REVIEW: Avenue Q

Kate Monster, Anika Larsen, Princeton, Robert McClure
Photo by Carol Rosegg 2008

Yes, it's true. Avenue Q is best described as an R-rated Sesame Street containing raunchy adult themes and language. Yes, there's a graphic inter-racial (inter-species?) sex scene between two puppets who manage remarkably well, considering that in place of their nether regions they have puppeteer arms thrust all the way up to their mouths. And yes, Ernie and Bert clones have a major subplot in which one roommate encourages the other to abandon his celibate lifestyle and act on his homosexual impulses.

Armed with that information, you have to make a choice: are you going to pay to see this musical or not? And if you go, should you laugh or cringe? Well, I did see the show, and I did a fair amount of laughing AND cringing. But most of all, I left the theatre shaking my head and thinking, "This beat out Wicked at the Tony Awards, winning Best Musical, Best Original Score and Best Book of a Musical? What were they thinking?"

A young puppet person, fresh out of college and living off an allowance from mom and dad, seeks to find purpose in his life, while living in squalor at a seedy tenement on Avenue Q. He quickly makes friends with the other residents, including a variety of scrappy yet affectionate puppet people, puppet monsters, human people, and washed up TV celebrity Gary Coleman. He even falls in "like/lust" with the monster next door. There are animated shorts just like on Sesame Street, but not. The clever, upbeat musical numbers celebrate low self esteem, Internet porn, alcohol abuse, taking pleasure in the misery of others, and how giving to the homeless is good because of the way it makes YOU feel.

The show unabashedly celebrates a profligate lifestyle, and does it so gleefully, the most appalling behavior is made to seem cute. Thankfully, the only thing contagious on Avenue Q is a preoccupation with self. Which is why, I think, Broadway has embraced it, and why it speaks to the 20 and 30-somethings in an otherwise graying audience.

The humor is sharply satirical, managing somehow to simultaneously approve and make fun of our hedonistic culture. There were any number of occasions when I asked myself, "Can they really say that?" or "Can they get away with doing that?"

Yes, they can. And by "they" I mean relative newcomers Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, who wrote the music and lyrics, and Jeff Whitty, who wrote the book. But most of all, the show's success may be attributed to the outstanding performances of just seven actor/singer/puppeteers, who play all the roles, sometimes more than one simultaneously. It takes real talent to be adorable while handing someone a noose so they can hang themselves, or play both the simple girl and the slut as they fight over a man child who isn't good enough for either of them.

Avenue Q manages to feel original, while spinning off the familiar style and structure of a childhood icon. It's smart, it's snarky, it's shameless, and more than any Broadway musical since Rent, shows how far New York's entertainment industry has sunk from mere decadence into outright depravity. You can learn a lot on Avenue Q, but morality and virtue aren't part of the curriculum.

Avenue Q plays at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts through September 21. Call 303-893-4100 or visit www.denvercenter.org. For more information on the show itself, visit www.avenueq.com.