Joyous, heartbreaking “Enjoyable Residence” on the Huntington

Arts

A stellar solid delivers an beautiful model of the celebrated musical based mostly on Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel.

“Enjoyable Residence” on the Huntington Theatre, Boston, by Dec. 14.

Judging by its latest productions, right here’s a truism in regards to the Huntington Theatre: You’re more likely to stroll out of there figuring out extra about what it means to be human than you probably did if you went in. That is very true of the theater’s present present, an exquisitely executed tackle the tragic and hilarious 2013 musical “Enjoyable Residence.”

Based mostly on the award-winning graphic novel memoir by the cartoonist Alison Bechdel, it fairly actually revolves round her efforts to place that household historical past to paper: Her drawing desk is seen on stage all through, a relentless reminder of her solitary and typically painful makes an attempt to mine her personal previous. It’s a previous that features her personal coming of age as a lesbian (“a lesbian cartoonist,” particularly), and her fraught relationship along with her father, a closeted homosexual man who vacillated wildly between being caring and abusive, typically in the midst of the identical dialog. Oh, and this all takes place in and across the household enterprise, an area funeral residence — the “Enjoyable Residence” of the title.

If that each one sounds heavy, it’s. However the story is leavened by a lot relatable humor — Alison’s early romantic foibles will make you cringe, however in one of the simplest ways — and directed with simply the suitable gentle contact by Logan Ellis to in the end be simply as joyous as it’s heartbreaking.

A whole lot of that’s owing to Sarah Bockel, who makes probably the most of what’s, in lots of circumstances, a thankless position: She performs a grown-up Alison, who — like her drawing desk — is on stage all through the present to “witness” her personal recollections of her childhood and adolescence. The vanity doesn’t 100% work: It turns on the market are solely so many principally wordless reactions you possibly can should your individual previous traumas and embarrassments when you possibly can’t truly take part in them. 

However, Bockel makes probably the most of these limitations, specifically when Alison’s yelling out sarcastic and ironic “captions” to the motion on stage, and when she’s given the chance to harness the frustrations from her childhood by the shifting music and lyrics by Jeanine Tesori and Lisa Kron. Her numbers “Maps” (“I can draw a circle his entire life matches inside,” she sings of her doomed father) and the pressing, in the end mournful “Phone Wire” — through which grown Alison lastly will get to step inside considered one of her personal adolescent recollections — are completely highlights. 

After all, none of this might work and not using a convincing “Small Alison” and “Medium Alison” to inhabit these recollections, and casting administrators Janet Foster and Brett Duffy deserve a raft of credit score for locating Lyla Randall and Maya Jacobson — they merely embody these characters, in a approach that feels each uncannily actual and profoundly shifting.

Randall, as Small Alison, is a bundle of vitality, but in addition successfully considerate in a refined approach as her character begins to grapple along with her household’s uncommon dynamics. And her supply of “Ring of Keys” — the musical’s standout tune, encapsulating all of the confusion, humor, and longing of Alison’s childhood — is a dead-on present stopper. Randall’s voice is childlike sufficient to be really touching, whereas avoiding any of the “solar’ll come out tomorrow” histrionics that may typically mar youngsters’s performances.

Jacobson’s Medium Alison, in the meantime, appears to be like and looks like she was plucked proper out of Bechdel’s graphic novel, and has clearly mastered the artwork of showing myriad difficult feelings, typically opposing ones, in a single look or expression. (Sit up shut when you can.) Her efficiency captures what it actually should really feel prefer to expertise the matches and begins of lesbian self-discovery, to not point out the will to be knowledgeable cartoonist, which couldn’t have been a straightforward mixture. 

As for Jacobson’s voice, its aching mezzo soprano carries with it that very same waterfall of competing feelings that her appearing does, specifically in “Altering My Main,” a wonderful paean to younger love/lust/obsession that shall be achingly acquainted to anybody who’s skilled any of the three.

Additionally key to the success of “Enjoyable Residence” are Nick Duckart as Alison’s troubled father Bruce and Jennifer Ellis as Helen, her long-suffering mom. Helen might be probably the most tragic character within the play, having spent a long time making an attempt to maintain a “regular” household life that she knew, mainly from the beginning, was based mostly on one thing apart from actual love. Ellis conveys a real disappointment and frustration within the position, and her quiet, quivering soprano makes “Days and Days,” the story of her long-crumbling marriage, merely devastating.

Characters like Bruce, in the meantime, run the hazard of coming throughout as (excuse the expression) a comic book guide villain, there merely to supply the supply of the primary character’s traumas. However, that’s not the case right here, because of the mixture of Bechdel’s unsparing supply materials, Kron’s multilayered guide, and Duckart’s uncanny skill to attract out the unhappy turmoil that lays beneath Bruce’s troubled facade — one which encompasses no small quantity of psychological sickness along with sexual frustration. Musically, on numbers just like the heart-wrenching “Edges of the World,” his voice remembers the untethered melancholy of Mandy Patinkin’s best Sondheim work.

After all, a aspect impact of the present not shying away from Bruce’s severe flaws, and embracing Duckart’s advanced portrayal of them, implies that in some scenes the viewers is compelled to take a seat in its discomfort at Bruce’s actions — sure, truly really feel issues, which is a trademark of “Enjoyable Residence” as an entire.

The principle gamers are aided and abetted by a strong supporting solid: Sushma Saha as Alison’s faculty love curiosity, Caleb Levin and Odin Vega as her siblings, and Wyatt Anton as numerous younger objects of Bruce’s untoward affections. Musically gifted to a fault, it’s a solid of singers who’re additionally professional storytellers: In an period of pop musicals, it’s refreshing to listen to a contemporary rating that doesn’t pressure the actors to belt on the high of their lungs or add riffs and runs each 5 seconds. The music of “Enjoyable Residence” speaks for itself, and the performers’ notes float and radiate by the auditorium. As susceptible as these characters are, their voices are robust and spectacular.

And it’s all finished in service of a narrative that does a tremendous job breaking down the supply materials — 230-plus pages and 1000’s of hand-drawn panels — to its essence, taking some liberties for dramatic impact however leaving the bones of the narrative intact. That features some moments of sheer hilarity, like the youngsters filming their very own industrial for the household enterprise within the raucous, Motown-style “Come to the Enjoyable Residence.” Others, involving Bruce’s sudden pivots and eventual downfall, are wrenching.

A collection of set items that slide each forwards and backwards and up and down, some well-utilized props — mud flying off an outdated piece of linen, glimpses of Alison’s cartoons on crumpled papers, and a unadorned corpse are amongst them — and a few refined lighting additionally all add to the combo. (One notably chilling lighting impact towards the tip of the play is assured to make your coronary heart catch in your chest.)

In the end, the Huntington’s “Enjoyable Residence” is, like life, humorous and poignant on the identical time, the trials of its characters all of the extra tragic due to how undoubtedly widespread they had been through the period of Alison’s childhood, and nonetheless are on many fronts. “I need to know what’s true,” the characters declare repeatedly, however ultimately, the play is about the way it’s potential to be taught to dwell with questions whose solutions we’ll by no means know. In different phrases, to be human.

“Enjoyable Residence” runs on the Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave., Boston, by Dec. 14, 2025. Purchase tickets at huntingtontheatre.org.