Jonas as a “mahvelous novelist” is a bit of a stretch, however. Jonas as a Jew — and not just a Jew but one who affects a Yiddish accent to sing his demented version of a shtetl folk tale — is even more of one. “The Schmuel Song,” as the shtetl number is called, is always a bit of a problem anyway; the only semi-dud in the sung-through score, it barely makes sense even when read word by word with a magnifying glass.
Sung by Jonas, it’s basically incomprehensible — to be fair, that’s at least in part because of the generally murky sound. David Zinn’s set, a weird abstraction of platforms and flowers, doesn’t help either. Only the aptly harsh, psychological lighting, by Stacey Derosier, and Dede Ayite’s sociological costumes, give him shadings and layers.
But if he starts out too blandly likable, he improves as time reveals Jamie’s narcissism and self-righteousness. His mellow croon slowly becomes a sputtering belt. Still, I only came to dislike the character as much as Brown evidently intends when he exuberantly leaped onto the couple’s bed with his boots on. The cad! But by then it was too late. Cathy had walked off with the show.
More often than not that is the case with productions of “The Last Five Years,” and it’s to Brown’s great credit that he has shaped the story to favor the woman even though it is basically his own. He’s the ur-Jamie.
But whereas the selection we hear from Jamie’s novel is meh, Brown’s achievement is unmistakable. The music (now somewhat over-enhanced with the addition of several musicians on a crowded elevated platform) is rapturous and difficult but not randomly so; it’s rapturous and difficult because love is too. The lyrics specify and condense both feelings in often scathing, always memorable phrases. Indeed, when Jamie sings to Cathy, near the end of their marriage, “I will not lose because you can’t win,” you may gasp at its cruelty. And yet you may feel, as I did, that Warren’s Cathy could have sung the same thing.
The Last Five Years
Through June 22 at the Hudson Theater, Manhattan; thelastfiveyearsbroadway.com. Running time: 1 hour 30 minutes.
