When I was a child, circuses still had side shows. I remember standing in a crowd and looking up at “a giant.” My father, who regarded side shows as part of the circus experience, eventually was won over to my mother’s view that side shows were a sad abuse of people who were born different.
We didn’t go again.
Who would ever think of making a musical on the subject?
Answer: Henry Krieger and Bill Russell, two very creative people who saw in the side show a metaphor for the human experience, the longings, the feeling of being a square peg in a round hole, and the difficulties and comforts of closeness.
I saw Side Show several years ago and loved it. So when it came to the Emerson Umbrella Center for the Arts, I told my husband we had to go. He ended up loving it, too.
The musical centers on pretty, singing Siamese twins whom a talent scout discovers in a side show among their circus “family”– the bearded lady, the cannibal, the rubber man, the fortune teller, a wide array of misfits.
The story is odd and wonderful at the same time — the sisters’ longing “to be like everyone else” likely to strike a chord with anyone who has ever felt different.
What came across in this production more than in the one I saw at the Lyric Stage, was how completely different the two personalities are. The girls are sensitive to each other and comforting, but one is outgoing, one is shy, and they have very different ideas about what a happy future would look like.
Side Show has wonderful songs, some poignant, some raucous, and the current production features excellent acting from the mainly nonprofessional performers. It was polished and moving (a two hanky event for me), and it runs through Nov. 10.
If you want to to see Side Show with professionals, it looks like it is going to be revived on Broadway. More on that at Playbill, here.
Photo: Playbill.com
Alice Ripley and Emily Skinner in the original production. It’s amazing how quickly you see actresses in this show as conjoined just because they sit close.
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