By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Children can be a head- and heartache even for the Creator. That’s the moral of the musical “Children of Eden,” with book by John Caird and music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz. That realization unfolds through soaring melodies and vibrant harmonies delivered by a talented cast.
“Children of Eden,” directed by Julie Zatko with Gail Mowry as music director, and Izzie Douglass as stage manager, will be presented by the Toledo Repertoire Theatre Tenth Street Stage, 16 Tenth Street, Toledo. The show opens Friday, Sept. 13 at 8 p.m. and continues weekends through Sept. 29. Showtimes are Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2:30 p.m. For tickets visit www.toledorep.org or call (419) 243-9277.
“Children of Eden” not so much a musical retelling of the Book of Genesis as it is a reimagining. This story of Adam and Eve springs from the dark edges of that narrative.
The Creator, called here Father (J. Heath Huber), tells us that all this creation came from a dream. He was lonely, and even after the garden was created he still felt something was missing, so he created his children Adam (Will DuPuis) and Eve (Ziyaan Nurruddin).
As he — and this is a decidedly male deity — comes to realize by the end, “children start to leave you the day they were born.”
Yet early on, he is flush with his new creations, his “Grateful Children.”
Eve hasn’t been around for more than a few days when she starts asking about that mysterious tree on the hill near the waterfall.
A clearly irked Father — Huber portrays him as a contemporary dad — tells her in no uncertain terms that she should not go to that tree and she should certainly not eat of its fruit.
Well, even if you skipped that lesson in Sunday School, you know how that works out. Even standing near the Tree of Knowledge she senses the spark of creation, the power of intellect that gives her the abilities she thought only the father possessed.
The snake played at the dress rehearsal by Emma Glover and Karli Huntsberger seduces Eve with promises of intellect. She tastes the fruit, and rushes back to share it with Adam. Eve makes him dumplings. She makes him cider. The Father shows up. Angry and unforgiving. Eve must go. Adam has a choice between staying with the Father, who promises him a new mate, or going into the wilderness with Eve.
He bites the apple and they are banished. They survive in this wasteland, and continue to offer sacrifices to the Father in hopes he will come and return them to Eden.
The first Act 1 is devoted to their story through the slaying of Abel (Jacob Hinojosa) by his brother Cain (Tajj Crowder).
As were his parents, he is banished. But he creates his own family. There are people out there, not created apparently by Father.
In the second act we meet Noah and his wife, played by DuPuis and Nurruddin. This traditional double casting serves to emphasize the way the second act mirrors the first with its confrontations between fathers and sons.
Here the rebellious child is Noah’s youngest of his three sons, Japheth, played by Crowder. He is the only one who does not have a wife. Father, who is planning to destroy the world to rid it of the offspring of Cain, badgers Noah on why that is so. Japheth has rejected all the women who have been presented to him. If he chooses his own bride, Noah reasons, then it will be easy for him.
But Japheth has set his heart on the servant Yonah (Chloe Rosenberger), who is of the line of Cain.
Noah and his family reject her. She cannot go on the ark with them. Instead she must share the fate of the rest of humanity.
Yonah expresses her resignation in ”Stranger in the Rain.” Being rejected is not new to her. But Japheth secrets her into a small space on the arc.
This journey seems to be extending beyond the proverbial 40 days and 40 nights. The others including Shem (Tyler Yard) and his wife Aysha (Rebecca Schmidt) and Ham (Hinojosa) and his pregnant wife Aphra (Emma Glover) are growing restive and hungry. Shem’s sly suggestion that they eat some of their animal fellow passengers is rejected.
When they discover Yonah, they are committed to throwing her overboard in an attempt to assuage Father, whom they assume is angry at them — not a bad assumption given his temperament. But he had ceased talking to Noah once the rains began.
But Japheth said they must get rid of him too. The confrontation between Adam and Cain is mirrored here, but Yonah said she will accept her fate.
This impresses Noah, and he marries them.
His wife tells him that now he must be the father in its fullest sense. Noah and Father realize this separation is “The Hardest Part of Love.”
Mama Noah celebrates with the upbeat gospel number “Ain’t it Good.”
“Children of Eden” ends “In the Beginning” a tribute to the power of vocal harmony. The 10-voice chorus of kids and adults, who have served to push the story along and portrayed the various animals, take center stage here. That’s fitting for a show that explores the meaning of family and clan. Is there a better expression of the unity of humanity than voices raised together in song.
