Holly Doubet was vacationing in Hawaii in 2018 at a time of tensions between the US and North Korea when an emergency alert warned everybody in the state of an incoming missile attack. “Seek immediate shelter,” she read on her phone. “This is not a drill.”
The Hawaiian Missile Crisis was hardly a replay of the Cuban Missile Crisis, which lasted 13 terrifying days in 1962. The crisis in Hawaii lasted 38 minutes. Some bozo who worked for the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency had mistakenly sent out a false alarm.
That was long enough, Doubet has said, to change her life. It inspired her to write her first musical with a trio of experienced collaborators (originally called “38 Minutes”), imagining how the event changed not just her life, but the lives of a diverse group of characters. “This Is Not a Drill,” opening tonight as a production of York Theater, has some tuneful moments and some appealing performances, but it is unlikely to prove life-changing for anybody in the audience.
One by one, we meet the characters of the four principal stories, each with a spelled-out problem.
Jessica (Felicia Finley) is in Hawaii on her own, because her husband backed out at the last second on their planned vacation without the kids. She suspects he’s cheating; her mother is unsympathetic: “men will be men.” Jessica sings “Am I Enough” (“When will I get enough/ to feel that promises/mean more than just words.”)
Tony and Chris (Chris Doubet and Matthew Curiano are lovers from Cincinnati (cue a song “Cincinnati Boys”) Tony is enthusiastic about everything; Chris is a workaholic and seemingly distant; they are both recovering from having been unable to adopt a child they had fostered.
Sophie and Derek (Aurelia Williams and Gary Edwards) are an old married couple who are estranged from their (unseen) son, because he’s gay, and Derek couldn’t accept that. Now, going back to Hawaii after fond memories of a long-ago vacation, Derek has a heart condition, and Sophie fears they’ve grown distant from one another.
Kaleo and Leilani (Kelvin Moon Loh and Cáitlín Burke), Hawaiian residents who work as entertainers for the tourists, are having trouble communicating with their teenage son Ikaika (Sam Poon) who resents his parents, thinking them sell-outs for diluting authentic Hawaiian music.
All receive the emergency alert at the same time; each panics. They all stumble onto one another. They wind up helping each other in various ways. When the crisis is over, their problems end up solved.
I suspect the creative team was aiming for a “Come From Away” vibe, strangers showing the best of humanity by helping one another in time of crisis. But it feels closer to “The Poseidon Adventure,” a group of disparate one-dimensional characters awkwardly thrown together in a desperate effort to survive/create suspense — although it’s not as effective as “The Poseidon Adventure” because at least Shelly Winters drowns in that 1972 disaster film, while there is never any real peril in “This Is Not a Drill.” It actually was a drill.
There are 18 musical numbers along the way, and none are less than competent, many are full-throttle ballads, some are catchy, one even moved me — to my surprise, since it was a group singalong that relied heavily on the word “Aloha.” Aurelia Williams and Gary Edwards were the standout singers in that particular number, but the cast as a whole is proof of how much talent in New York there is to tap into.
The creative team tries a couple of times to stretch “This Is Not A Drill’ beyond just a feel-good show. At one point, Madeline, the hotel manager, (Marianne Tatum) is mockingly depicted as patronizing and ignorant about Hawaiian culture. But this just made me wonder why, since this alert went out to everybody in Hawaii, a state of more than 1.4 million residents, three of the four stories were about tourists.
Far more successful are the scenes involving the state employee who sends out the false alarm. Lukas Poost is terrific as that goofball, and his song a highlight, the really rocking “Damn I’m Sorry” that he manages to make amusing:
Damn I’m sorry
But I hope that you don’t blame me
A lonely guy in paradise
A convenient sacrifice
This Is Not A Drill
York at Theater at St. Jean’s through October 11
Book by Holly Doubet and Joseph McDonough
Music and lyrics by Holly Doubet, Kathy Babylon, and John Vester
Directed and choreographed by Gabriel Barr
Music supervision by Paul Bogaev, arrangements by Ben Babylon, Paul Bogaev, David John Madore, music direction by David John Madore,
Scenic design by Edward Pierce, costume design by Johanna Pan, lighting design by Alan C. Edwards, projection design by Brad Peterson and Peter Brucker, and sound design by Shannon Slaton.
Cast: Cáitlín Burke as Leilani, Victor E. Chan as Ensemble, Bill Coyne as Ensemble, Matthew Curiano as Chris, Chris Doubet as Tony, Gary Edwards as Derek, Felicia Finley as Jessica, Kelvin Moon Loh as Kaleo, Sam Poon as Ikaika, Lukas Poost as Ensemble, Marianne Tatum as Laura, and Aurelia Williams as Sophie. The swings are Xavier Reyes and T. Shyvonne Stewart.
Photos by Carol Rosegg
