Fela! awakening [updated]

UPDATE: Run extended to October 4

Fela! has been extended. Tickets for this extension (September 24-October 4) will go on sale Monday, September 15 at 12pm through Ticketmaster or by calling 212-560-8912).

*****

The innovative, electrifying and controversial Fela Anikulapo Kuti--one of Nigeria's greatest musical performers and band leaders--died at age 58, in 1997, of complications from AIDS. But while his legacy endures among music fans worldwide, he also continues to inspire social justice activists with his lyrics' critique of colonialism and of his country's oppressive military junta. For this persistent, outspoken stance, he was imprisoned and brutalized, his supporters suffered beatings and rape, and his brilliant activist mother, Funmilayo Kuti, at age 82, was thrown from a window, later dying of her injuries.

Fela!--a concert-style musical directed and choreographed by Bill T. Jones and co-written with Jim Lewis--brings the story of the aftermath of that tragedy to the intimate 2nd floor theater at 37 Arts. If one imagines that this might be too unwieldy, too disturbing a story for a musical--one that collages the deliriously, lavishly, infinitely unspooling Fela tunes, dozens of eye-popping dancers, and accounts of violent repression--think again. Jones makes it all work--and then some--with a tight book, an even tighter bedrock of Fela songs provided by the Brooklyn-based Afrobeat band Antibalas, a sensational company of dancers, and a frequent smackdown of the invisible wall between performers and audience.

And then there's Sahr Ngaujah, plunging into the role of Fela with every ounce of his energy, emotional complexity and wit. From start to finish, Nguajah leads this production with an authority that never lets you entertain doubt that the inventor and king of Afrobeat indeed stands before you.

The evening is lengthy--with a 15-minute intermission--but engaging and rewarding. The audience gets caught up in the percolating vitality and the courage of Fela's Afrobeat, even as we're drawn to the softer side of Fela's love of his mother, or as we flinch from his flashes of angry impatience, or feel revulsion at his oppressors' brutality.

Jones--who took home a Tony® for choreographing Spring Awakening--has another winner here. Let's hope its run will be extended beyond the scheduled September 21 closing. In the meantime, you'd better rush for your tickets: FelaOffBroadway or Ticketmaster at 212-307-7171.

Click here for musical excerpts from Fela!, including my personal favorite, Track #8, Water Get No Enemy.

(c)2008, Eva Yaa Asantewaa