"The Rosenbach Company" combines the music of Mark Mulcahy (left) and the illustrations (above) of Ben Katchor.
Stages
Quirky comic-strip illustrations mix with an indie-rock sound for a musical about book collectors. Say what?
"It does bring together some really odd sensibilities," says award-winning graphic novelist Ben Katchor, who's teamed with former Miracle Legion lead singer and composer Mark Mulcahy for "The Rosenbach Company." "But I think that's part of its appeal."
The musical, which receives its Boston-area premiere at the Jewish Theatre of New England tomorrow night and Sunday, combines Katchor's projected illustrations and animations with Mulcahy's music in a sung-through piece performed by singers at music stands.
"I think it's more like a concert, but it's full of theatrics," says Katchor by phone from his home in New York. "Since all the people we work with are from the pop-music world, they understand that view of theater."
"The Rosenbach Company" began as a commission from the Rosenbach Museum & Library in Philadelphia, which celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2004. Katchor says he became fascinated with the brothers Abe and Philip Rosenbach, who became the most prominent collectors of books and antique artifacts in America in the first half of the 20th century. The museum houses their collection, which includes such rare items as James Joyce's manuscript for "Ulysses" and John Tenniel's original illustrations for "Alice in Wonderland."
"The life of these brothers was something like a light operetta," says Katchor. "They were flamboyant and larger than life. When you boil their story down to two hours, it becomes these dramatic vignettes, some of which were actual stories Abe liked to tell at dinner parties."
At the heart of the Rosenbachs' story is their obsession with objects. "Abe in particular was obsessed with collecting early children's books, which of course are very rare since children literally chew on books," Katchor says. "Suddenly the idea that his whole life was about differentiating books seemed about taste. Just as a book from 1830 tastes differently than a modern paperback, the provenance of books imbues them with a certain flavor."
Katchor says the story is also about how brief human life is compared to a book. "Abe was a conduit for books that passed through the hands of previous owners," he says. "The notion that books outlive their readers gave him a real sense of his own mortality."
Finding the dramatic potential in apparently ordinary stories has become a trademark for Katchor, winner of a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant, who's earned acclaim for his cartoons in The New Yorker, his comic-strip series "Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer," and the graphic novel "The Jew of New York," among other works.
Katchor wrote the story for "The Rosenbach Company," then handed the text over to Mulcahy, with whom he'd worked on an earlier piece, to create the music. Mulcahy will be singing, too.
The work comes out of a long tradition of the ballad or picture reciter, Katchor says: "Sometimes the audience's attention is on the singer, sometimes it's on the picture. That allows you to shift between narration and dialogue, which is sometimes awkward in theater."
So is "The Rosenbach Company" really a musical?
"I'm not sure 'musical' is the best term for what we're doing," Katchor says. "Audiences have all these expectations about how people should behave in musical theater. I approach the music as one more element in creating the most interesting way to allow the story to unravel."
At the Leventhal-Sidman Jewish Community Center, 333 Nahanton St., Newton, tomorrow at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Tickets: $28. 617-965-5226, lsjcc.org
Homecoming for 'Bee'
William Finn's "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" will return to its home in Pittsfield to open Barrington Stage Company's 14th season in a co-production with North Shore Music Theatre. The show, a touching musical comedy about middle school contestants in a spelling bee, has been running on Broadway for nearly three years after it was developed at BSC. The production, which runs June 11-July 12 in Pittsfield and then heads to Beverly Aug. 12-31, will be the first regional theater production after the Broadway production closes in January.
BSC artistic director Julianne Boyd says she's excited to bring the musical back home before it becomes available to other regional theater companies and high schools. "Since Bill Finn is working here with us [on the Musical Theatre Lab], he'll oversee this production and we hope to send it out with the original spirit of the show."
Although BSC has profited from the success of the show, Boyd says the revenue generated has been more of a steady trickle than a stream. "It's helped us produce new works in the musical theater lab," she says, "and it's encouraged more writers to submit works to us, but we renovated a theater in Pittsfield that we still haven't paid for."
Information: barringtonstageco.org, nsmt.org.
Notes
Local favorites Leigh Barrett, Kathy St. George, and Robert Saoud will join Stoneham Theatre's resident Youth Ensemble Dec. 10 for "Miracle on Main Street," a benefit for the theater and the Hundred Club of Massachusetts, which benefits the families of fallen firefighters. Tickets: $35 for pre-show wine and cheese reception and concert, $75 for pre-show cocktail reception, concert, and post-performance artist meet-and-greet. 781-279-2200, stonehamtheatre.org.
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