BROADWAY SNAP-SHOT
by Russell Bouthiller

Dateline: February 6, 2005

GOOD VIBRATIONS

Wouldn't it be nice if the songs of Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys were part of a dynamic and vibrant Broadway musical? Well, that's what playing at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. Directed and choreographed by Broadway veteran John Carrafa, GOOD VIBRATIONS features a cast of youthful newcomers splashing around in the winsome sounds of the Sixties.

GOOD VIBRATIONS mimics the MAMMA MIA! formula: a popular group's oeuvre gets shoe-horned into a narrative that conveniently echoes the sentiments of their most famous hits. Hence, with a Beach Boys spin, Richard Dresser's book neatly incorporates "Surfin' USA," "I Get Around" and "Be True toYour School" into this Annette Funicello/Frankie Avalon plot.

GOOD VIBRATIONS opens at a nameless East Coast high school some time in the Sixties; the exact year is anyone's guess. Class hot-shot Bobby (David Larsen) vows to head for California shores and live the life of endless summer. Friends Dave (Brandon Wardell) and Eddie (Tituss Burgess) catch the same wave and urge Bobby to persuade the geeky, Caroline (Kate Reinders), to transport them in her snazzy red convertible. "Little Deuce Coupe" would have worked nicely here, but for some reason it was sent to the chop shop.

Caroline confesses she's had a crush on Bobby ever since the fourth grade and when she learns that Bobby is only interested in her stylish car, she's heartbroken. Set adrift on the West Coast, Caroline discovers a sudden surge of self-worth and independence. In the bounce a beach ball, she's the most popular girl on the beach while Bobby is left swinging his graduation tassel.

GOOD VIBRATIONS is honest in its aim to be no more than bubble gum for the brain. Nothing compelling, challenging or remotely surprising ever happens. Laughs are scarce and cheap, but plasticized paste-on smiles are in abundance. The entire cast is bronzed and waxed to Coppertone perfection, so much so you get the sense that if you held any one of them close to your ear, you would hear the roar of the ocean.

Still, this sun and sand-drenched homage to happiness may prove to be a record-breaker in one sense. GOOD VIBRATIONS garnered some of the worst notices in recent Broadway history. Ben Brantley of The New York Times called it a "singing headache [that] sacrifices itself, night after night and with considerable anguish, to make all other musicals on Broadway look good." And David Rooney, writing in Variety, felt that "[a] chaotic sense of haphazard, try-anything desperation pervades most aspects of this amateurish attempt to stitch the Beach Boys' hits into a musical."

John Carrafa, whose DANCE OF THE VAMPIRES became one of Broadway's most legendary flops, looks to have done it again. In its attempt to appeal to every possible age group, GOOD VIBRATIONS reaches none. Characters seem to be living in separate time zones and decades. Even the language is off-kilter; how often did you hear the word "Awesome!" in the 1960s? Costumes by Jess Goldstein look like samples from every fashion trend since the Johnson administration. GOOD VIBRATIONS, a show that tempts New York theatre-goers to reconsider their position on the Second Amendment.