Swept Away Broadway Reviews

You may nevertheless want to ask yourself whether a show whose sound effects include amplified vomit is right for you. For all its hornpipes and full-throated song, its visual panache and masculine eye candy, “Swept Away,” is among the darkest, most unsparing musicals ever to anchor itself on Broadway. And despite the suggestion of rapture in its title, it is really about the gravest decisions humans can make, the depths of souls that are darker than the sea’s.

In turning the Avett Brothers’ take on this gruesome true story into a musical, Logan and director Michael Mayer were facing a strangely paradoxical task. On the one hand, the events are there, the songs are there, and the central characters and situations are just waiting to be brought to three-dimensional life. Conversely, that very straightforwardness is a potential trap. A piece of theater assembled from preexisting songs, or charting a known historical event, can wind up feeling by-the-numbers: The things we expect to happen happen, and along the way folks sing about them (or, more likely, they sing about slightly generalized circumstances adjacent to the specific ones onstage). Despite its creative team’s efforts to lace a capital-T Theme through the work, Swept Away often falls prey to this roteness. Logan, with the support of Scott and Seth Avett and their bandmate Bob Crawford, has chosen “salvation and redemption” as the play’s big idea, but its deployment is telly not showy — we hear a lot about it, but our pulses never really rise with the stakes.

As enthralling as it is disquieting, Swept Away, opening tonight on Broadway, is a taut and captivating new folk musical featuring the gorgeous songs of the roots-rock group The Avett Brothers and an impeccable cast headed by John Gallagher Jr. and Stark Sands.

Something I won’t be saying on my death bed: “I wish I would’ve watched more shows about boats.” Yet another crew of singing seafarers sets off in the Avett Brothers’ uneven “Swept Away,” which opened Tuesday night at the Longacre Theatre. The musical adds a twisted new twist, through — cannibalism. On Broadway? Not so appetizing.

I suspect “Swept Away” will end up as the most niche of this fall’s armada of Broadway musicals; it’s an unusual, all-male piece that doesn’t offer obvious commercial appeal, especially given its dire theme for a big Broadway night out. But it strikes me as a weird, sure, but also daring interpretation of a kind of music we only rarely hear on Broadway.

In this 90-minute show, directed by Michael Mayer, the folk-rock score of the Avett Brothers is a rich pleasure (and sung beautifully by a talented cast, particularly its four principals). However, the story (by John Logan) and staging of the ill-fated sailors—on board a whaling ship that leaves New Bedford, Massachusetts, sometime around 1888—creaks a little more ominously.

Without spoiling anything, Swept Away is a musical that will keep viewers on their toes until its final moments — even if it does rush its ending a smidge. In fact, attendees may find themselves wanting to take in a secondary viewing (after the adrenaline wears off, of course) to catch glimpses of what they missed the first time around; I’m certain that there were subtle cues from each of the actors that I didn't notice in my flurry to catch all of the action. But, be prepared: The powerful performances and message of brotherhood and sacrifice will stick with you long afterward. Steel your heart, grab a lifejacket, and set sail for the Longacre Theatre as soon as possible. Grade: A

As with Tammy Faye, another new musical this season which today announced its closing, Swept Away a musical cursed by the finality of the Broadway premiere. A few more workshops to iron out a problematic book and it really could work; its elements brought together under a firmer directorial hand. The Avett Brothers’ music, with their specific sound and sense of down-home longing, seem ideal for a theatrical adaptation, but it’s a shame it’s left at sea by a book with no clear navigation, flailing its arms for rescue.

Despite its title, Swept Away is not a musicalization of the classic Lina Wertmuller film (or its abysmal Madonna-starring American remake). Rather, the show featuring the songs of the popular band The Avett Brothers is a dark, fable-like tale, inspired by a real event, about the fateful aftermath of a shipwreck. It’s strong stuff, and hardly the sort of musical for tourists simply looking for a fun time. But this superbly staged and acted production exerts a powerful, hypnotic force that demands attention and respect.

The show makes highminded use of The Avett Brothers’s album Mignonette – the name of that wrecked British yacht – much as Girl From the North Country wove early Bob Dylan into bleak narrative (albeit with a more complex environment and fully-realized characters). Both come out of the haut-Broadway tradition of Menotti operas and Marc Blitzstein, often as not seen as caviar to the general. The new work is obviously a labor of love executed with exemplary taste but, in the end, lacking in qualities by which an audience is likely to be swept away.

The good news is that Mayer is in top form with his latest Broadway entry. The new musical “Swept Away” opened Tuesday at the Longacre Theatre, and it helps immeasurably that this divisive director is working with great material here. In its first half, the musical recalls the grandeur of Benjamin Britten’s opera “Billy Budd.” Then Rachel Hauck’s set capsizes – the ship really flips over! – and the musical turns into an intimate chamber piece with its four survivors starving and slowly spinning around in the middle of the sea.

If truly dark musicals are not your taste, I’d suggesting staying away from “Swept Away.” Others are urged to come sail away on this often-remarkable journey.

Despite all this effort, Swept Away hasn’t found a rationale for telling its nightmarish story. We don’t have enough sense of these individuals to care about their fate, and we only get glancing references to larger moral questions that might implicate us, or make us consider how we might respond in such extreme circumstances. The show has the power to shake us up, but then it merely tosses us overboard and sets us a adrift, floating on troubled seas without a clear destination.

Overall, “Swept Away” is a high-adrenaline and pulse-pounding new Broadway musical. The music by The Avett Brothers is quite catchy and it will stick with the audience well after the show is over; moreover, it will certainly spark conversations among viewers. The acting performances by the cast members are riveting and electric all around. It is able to delve beyond the surface, and there is an honesty and authenticity to it like no other, and “Swept Away” stands out in a raw and unflinching manner. It is a stirring tale of shipwreck, salvation, forgiveness, and brotherhood that is set on the high seas. It is worth checking out, and it garners 4.5 out of 5 stars.

In thinking about “Swept Away” afterwards, and casually researching the story, I landed on a fascinating tidbit: The 17-year-old cabin boy who was murdered aboard the Mignonette was named Richard Parker, which is the name that Yann Martel gave to the shipwrecked tiger in “The Life of Pi.” This led me to realize that Martel’s novel, ,turned into a Broadway musical of its own, was one of the many works of literature, theater, movies and music that “Swept Away” evoked for me in one way or another. Among these were Moby Dick, Traffic’s John Barleycorn is Dead, Hitchcock’s Lifeboat, Sting’s The Last Ship, Dylan’s Girl from the North Country. These inadvertent evocations didn’t make me view “Swept Away” as derivative. Rather, it left me aware of the qualities that were in insufficient supply – tension and details and meaning.

There’s an undeniable energy in firsts and lasts. Swept Away tells the story of the final voyage of a whaling ship bound for the scrapyard, and the maiden voyage of a young crewman setting sail for the first time. It also marks the folk rock band The Avett Brothers' Broadway debut — and the journey is well worth taking.

Although I admire Swept Away’s sincerity, however, I must admit that I was not ultimately very moved by it. The Avett Brothers’ voice is richly conflicted and specific, but the characters in this show are not; they are generic in their typology, and the story doesn’t quite support the framing of Mate’s deathbed confession and conversion to spreading the truth. Swept Away made me want to listen to more songs by the Avett Brothers, but I wasn’t sold on its larger points about brotherhood. For others, perhaps, the sense of redemption Mate lands on will seem worthier of his grim trip of guilt.