Hugely complex, beautifully engaging and rather unsatisfactory, the 10-year-old Olivier and Tony Award-winning emotional rollercoaster Dear Evan Hansen continues to provoke difficult conversations.
Dealing with the big, dark issues of teenage angst, tenuous friendships, exploitation of tragedy, mental health, the desperation to belong and fractured relationships magnified and skewed by social media, Steven Leverson somehow manages to still make the piece entertaining.
Much lies in the gift of the main characters, and fresh-faced Ryan Kopel (Book Of Mormon; Ser Aeron Bracken in House of the Dragon) is utterly believable as sweaty-palmed, anxiety-ridden teen Evan, tasked with writing mood-boosting letters to himself by his therapist. His dad is long-gone with a cocktail waitress, and mum (a convincingly harassed Come From Away’s Alice Fearn) is juggling shifts at the hospital with night school, leaving little time for Taco Tuesday or to navigate a needy son (with “Anyone Have A Map?” poignant).
Kopel portrays the desperation to fit in, to be liked and to help alleviate pain in others so heartbreakingly well that, despite the perhaps-otherwise monstrous web of lies he weaves, he still has the audience onside and hoping against hope for a happy ending.
But there are no winners here. Killian Thomas Lefevre (Bat Out Of Hell) is a fellow outcast student; angry, reliant on drugs to get through the day and depressed, Connor sarcastically signs Evan’s plaster-cast and steals the latest ‘Dear Evan Hansen’ letter which, after his suicide, is misconstrued as indicating to his bewildered and grieving family that their son did have a friend and some happiness in his life.
Naïvely relying on ‘family friend’ and IT whiz but morally corrupt Jared (Tom Dickerson Book of Mormon) for guidance and social cues, Evan is forced onto a slippery slope of deceit as his acceptance—as Connor’s secret best friend—into what seems to him to be a perfect family, the proximity to his love interest Zoe (fabulously-voiced Lauren Conroy) and newfound status at school bolsters his confidence and replaces the myriad prescribed medications.
Vivian Panka (Heathers the Musical, 9 to 5 the Musical) is student Alana, who turns her desperation to be somehow connected to the drama into a social media manipulator and fundraising success; Helen Anker (Mamma Mia!) is anguished, keen-for-a cause (Buddhism last year, free range this) mum Cynthia clinging to the fantasy glimpses of Connor enjoying life, while Richard Hurst (RSC and The Lion King) is convincing as conflicted dad Larry, angry that he gave Connor the world but he threw it away and seeing in Evan the son he really wanted.
Musical director Michael Bradley leads a nine-piece band in the pit as Benj Pasek and Justin Paul’s songs are apposite, with “You Will Be Found” and “Requiem” standout and “Sincerely, Me” great fun, highlighted by Carrie-Anne Ingrouille’s choreography.
Set designer Morgan Large’s sliding glass panels emphasise Evan’s remoteness and feeling of “Waving Through A Window”, while director Adam Penford keeps the pace but allows quiet moments to showcase Kopel’s depiction of the socially struggling teen.
So much to commend, but somehow the final dénouement is jumbled with no time to digest or really understand the nuances and what exactly happened.