On July 22, 1978, Meat Loaf played in concert at the then-named Garden State Arts Center. His debut album was now an established hit and would eventually sell an estimated 43 million copies. Bat Out of Hell was so popular for so long that it stayed on the charts in the United Kingdom for 485 weeks. Only Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors lasted longer. On that hot summer night in July, all of the lifeguards from the Oakcrest Swim Club in Edison, New Jersey made the trek to sit on the lawn and rock.
Jim Steinman wrote the music and lyrics which contain a heavy dose of Bruce Springsteen-flavored surburban teenage angst. The genius of this record, however, is the bombastic operatic scale of the production and vocals. The lyrics were catchy, clever and often funny. The mood suggested trouble right from the first line: “the sirens were screaming and the fires were howling way down in the valley tonight.”
Many of the songs on Bat Out of Hell were intended for a musical Mr. Steinman had been writing. After all these years, he has finally written a book for a fully staged concept. All songs from this iconic recording are included in the show plus a smattering of hits from the two other Bat Out of Hell albums which followed. The music is so grandiose and the lyrics are often so intimately conversational, the theatrical promise is clearly evident in this well-known material.
Now for the very good news. Despite a dreadful sound design, the music is faithfully rendered. The band was certainly “All Revved Up With No Place to Go.” Meat Loaf’s vocals are forever linked with these songs and I certainly had expectations of disappointment. This entire cast was big voiced and kicked some serious ass in the belting of these rock-n-roll classics.
The plot involves a group of lost kids who have some disorder whereby they never age past eighteen. They live underground in a tunnel “frozen in the aquastage before the good things come.” Huh? The big evil corporation is called FALCO. The daughter of the company chief is enamored with a boy who won’t grow up. The Peter Pan references are so thick that one character is named Tink.
There is nothing inherently wrong with the story. It’s a bit silly and not totally coherent but then again so are some of the songs. The major problem of this show is the tone. The title track suggests “there’s evil in the air and there’s thunder in the sky and a killer’s on the bloodshot streets.” What appears on the stage, unfortunately, is a production which feels like an episode of the television show Glee. Maybe a better analogy would be Mad Max as updated by the Mickey Mouse Club.
The direction by Jay Scheib does not help elevate a somewhat ambitious jukebox book musical. The main storyline is the romance between Strat (Andrew Polec) and Raven (Christina Bennington). His rendition of the title song and her “Heaven Can Wait” were high points. If there were darker elements incorporated into the staging and character development, there might be some depth to the storytelling. There’s just no observable edge to these kids despite their phenomenal vocals and nice chemistry.
The veterans fare much better. As Falco, Bradley Dean (Dear Evan Hansen, The Last Ship) completely develops his evil corporate despot. His droll, martini loving wife Sloane is an exceptional foil in this unhappy marriage. Tony Award winner Lena Hall (Hedwig and the Angry Inch) is as entertaining as Mr. Dean. Over dinner with their daughter Raven, there is a superbly executed time travel back to their early days when it was “Paradise By the Dashboard Light.” These two blew the song through the rafters and nearly stopped the show.
Why was the ensemble standing behind them doing idiotic spasmodic movements? For crying out loud, the intense moment between these two “praying for the end of time” was riveting stuff. The dancers looked ridiculous and were enormously distracting. Xena Gusthart’s choreography seemed to be an awkward meshing of dystopian aerobics and voguing.
The lighting (Patrick Woodroffe) was also not particularly good. The spotlights shone too brightly on the lead performers. If you are putting on a book musical and not a concert, there should be some expectation of mood setting. Never mind, just turn the sound up to arena levels and hope no one notices.
Jon Bausor’s set design was very memorable. Half the stage is the tunnel “where the deadly are rising.” The other half is the towering FALCO building with a hint of guitar neck in its linear structure. The set allowed for multiple scene changes and some nicely executed live videography work. Mr. Bausor also created the costumes. They were better than the zombie in a bag variety you can buy at Party City for sure. But they were awfully generic leather and fringes for a world in which “nothing ever grows in this rotting old hole, and everything is stunted and lost.”
Three of the songs from the original album were originally written by Mr. Steinman for Neverland, his planned futuristic update of Peter Pan. That idea is perhaps sprinkled a bit too literally in this final version. As a result, his moody and introspective songs of teenage angst told from an adult perspective are diluted. They are, however, enjoyable to hear and extremely well sung.
The saddest part of Bat Out of Hell is the missed opportunity. In the right hands, this one might have been a campy classic. At the performance I attended, the audience was indeed laughing. Not with the show but at it. I wanted to say to them, “you know, that’s not ideal.” I needed them to reply, “You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth.”