In Spring Awakening, composers Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater inject Frank Wedekind’s 1891 play of the same name with alt-rock crowd pleasers, to tell a story of sex and repression in 19th-century Germany. When it premiered in 2006, Spring Awakening swept the board at the Tony Awards and has enjoyed several revivals (including an incredible sign language production I highly recommend you look up on YouTube) and captured the imagination of audiences, with what is undoubtedly a milestone in musical theatre history. But in these days of Hamilton and Six (two productions that similarly bring history to life through pop culture), does Spring Awakening still hold up to its cult status? An Oxford University student production puts the show to the test at the Playhouse this week.
The audience is presented with a community that keeps its young people separated by gender. However, the boys still admit to their explicit dreams of women, and the girls long to know more of what relations with a man entail. In a captivating opening scene, Wendla (a flawless performance by Hannah Andrusier) asks her mother (one of the many comic roles executed perfectly by Ella Tournes) about the birds and the bees. All her mother can reply is that a man and a woman make a baby when the woman “loves her husband with all of her heart”. This is illustrative of one the show's main themes: that the young fail to flourish because of the misguidance of the generation above them. All the adults are shown as either evil (abusive parents and teachers) or laughable (horny piano teachers) and their presence is shown as something to be fought against, rather than learned from. In her programme notes, director Issy Paul says that this “offers the opportunity to give a cathartic sense of control back to our own generation”. Whilst some may agree with this, it also seems to give one particular character a get-out-of-jail-free card for some pretty irresponsible actions at the end of Act One.
This production has many commendable aspects. Emily Stevenhagen’s set design has a beautiful backdrop of an LED light framed church window, moveable staircases and scenery to bring the many locations of the story to life. With many actors being called upon to play instruments live on stage, as well as singing complex scores with athletic choreography, it is worth pointing out that this is one of the tightest and most talented ensembles I’ve seen in a student musical. When it comes to lead performers, Henry Waddon was an effortlessly charming Melchoir, who provided one of the highlights of the night, with some beautiful falsetto vocals on the song “Left Behind”, and was perfectly juxtaposed by Joe Winter as the more introverted Mortiz.
Technical issues sadly marred the quality of the production with badly mixed musicians, malfunctioning microphones and mistimed lighting cues aplenty. Their where also a handful of misjudged staging decisions including some unconvincing stage slaps and an unintentionally comical use of a birch rod.
Despite its flaws, this production of Spring Awakening shows there is still light and power in the material. Great songs such as “B**ch of Living” and “Totally F***ed” are performed with guts and discipline in equal measure and are well worth a night out at the theatre.
