With inclusion on several reviewer’s “best of the decade” lists when it was released including those of Paste, NPR, and Rolling Stone, Sufjan Stevens’ acclaimed 2005 concept album Illinois enjoys cult status for its lush orchestrations and wildly inventive portrayal of the state’s people, landscapes, and history, complete with UFOs, zombies, and predatory wasps. This musically ambitious work, which weaves together cinematic orchestral anthems, jazz riffs, and other musical influences to explore wide-ranging narratives about blossoming queerness and self-exploration is expanded upon through a mix of live music and impressionistic choreography to revisit the beloved album’s themes of self-discovery.
Dancer, choreographer, and director Justin Peck has assembled an impressive body of creative projects, starting out as a soloist with New York City Ballet and moving on to create work for that company and prestigious companies from around the world, as well as on Broadway with Carousel and Stephen Spielberg’s acclaimed film West Side Story. The Tony Award-winner embraces Stevens’ album in an ecstatic pageant of storytelling, theater, dance, and live music with a cast of virtuosic dancers, singers, and musicians with a narrative crafted with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Jackie Sibblies Drury (Fairview, Marys Seacole). Featuring new arrangements of the entire album by composer and pianist Timo Andres for a live band and three voices, ranging in style from DIY folk and indie rock to marching band and ambient electronics, this bold, new music-theater production leads audiences on a mighty journey through the American heartland, from campfire storytelling to the edges of the cosmos.
There have been many dance theater pieces inspired by pop artists, but few carry the sweeping emotional heft of Illinoise. Justin Peck’s dance production based on Sufjan’s Stevens’ critically acclaimed 2005 album is now receiving its New York City premiere at the Park Avenue Armory after buzzy runs at the Fisher Center at Bard and the Chicago Shakespeare Theater. If the rapturous audience response for this limited engagement is any indication, this won’t be its last stop.
Mostly, “Illinoise” makes me wonder why so many musicals, even those that feature dance heavily, are so leadfooted in their storytelling conventions. (No surprise that Peck was influenced, as he told The Times, by the groundbreaking pop jukebox dancicals of Twyla Tharp.) “Illinoise” instead builds on its faith in the audience, trusting us to organize its various streams of information into a steady river of deep feeling inside our own heads. Or if you wind up crying, as I did, outside.
2024 | Off-Broadway |
Park Avenue Armory Off-Broadway Premiere Production Off-Broadway |
2024 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Book of a Musical (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Justin Peck |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Choreography (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Justin Peck |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Featured Performer in an Off-Broadway Musical | Ben Cook |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Lead Performer in an Off-Broadway Musical | Ricky Ubeda |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding New Off-Broadway Musical | Illinoise |
2024 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Orchestrations (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Timo Andres |
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