High Risk, High Reward Theatre at The Public: Seat of Our Pants Review

The Skin of Our Teeth is a monster of a play. Thornton Wilder's 1942 absurdist romp is epic in scope, jam-packed with biblical allusions and meditations on the resilience of humanity, the--perhaps inescapable--cycle of history, and how we can hope to salvage anything resembling joy or meaning from it all. It's a bizarre play, and bizarre source material for a musical. Nevertheless, with The Seat of Our Pants The Public is tackling Wilder’s monster head on, but “now some other guy’s added songs.” That guy, Ethan Lipton, has pulled off something truly excellent and the cast, crew, and band execute his vision nearly to perfection.

The musical follows the plot of the original play quite closely. In act one, we meet the Antrobus family. Maggie Antrobus (Ruthie Ann Miles) is the worried mother of two children, Gladys (Amina Faye), and Henry (Damon Daunno). The world is unambiguously ending. An unstoppable wall of ice is descending from the north and has already reached their New Jersey suburb; too much time outside means near certain death. George Antrobus (Shuler Hensley) plays the aloof father, busy with his work, inventing the wheel, and the alphabet, and multiplication tables. Yeah, it’s weird.

In act two, we learn that the world has miraculously survived. George is about to be sworn in as President of the Fraternal Order of Mammals at their annual convention, a boisterous party echoing the roaring twenties in both tone and costuming, as the humans and animals alike all ignore the next impending disaster: a newly gathering storm. When the storm hits it quickly escalates to apocalyptic levels. But the family, along with two of every animal, escape onto the large ship at the end of the pier in a goofy Noah’s Ark riff.

Act three is much darker. George and Henry have been off fighting, soldiers on opposite sides of a just-ended conflict. The mood is gritty and tense as they return home and face each other at last, as they never got the chance to on the battlefield.

There is no continuous narrative tying the acts together, just the Antrobus family and different flavors of apocalypse. Wilder’s original script is left largely intact. But now, there are songs. In a note in the playbill, composer and adaptor Lipton describes the challenges of adapting the work into a musical, and how he eventually decided that, if he wanted to do justice to the Pulitzer Prize-winning original, he could not be shy about it. He would need to put his own “authorial stamp” on it. And stamp he did, with each musical number building off of and slotting seamlessly into the source material.

The show opens with “The World is Ending” sung mostly by the Announcer (Andy Grotelueschen) and the band. It’s great fun as we jump between Lipton’s jubilant lyrics and the rapid pace of Wilder’s original opening monologue. The band, integrated as a visible element of the performance, is a highlight throughout the show. The music is excellent of course, but they aren’t your typical pit band. They change costumes with each act, sing along with the cast, and even--in the case of Allison Ann Kelley (Banjo/Guitar)--step onto the stage in several scenes.

Following Grotelueschen’s introduction, the audience learns near-immediately that this is a deeply absurdist world. There are speaking dinosaurs and mammoths outside the Antrobus home. (Pets? Family friends? It’s not entirely clear.) Wilder, like his absurdist contemporaries Beckett, Camus, and Pinter, faced a world that seemed bleaker than ever, having just emerged from the horrors of World War Two only to contend with the fresh, horrible specter of nuclear annihilation. What is the point of anything when the universe is cold and indifferent at best, malicious at worst? The absurdist moments make us laugh and think in equal measure as they deftly hold up a mirror, and Lipton carries that thread through in his songs. It is easy for us to laugh at “Stuff it Down Inside,” where Mrs. Antrobus implores her children to suppress any and all negative feelings. But it’s laughter of recognition. We all do it, even knowing that we shouldn’t. But how else can we be expected to face the end of the world? How are we supposed to find anything remotely resembling purpose, or meaning in a world that often feels like it's in an inescapable decline? The team behind The Seat of Our Pants has an easy answer to the key question “Why this play, now?”--they could simply gesture broadly and we’d all nod in knowing agreement.

One way to face the end of the world, this wacky bunch of characters shows us, is some amount of hedonism. In act two, that amount is dialed up to eleven with their Gatsby-esque convention party. But the philosophical veneer of unabashed lotus eating has its cracks and The Seat of Our Pants doesn't shy away from encouraging us to look through them in its absurdist way. Everything is fine! Pay no attention to the already obvious impending super storm! Sure, our weather monitoring thing-a-ma-bob has a setting for END OF THE WORLD, but it never gets there! And if that isn't enough, we also get a more explicit warning against unchecked intemperance in the form of a fantastic solo from Damon Daunno on "Cursed with Urges." At this point, Daunno's Henry Antrobus is an edgy, troubled teenager, angry at pretty much everyone, but especially his parents, who hold him in check when he just wants to do whatever it is he wants to do. Daunno is riveting and dangerously energetic, helped along by some well-executed rock show style lighting design from Lap Chi Chu.

But the core of the show's philosophy is best embodied by Sabina, played by the incomparable Micaela Diamond: maid to the Antrobus family in act one, pageant winner temptress in act two, and survivor of the war in act three. It's a meaty part and Diamond feasts. Sabina rides the ups and downs of the show's excesses, giving into them at times, thoughtfully commenting on them at others. The track also calls for Diamond to step outside the character, becoming a sort of fourth wall breaking, meta-commentarian. She juggles these roles adroitly, managing to extract the most comedic value from each transition. It isn't a subtle dynamic--I wouldn't describe a single thing about The Seat of Our Pants as subtle--but it is seamless. She’s our conscience, giving us the moral of the story without us even realizing it in act one: embrace the small pleasures when they come; “enjoy your ice cream while it is still on the cone.”

Vocally, Diamond is stunning, and her character work is strong, with an expressiveness that sometimes teeters on the edge of cartoonish, but never goes too far. With this performance, she's cemented a place for herself on my list of performers whose presence alone will make a show a "must see". Even among a very strong ensemble, she’s a cut above. Never is this clearer than in the third act, which suffers for its more serious, gritty tone. The Seat of Our Pants is at its best in the gleefully absurd moments, when a sentient mammoth shuffles into the living room or when an anthropomorphized turkey jokes about avoiding the Thanksgiving dinner table. Act three’s post-war reality is a difficult transition. Rather than kicking us off with a tight, comical song, Grotelueschen shuffles out, haggard and aged by the war. With the teary eyes of someone who has seen too much, he tells us, "The War is over," and leaves the stage without fanfare. It’s a powerful moment, but the production struggles to nail the tonal shift as the final act continues. Then comes Diamond to the rescue.

Her final solo, the eleven o’clock number “The Wonderful Thing About Ice Cream,” brings the show right back to its strengths. It’s big, bold, and winks at its own silliness even as it is--at its core--unashamedly earnest. It neatly synthesizes the different “vibes” of the three acts: no small feat, but Lipton’s lyrical prowess and Diamond’s incredible performance deftly thread that needle.

I almost wished the show ended there, as the finale, “We’re a Disaster,” starts off as a bit of an eye-roll. Sunny Min-Sook Hitt’s choreography has the entire company--except Daunno’s estranged Henry--stomping around the stage in a manner reminiscent of a cringey movement exercise from a college theatre class. But then the chaos resolves into a simple, repetitive choreography as the company sings together. That moment of transition--where these independent individuals physically harmonize into a cohesive whole, dancing together as one--has been replaying in my mind ever since, along with their final refrain:

“We are not here to surrender, we are here to rendezvous.”

The Seat of Our Pants is bold, brave, irreverent, thought provoking, and hilarious, but above all, it is a simply exceptional piece of theatre. I cannot wait to see it again.