
Monet Sabel as Carole King in Wick Theatre’s Beautiful. (Photos by Amy Pasquantonio)
By Britin Haller
As a theater critic, reviewing the same titled show in a different production is a double-edged sword when one of the performances is inevitably not as good as the other. Such is the case with Beautiful: The Carole King Musical now playing at the Wick Theatre in Boca Raton.
We’re not going to sugarcoat it. It’s so far away from another local theater company’s production, it feels like the difference between two of Carole King’s songs “Uptown,” and “On Broadway.” If you know New York City, that’s about 40 blocks, give or take a few.
That doesn’t mean Beautiful at the Wick is not entertaining, or that you shouldn’t go, especially for anyone who has not previously seen it performed elsewhere. Or that you shouldn’t sing along, only not too loudly as requested by Executive Managing Director, Marilyn Wick, in a joke she made in her audience welcome.
Our companion of the evening thoroughly enjoyed herself even though she went in thinking she’d be listening to the famous Carole King songs she loves from the Tapestry album. But this jukebox musical features songs Carole and her husband, Gerry Goffin, wrote together before she got famous. Fortunately, Beautiful does contain a few of the traditional hits immediately recognized as Carole King’s.
The story of Beautiful opens in the late 1950s, when a then-teenaged Carole Klein (née) takes a gig writing tunes for the famous music producer, Don Kirshner, even while she’s still in school and living with her mother in Brooklyn.
Along the way, Carole falls in love, gets pregnant and gets married, in that order, and becomes one half of one of the greatest, and most prolific, songwriting duos of all time. And that’s all over a decade before she gives us the remarkable Carole King and Tapestry.
As the legendary songbird, Monet Sabel, is no stranger to the role, having played CK previously in four other productions. Sabel fits into the part like a well-worn glove and while her energy is not super-high, one cannot accuse her of sleepwalking. There is no doubt that Sabel is an enormously talented musician who resembles the Carole King of the 1970s.
Carole’s louse of a husband, Gerry Goffin, thinks he’s wiser than she is from the get-go in their meet-cute. Carole’s response when he tells her to listen to Bach sometime is she plays a few bars of Bach. Gotta love that.
Before you can say “It’s Too Late,” Carole is pregnant, and Gerry proposes. One of the few times he tries, at least, to do the right thing.
Gerry is brought to life by Sean William Davis. Davis is no stranger to Beautiful either after appearing as both Nick, and a Righteous Brother, on another Palm Beach production. It should be easy for us to see Gerry Goffin’s appeal, and why Carole fell in love with him and stayed in love with him, but it’s not. He comes across as unlikable, pretty much from the start, making Carole look needy and lovelorn. She’s insecure from the moment she meets Gerry. “I have all the right amount of body,” she tells him, “it’s just not organized properly.”
Gerry and Carole write for Kirshner, a good guy who is also their mentor and friend. Ben Sandomir is understated, and everything he should be, in this mostly non-musical role.
Carole and Gerry work alongside fellow songwriters, and competitors, Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann, a real-life duo who stayed married for 62 years until she died in 2023. These two are written as the comic relief characters, only they aren’t very likable, nor very funny. Which is surprising considering it’s talented actors Leah Sessa and Taylor Hilt Mitchell, the latter who has also appeared as Mann in a different production of Beautiful.
Leah Sessa is just okay here, and having seen what this powerful actor is capable of (Bye Bye Birdie comes to mind) that’s surprising. The only time Sessa really shone was in the scene where Carole and Cynthia are discussing Janelle Woods, the woman who is having an affair with Carole’s husband, and Cynthia is lending a sympathetic ear.
Barry Mann, as played by Mitchell, is supposed to be an adorable whiny hypochondriac who endears himself to us. Instead, he comes across as a whiny hypochondriac who becomes annoying real fast. Even his big proposal joke falls flat, although Mitchell does nail a few lines.
A jukebox musical is not ideal as the plot is manipulated to fit certain songs. So the show is at a disadvantage from the start. Despite the serious subjects of adultery and drug abuse, there should be plenty of laughs, and heart, and characters to root for. That’s why playing up the comic aspect is always welcome, as it helps make the genre more palatable. But we could see no chemistry, or heart, between Cynthia and Barry.
As Carole’s Ma, Genie Klein, Colleen Pagano is also tasked with providing the comedy, but again as with Sessa and Mitchell, she comes up short. And considering Ma has some great one-liners, this is a real shame. It’s not always the line itself that gets the laugh, it’s the delivery. Pagano might want to work on this because we know this role can be more than it is at the moment. Pagano does do nice work on Genie’s peptalk for Carole at a time when her daughter needs her. Mostly Ma chain-smokes and puts down Carole’s father, and Carole’s desire to be a songwriter, at one point telling her “Girls don’t write music, they teach it.”
Aaron Atkinson, an actor we loved as Pharoah in The Wick’s recent show Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, plays Nick, a guy who flatters Carole and helps her realize her own self-worth.
The book by Douglas McGrath plays fast and loose with the truth. At the end of Beautiful, we are led to believe Carole has just left Gerry and moved to California, when in reality, she was already on husband number two (out of four) by that point. She also had two previous albums before Tapestry, that went nowhere. The most glaring half-truth is that the Janelle Woods character is fictional and only based on the woman Goffin did have an affair (and a child) with. That was former The Cookies member, Earl-Jean McCrea, who had a hit with “I’m Into Something Good.”
The biggest highlights are the ensemble dance numbers starring The Drifters, The Shirelles, and Little Eva. As the Drifters: Desmond Newson, Jawan Hayes, Jymil Littles and Kalab Quinn wow us with “Up On the Roof” and “On Broadway.” Shirelles actresses Nia Bourne, Matti Endsley, Sarah Rose Hackshaw and Sheena O. Murray excite us with “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow,” and Little Eva (Matti Endsley) and friends have us boogieing down in our seats to “The Locomotion.”
Most people probably don’t know that Little Eva started out as the babysitter for Carole and Gerry’s first daughter. “They’re getting hits with their babysitter?” Barry asked in one of the lines that Mitchell delivered perfectly. Babysitters, old girlfriends, that’s some nepotism in the Brill Building.
Ensemble member Jawan Hayes could read the phone book, and we’d stand in line. Hayes was the one bright spot (pretending to work the sound booth) in the otherwise non-eventful “Chains” number. Is Hayes a triple-threat? Because if so, it’s about time this superstar gets his own show.
“You’ve Got a Friend,” a number with Sabel, Mitchell, Sessa and Sandomir that’s meant to be a goodbye for Carole who would be leaving soon for California, is sweet with good harmonies.
Nate Gilanyi and Brent D. Kuenning perform as The Righteous Brothers in their huge hit “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling.” This song is often played over-the-top for big laughs in other productions, but not here. That’s a missed opportunity, as we see it.
“Walking in the Rain,” as sung by Barry and Cynthia is nice enough, although they both seem to be trying to out-sing the other instead of blending their voices in what should be a lovely love song.
Director Jeffrey B. Moss is at the helm of Beautiful. Stage design by Mike Sabourin is simple and effective with pianos and couches quickly sliding off and on. Scaffolding and platforms are utilized for variety reminding us of such classic television programs as American Bandstand, Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In, and Soul Train.
Choreography by Quincy Legito gives us some electric dance numbers. Clifford Michael Spulock’s lighting always seems to go on and off at the right times, and in the right places, plus Kacey Koploff’s projection design.
Wigs by Bobby Zlotnik mimic the day. Cynthia first appears in a curly platinum bob popular in that day and age, and then midway through changes to a short straight look with bangs. ee goes from a ponytail, to housewife hair, to the voluptuous mane we see on the cover of her Tapestry album.
Some of the costumes designed by Alejo Vietti are gorgeous, most notably The Shirelles, who go from colorful swing dresses gathered at the waist, to pretty pink ones, and finally to blue sequins. The Drifters look hot (and very cool!) in their midnight indigo blue suits with lime-ish-yellow shirts.
We know Carole Klein is supposed to be a mousey little thing, and the opposite of glamourous, but man, they do not do her any favors with some of the clothing choices, particularly in the scene where she catches Gerry at another woman’s house.
Finally, the butterfly that is Carole King emerges out of her cocoon to become the dynamo who wowed the world at Carnegie Hall on June 18, 1971. This is the moment we’ve been waiting for. It should be everything. It should take our breath away. Give us goosebumps. And we know what this can feel like, because we felt it before in another theater production.
Instead, this big reveal can only be summed up as anti-climactic, because that wow factor, the glow-up if you will, was lost the second we see Carole in the prior scene wearing her Carnegie dress in her dressing room. Much better to have her in a robe here, so as not to spoil the big aha.
But we can’t end this review without addressing the elephant in the room. There were sound problems. Most notably microphone ones that seemed to happen to only the lead singers. The first time it occurred, someone not in the cast walked out on stage and gave a handheld to The Shirelles’s lead, but that wasn’t any better as we still couldn’t hear her.
The second time the lead singer’s microphone was out was during our favorite song, the The Monkees’s nostalgic hit “Pleasant Valley Sunday,” a catchy tune meant to express Gerry’s suburban life boredom. Between the sound issue, and worrying about the poor unfortunate soul who was thrust into the spotlight, and not in a good way, we took no enjoyment there. Thankfully for her, she found her sea legs and muddled her way through.
There were pitch problems on several of the songs so bad we cringed, even by the leads. Could they not hear themselves? We feel for the actors and singers who put so much work into everything they do. There is no doubt they must be frustrated going out to each performance not knowing if the net will catch them or let them fall on their faces.
Tis is the second musical in a row with sound problems (in Joseph, the soundtrack froze up leaving the cast looking like deer caught in the headlights.) Perhaps it’s time The Wick ups their game and invests in an update. Or perhaps even, move away from pre-recorded music. After all, the Carbonells no longer recognize musical directors who don’t work with a live orchestra, leaving The Wick’s talented in-house guy, Bobby Peaco, with the short end of the baton come awards-time.
We have nothing but the utmost respect for Marilyn Wick who
was recently honored with a Special Carbonell Award for outstanding contributions to the South Florida community. But a working sound system is a non-negotiable item; but the lack of being able to hold their own in a competitive theatrical marketplace (that’s getting more and more creative) is definitely holding The Wick back from being a true force to be reckoned with.
So here’s the bottom line. Beautiful: The Carole King Musical played on Broadway for over six years and won multiple awards, so we know it’s got the goods. If you’ve seen it done extremely well, try not to make comparisons. And if you’ve never seen Beautiful, by all means head to The Wick, because you’ll thoroughly enjoy seeing it. And if the sound system is running on all cylinders, hopefully hearing it.
Get there early for “Broadway Buzz” where you will learn the backstage secrets and the backstory of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical at the Wick.
Britin Haller is a mystery author and an editor for Turner Publishing. Her recent short story “So Many Shores in Crookland” can be read in the 150th issue of Black Cat Weekly. Britin’s latest edit, a cozy mystery novel called Dumpster Dying is by Michelle Bennington and available where books are sold. Find Britin across social media.
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical plays through February 16 at The Wick Theatre 7901 N. Federal Highway, Boca Raton FL; Wed-Sat Evening Performances at 7:30 p.m.; Matinees are at 2 p.m. Wed, Thurs, Sat & Sun. Running time approx. 140 minutes includes a 15-minute intermission. Tickets starting at $89. Call 561-995-2333, or visit thewick.org.