It was a delightful surprise, like the holiday gift you didnt know you wanted until you got it. Every bit of praise for the cast, the crew, the book, the music and lyrics is just as true now on Broadway as it was Off. Whew! I can heartily recommend it to anyone who missed this gem the first time around during its too-brief one month run.

So one of the best musicals of 2016 is now one of the best musicals of 2017. And if its not easily the best new show of the Broadway season ending next May, wont that be great news? It means another terrific, bold work must be on its way.

Based on an Israeli film, The Bands Visit is a quiet, droll, intimate and beguiling work. An Egyptian police band specifically the Alexandria Ceremonial Police Orchestra is headed to Israel to perform at a cultural center. Its a modest event but clearly a big deal to the men taking part, especially their punctilious conductor and leader Tewfiq (a delightful Tony Shalhoub). Unfortunately, a slip of the tongue in English means they buy tickets to the wrong destination. Instead of a bustling city with an Egyptian cultural center making its grand opening, they end up stranded in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere.

Stranded for the night in a town with no hotel, they are taken in by the locals, some of whom are to be honest quietly pleased to have something new happening for a change. People eat and drink. They play music. They go to a roller rink or a restaurant. They talk. What else can you do in Beit Hatikva? In the morning, the band goes on its way. Thats it. Thats enough.

Gently, sweetly, we come to know these people both the visiting Egyptians and the locals we come to know their heartbreak and loneliness, their kindness, their strengths and their faults. Someones faults can be quite amusing and even appealing when you only have to deal with them for one night, when youre only discovering them for the first time. Marry this person and see that same fault again and again and yes, you might be singing a different tune. When a married couple has a fight in front of one of the musicians and tries to apologize, he says simply, Ive been married 20 years. He understands.

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