REVIEW: Diversionary’s “Midnight at the Never Get” a heart-rending musical
Five years after they bought the rights, Diversionary Theatre hosted the West Coast premiere of "Midnight at the Never Get," which has already been extended through Nov. 24 thanks to a warm reception. With Clark Cabaret downstairs, Diversionary is a fitting setting for the heart-rending musical framed as a 1960s cabaret show. Diversionary's choice to build a bar for the community connects with the show's theme of gay bars being an essential space for LGBTQ+ gatherings, activism, history and love.
Show star Bryan Banville (Trevor Copeland) said, "The story talks about so poignantly about how in the 1960s there wasn't always that community, so you had to find it in the bar called The Never Get, where he met a lot of his very close, dear friends and the love of his life, and he's created a sense of community... That is the very special connection to what Diversionary stands for, and the space that they've created mimics a lot of what The Never Get [was for] Trevor and his community."
Opening on a meet-cute in 1963 between singer Trevor Copeland and composer Arthur Brightman, the saccharin music inspired by the Great American Songbook takes us through the pair's romance amid the upheaval of the 1960s in New York City.
"Midnight" was co-conceived by Max Friedman, by the show's music, book and lyrics writer Mark Sonnenblick, and by Sam Bolen, who originated the role of Trevor. Bolen was in the Diversionary audience on opening night to see the new version of the musical he worked on since 2015 through two off-Broadway runs, first at York Theatre then at Signature Theatre. It was slated to come to Diversionary sooner, but COVID-19 canceled its West Coast debut.
For the first time, someone other than Bolen played Trevor. Banville portrayed the debonair host of the cabaret show, as he narrates and sings the story of his enduring romance with Arthur. Cody Bianchi made their Diversionary debut as The Pianist, a facsimile of Arthur who plays piano, sings and acts across Banville. The besotted Arthur is the more reserved of the couple, but Bianchi's eyes shimmer as they write song after song about Trevor. Bianchi and Banville do not leave the stage for the 90-minute performance with no intermission.
"It's so vulnerable, of course, just having two of you on stage with the music. You just feel very open to the audience," San Diego transplant Bianchi said. "I've never had an opportunity like this where I've actually played the piano and accompanied an entire show while being an actor in it as well."
Banville has a long history in San Diego's professional theater ecosystem but has frequently been festooned to character roles, playing the absurd and funny. Here he succeeds beautifully as the leading man. For Banville, this character and his love story connected with him because it felt rooted in reality rather than so many oversexualized, overplayed gay romances.
"What I think makes Trevor really unique and special of a character to portray is that I get to portray someone who is simply just living their life and trying to understand their own human existence amidst the chaos and craziness that is happening around them and what it means to truly be yourself," Banville said.
The musical takes place entirely in the back room of The Never Get where the duo gained an underground following for their show before Arthur has the chance to make it big as a songwriter. The audience quickly learns this is an afterlife chosen by the irresistibly charming Trevor.
Trevor tells the audience, "You get to pick a memory. Make a little house out of it. Hang the walls and rough the floors with all the detail you have left. And then you stay, as long as you like, in your infinite moment, where you can be just like you were." Or rather, who you wanted to be.
So here he is, in the gay nightclub, ahem "members-only club where members are anyone but the vice squad," where he hosted a cabaret show with the love of his life. With none of the lights in the sign out and the piano in tune, it is even better than reality, except he is starting to forget some of the details. Scenic designer Yi-Chien Lee crafted an elegant, warm interior for Trevor to practice his show with a cast of dear friends in the audience.
Trevor has been honing the act alone for years while waiting for Arthur to die and pass into this memory. While Trevor's deep love for Arthur makes him feel honest, it quickly becomes clear in this memory play he is not always a reliable narrator, focusing on the "sunshine [and] smiles [and] movie reels with Ferris wheels and Paris styles" as one song reads, over the harsh reality of a time where their love was illegal.
As the pair's romance and artistic collaboration bloom, Arthur grows frustrated with having to change his love songs to fit a heterosexual audience at the few places they are booked. Arthur pushes for his songs to remain as they were originally written, refusing to change "him" to "her" to obfuscate these are songs written by and for gay men. Despite their classic sound being outdated in the age of rock-n-roll, their inversion of love interests gains them a loyal following and even a meeting at Columbia Records.
As it becomes clear Arthur's star may surpass Trevor's, Trevor clings to the show they performed at The Never Get, which serves as a sanctuary for their love while historical events occur around them. A police raid and night in jail is an intrusion of reality between the two romantics, although it is also the fodder for the funniest song of the musical, "Boy in Blue," about a gay man in love with his arresting officer: "He owns a gun / His outfit's fun / I won't forget his number, cuz it's 9-1-1!" The reference to 911 is anachronistic, but at this point, the audience has been wrapped up completely in the sound of the era with Banville's radio-worthy voice as he switches between crooning ballads and delightful upbeat songs.
While Trevor glosses over the experience with the raunchy song, he can't hide from the audience that Arthur's fear and internalized homophobia are in contrast to his desire to be an openly gay songwriter. Arthur wants his songs to convince society to listen to him and accept their love, not to be out in the street protesting. This is at odds with Trevor, who befriends more outspoken activists in the early stages of the fight for gay liberation.
Dramaturg Jesse Marchese noted the conflict between the two mirrors the schism in the activist community of the 1960s. The Mattachine Society organized the Julius Bar "sip-in" of 1966 to fight against New York state laws barring businesses from serving homosexuals. Inspired by the Civil Rights Movement, the largely white men who made up the prominent gay rights organization founded in 1950 in Los Angeles, wore suits and ties to the sit-in. After their lawsuit, the New York State Supreme Court ruled being gay was not indecent behavior so they must be served. Their push for inclusion in society relied on "respectability politics," in today's parlance, built around upholding a conservative, wholesome image in order to assimilate.
"It may not be protesting and fighting the same way that other folks are doing in the '60s, but their cabaret and their music was Arthur's own way of pushing that and showing that love between two men is exactly the same as love between any two other human beings," Bianchi said.
In contrast, more radical LGBTQ+ activism began taking hold in the tumultuous '60s before bubbling over in the spontaneous, violent Stonewall Riots led by younger, browner, poorer and more gender-diverse members of the community. Today, this is the most iconic and important event in American LGBTQ+ history, spurring activism across the nation.
By current standards, it would be easy to look down on Arthur's retrograde views and write him off. Initially, this was how Bianchi expected to portray him until Director Stephen Brotebeck, who masterfully conducted the pacing of the musical, urged them to show why Trevor fell in love with Arthur without foreshadowing their later struggles. The slow unraveling of Trevor's oversimplified narrative of their love reveal deeper questions than just 'Will Arthur show up at The Never Get in the afterlife?'
Seeing Arthur through the eyes of Trevor who loves him actually centers his humanity and makes the messages of the show more challenging to wrestle with. Trevor even brings out the humanity in invisible audience members as he addresses them throughout his cabaret performance. Portraying such a character shaped how Banville shows up in the world.
"What makes Trevor really special to me is getting to live in someone's body who is not quite like me because he leads with vulnerability," Banville said. "It's something that I personally struggle with... Getting to portray someone who does that has opened up a lot of things for me as a person."
The musical concludes with a heart-rending twist, well worth experiencing in person as Troy Tinker-Elliott takes the stage for one final song. A clever costume change thought up by costume designer Claire Peterson reveals each character's growth in the final scene of the musical. Janine Rose returned to Diversionary after "TL;DR" as the sound designer for "Midnight." Astoundingly, despite a live drummer in the three-person band behind a curtain on the stage, not one word of the dialogue or lyrics was inaudible. Bianchi and Banville praised Ron Councell for his music supervision and coaching. Nayeli Bailey's lighting design created an intimate atmosphere for the cabaret show turned musical. Aaronne Louis-Charles served as stage manager.
