I Saw "Hadestown" In London: An Analysis

I saw “Hadestown” on December 27th and right afterwards I wrote a quick post where I went over a few main points that I wanted to dissect further. Previously I listened to just the bootleg where I did truthfully miss a bunch of stuff and made a lot of comments and I may refer back to some of them in this post so the link for that post is here.

To understand my perspective: The original is quite possibly my favorite musical of all time, I’m a person who sees shows in New York City on a regular basis, I’m an American who basically went over to see my British boyfriend who lives in London (also a fan of “Hadestown” but not as much as me) on the agreement that he buy the “Hadestown” tickets and I pay the air fare, and I have stolen his laptop for the evening to write this. Also it has been two days since I saw it and he and I have discussed it a lot so the overwhelming aspects have worn off and I may forget some hopefully minor details.

8. The set and staging give me LIFE. During “Way Down Hadestown” I literally smacked my boyfriend’s leg just to ensure that he was seeing what I was seeing. We also did a lot of pointing but it was mostly at either Amber Gray or Patrick Page doing subtle acting things in the corner.

I’m actually going to start on a positive note and end on a positive note so let’s talk about this first since it will help lay the groundwork for other details.

I was originally pretty unimpressed with the set. There was no curtain or anything so the set was just there when we got in and when the show started the actors just went out and took their seats. I remembered reading in a review of the show that it looked like the backroom of a church in New Orleans and I kind of see what they mean but it was more evocative than direct. It actually reminded me a bit of the set from “Once” with less character.

It’s a mostly light wood set in a half circle with steps and the musicians are sitting on the steps. Above that there’s a balcony that is very French Quarter with a black iron spiral staircase and there’s a huge set of double doors behind the balcony. When the show starts, Hades and Persephone are sitting on the balcony and they basically chill there until their respective entrances into the show, which I thought was cool but I was constantly watching them just because I love them and both Amber Gray and Patrick Page never stop acting so it’s fun to see little things like Hades reading the newspaper and Persephone fanning herself and looking bored. It also hurt my brain to contemplate that they are Underworld gods who are in the Underworld when they are on the balcony but they’re above everyone else? It doesn’t totally make sense but it looks cool.

On the half circle stage below there are a bunch of tables and chairs during the first half of act one where the chorus are chilling in modern work clothes (I forgot to mention the clothes, damnit; I’ll do it after this). Most of the Orpheus and Eurydice action in the first half of act one happens here with some minor going-up-on-the-steps. Hermes is positioned stage right for nearly the whole show with a few small moments of dancing with Persephone during “Living It Up On Top” and “Way Down Hadestown.” This fact will be important later.

The first really key aspect to the staging is the turntable on the floor. I don’t know the proper terminology but it’s a three layered turntable, which doesn’t do anything in the show all the way until “Way Down Hadestown” at which point it becomes an essential feature. Amusingly, the audience seemed fairly unsure of the show until that song, which seemed to win everyone over because 1. it’s a banger and 2. that’s when the show started to get epic. That song is obviously a big number and it starts with this dance Persephone instigates that I will discuss specifically in the section on Amber Gray’s performance but what you need to know is that she’s in the center of the circle and most of the action happens there. Of course, if you are watching above you see Hades in the balcony putting on his coat and sunglasses before he descends the spiral staircase for “You’re early.” “I missed ya.” He helps Persephone put on her coat and then they go to stand in the center circle which raises up to put them above everyone which is the position they’re in when Eurydice says her line. This gives Hades a good vantage point to notice her, setting the stage for “Hey Little Songbird.” After Hades’ “one, two, three, four” the platform descends slowly into the ground as smoke raises up around them and I lost myself. It was epic.

From there the turn tables got used a lot. “Chant 1” had Hades and Persephone on the center as a platform with the chorus on the first outer circle and Orpheus or Eurydice on the furthest circle. “Chant II” was similar with Eurydice in the middle circle with the workers, Orpheus in the first rung, and Hades and Persephone on the outer rung walking in opposite directions, opposed to each other. In “Wait For Me II” the turntable is used to break part Hades and Persephone’s clasped hands. During “Gone I’m Gone” Eurydice descends into the floor the same way Hades and Persephone did in “Way Down” and she doesn’t emerge again until her solo in “Why We Build The Wall” where she literally comes out of the floor to show her devotion to the cause. I’m pretty sure Orpheus also descends into the floor during “Wait For Me” among a ton of smoke. During “How Long” the circle is open which literally forces Hades and Persephone to sing to each other across a gap between them (symbolism!). And finally, when Orpheus turns around, Eurydice descends into the floor again, slowly and tragically.

The other really big set thing that happens is during “Wait For Me” when the set breaks apart into three pieces, creating two narrow streets that characters can walk down. This is basically the Underworld set and through the magic of lighting mostly, looks entirely different. At this point, I kind of understood why the set was so bare and bereft of color. Once “Why We Build The Wall” starts, you feel less like you are in an enclosed area and more like you are in a huge city. The table and chairs on the balcony disappear and that huge set of double doors is now the entrance to Hades’ office.

Some aspects of the original NY production remain but in different ways. The double headed mic which was apparently integral to the original staging is still there but it is mostly off to the side. Hades uses it during “Why We Build The Wall” and it gets a few other cameos but it no longer seems to have any symbolic meaning itself. The swinging lights from “Wait For Me” are there and the Fates still use lanterns during that song and “Doubt Comes In” which was expertly staged with lighting and smoke to have Eurydice disappear and reappear. 

Oh and during “I conduct the electric city” there’s a little explosion of the lights because Hades is a drama queen.

I forget costumes. Okay, here you go.

I said this before somewhere else but the costumes need work just because they are not really cohesive. The gods are all in some kind of 1930s-ish look (although Persephone’s dress (it’s two dresses but they are the same in two colors) could read as 80s) and seem to have varying levels of shiny to their outfits. Hermes and the Fates have very shiny outfits, Persephone’s has some kind of glitzy in the detailing on her dress and the pinstripes on Hades’ suit really sparkle in certain lights. Hades also has shiny sleeve garters (is that what they’re called) and, curiously, a red back on his vest. My boyfriend said that the red back isn’t really apparent until scenes where Hades is vulnerable with Persephone so I guess that’s it’s symbolic purpose.

Also, Hades’ wall tattoo. I don’t know. It’s somehow cool and lame at the same time.

This is contrasted with the chorus and Orpheus and Eurydice who are kind of in shabby modern clothes. It’s weird and it may have something to do with choices made regarding the setting that I will get to at Point One.

1. The addition of the climate change thing, Orpheus’ ignorance about the gods, and the new “Epic” origin and how this diminishes the essence of a creator and kind of makes Eurydice seems more unreasonable.

So I said in my bootleg post that I liked how they redid “Anyway The Wind Blows” to be a character development moment for Eurydice and I stand by that but it also instigates a more overt addition of climate change as a theme in the show. Eurydice sings, “Strange things happen in the world today./Fall comes early, spring comes late” which I didn’t know the meaning of when I listened to the boot. Climate change was already kind of an under-the-surface idea in the original but now it’s very literal.

It turns out that the weather has changed because Hades is basically trying to keep Persephone with him as much as possible. This is explained directly as him keeping her with him because their marriage is going poorly and he’s afraid if he lets her leave that she won’t come back. I think this is totally fine, by the way, especially because it suits the original theme about doubt and trust.

Here’s where it gets weird. Orpheus was always kind of magic. His singing manifests Persephone in both the original and this one when he sings about her. In this one, Orpheus first creates a flower with his music which he gives to Eurydice and it becomes a big symbol in the show. The change is that in this production, he seems to be singing about the story of Hades and Persephone because he somehow has dreamed up this “la la la la la la la” tune which Hermes tells him straight out is the tune of an old song that, if he can bring about the rest of the words, will fix the climate change. This really takes away Orpheus’ music credentials and kind of changes his motivations from “write music, save girlfriend” to “write music to save the world and oh my girlfriend too”. More on their relationship in Point Three.

To digress slightly, Orpheus doesn’t even know that the gods are real until Hermes (a literal god, by the way) tells him that Hades and Persephone are real and they control the weather. His lines from “Way Down Hadestown” have gone to Persephone since he doesn’t actually know anything about Hadestown. This asks the question: is “Hadestown” set in the modern day? The near future? It doesn’t seem to be an alternate Great Depression setting, which the original seemed to be. If it is the modern day or near future, what’s up with the gods throwback clothes?

Anyway, in the original Orpheus’ commitment to writing a song about Hades and Persephone came off more as the devotion a creator experiences when they personally connect with a subject. He is fixated on their relationship, not because fixating on it will have some grand purpose, but because he connects to their story and is moved by it (and because it ends up as a parallel to his own). In the original, it also seems that Orpheus is kind of friendly with Persephone, like they’ve met before, so that could be a very strong case for his commitment. This is why in the original “Chant I”, Eurydice very much so has every reason to be pissed at him for ignoring her for the song. It is the essence of someone who creates to be fixated on their creation, occasionally to the determent of their relationships. In this version, since Orpheus is trying to write the song to literally save the world, Eurydice’s complaints feel more selfish.

A sort of “reveal” about the origin of “Epic” comes in “Epic III” when he is singing to Hades and Hades asks him how he knew about the “la la” melody because apparently, it’s actually a tune Hades came up with as a response to his love for Persephone. When Hades sings the tune he also manifests a flower, which Persephone puts in the pocket of his vest (the flower matches the back of it, by the way). I originally didn’t like this idea on the basis of “but Hades isn’t a musician” to which my boyfriend smartly replied, “but that incomplete melody isn’t something a musician would come up with.” Dang, he’s right.

I don’t mind the explanation about Hades’ doubt that Persephone will return causing climate change or even the fact that the tune was originally Hades’ but I hate both Orpheus’ ignorance about the gods and the directly stated idea that the song will fix the world. They severely weaken both Orpheus and Eurydice’s characters.

2. More on the “revolution” idea I discussed after I listened to the boot and why it conflicts with the main themes of doubt and love. Also how the chorus is both good and bad.

The second half of Act Two has developed communist tendencies and we need to talk about this. I joked a long time ago that Orpheus is a commie and Hades is a greedy capitalist, but that subtext has rapidly become text. In the original, Orpheus shows his red scarf with his line in “Living It Up On Top” about giving you a song for free. This line is gone now, which weakens his character, but let’s focus on the chorus.

Instead of the subtext we now have this “Show me the way” theme in the later portion of the show that seems to imply that if Orpheus can get Eurydice out of Hadestown, everyone can escape and be free. Eurydice even says, “What about them?” meaning the workers when she is encouraging Orpheus to leave***. But like, they’re dead? Why would they have a revolution?

In the original, the threat of Hades losing control of Hadestown was present because the shades were all taught to question by Orpheus in “If It’s True” and then they watched as Hades proposes the deal with Orpheus. There was never really a set up that said the shades would revolt; in fact it was supposed to be Hades’ doubt in their loyalty that drove him to make the deal instead of just letting Orpheus and Eurydice leave outright as a gift for sort of fixing his marriage. By making the threat literal,  Hades seems way more reasonable for his willingness to make a deal and the shades also seem less reasonable when in “His Kiss, The Riot” Hades explains that he gave them jobs because they were suffering. Hell, if his marriage is fixed he may not need all his emotional support industry anymore and he won’t work them as hard.

This whole change reads as trying to fix a problem that was never there.

Now to address the chorus. The original didn’t have a chorus so this is an addition and it is sometimes great and sometimes not. It’s great whenever there are choral bits from the original where the workers are supposed to be singing but were originally just the main actors. The downside is that they overuse the chorus during times when the focus should be more personal. The single worst case of this is in “Come Home With Me” where the chorus is saying Orpheus’ lines with him. It’s also pretty bad in “Wait For Me” where there seems to be way more chorus than before and a superfluous bit where the stones let him in that seems to be added solely to justify the fact that the chorus of workers is singing with him. Dial it back, guys.

All this community really detracts from the core connection between the two relationships at the heart of this story. This is a story that focuses on individual relationships in the grand scheme and now it is trying to fit too many things in at once.

*** There is a slight implied idea that Eurydice is so self interested that this is character development for her, which I guess if she is self interested this would explain her not caring about Orpheus’ world saving song. But also, she learns to care about one (1) singy boy in addition to herself. This brotherhood idea comes off a bit forced.

3. How Eva is the perfect Eurydice and Reeve is an acceptable Orpheus, but there’s something off here (feat. Choreography from “All I’ve Ever Known”)

Going off the idea of personal vs. public moments, let’s talk about Eurydice and Orpheus.

Eva Noblezada is absolutely ridiculous as Eurydice. She blew me away. Every note was astounding. “Flowers”, one of my least favorite songs in the show, made me cry when she sang it because she felt every word and made you feel it. They have seriously lucked out with her.

Reeve Carney is okay. He has greatly improved over time (my boyfriend admitted that he actually likes his falsetto more than Damon Duanno’s) but when he’s up against Eva, Amber, and Patrick, he’s clearly the weakest link. Also, to apologize for something I said in my bootleg review where I was irritated by him singing like Lou Reed, he does this mostly as an acting thing to show Orpheus trying to come up with lyrics he doesn’t already have so it’s fine.

The problem is between them and I’m not even so sure if it’s their chemistry, which I originally suspected. So many of the parts of the show that really drive home how much Orpheus loves Eurydice have been changed so that they focus more on Orpheus’ man pain (especially “If It’s True” and “Doubt Comes In”).

The most awkward part of this dynamic difficulty comes in with the choreography for “All I’ve Ever Known.” Throughout the song, they’re doing a bunch of different things that are clearly meant to show aspects of their relationship: they have a kind of simulated sex moment, laying next to each other, piggy back rides, jumping into his arms, etc. It feels unnatural and like they are trying to convey a passing of time which isn’t really needed if the audience buys the relationship.

My boyfriend actually had a great solution here: Eurydice sings forlornly to herself at the beginning, then she sings to Orpheus during the rest. Instead of choreography, he takes her in his arms like she says in the song and everything is very simple and intimate.

As for the rest? “If It’s True” really needs to go back to its original lyrics. It’s now really strange how a song about Orpheus’ man pain and doubt of Hades’ words is the song that “broke [Persephone’s] heart in two” when the original song was a tearful plea about how much he loved her and much more worthy of Persephone’s sympathy.

4. Amber Gray is literally perfect even when she accidently spills water on herself at the curtain call.

Damnit. Give her the Tony right now, I swear.

I mentioned before that Amber never stops acting for even a second and oh, do I mean it. Amber has been playing this role for a long time and it shows because her performance is fully integrated. There are so many details that just make her a consistent delight to watch.

During “Road To Hell” she’s excitedly clapping for everyone (amusingly Hades claps unenthusiastically for everyone expect Persephone who he stands up for) and throughout the moments leading up to her intro, she’s leaning on the balcony bored, glaring at Hades, looking around like she’s waiting for time to pass, etc.

Right before “Living It Up On Top” she puts on her coat and goes around to give Hades a kiss on the cheek and when he doesn’t really respond she waves her hand dismissively at him before clumsily going down the stairs. “Living It Up” is a weird number to see because I always imagined it really upbeat but this performance felt kind of bleak. I think they slowed down the tempo and also the choreography left a lot to be desired. But even more than that is the way Amber Gray plays it. Instead of being a happy drunk like I was expecting, she’s a drunk with underlying melancholy. She isn’t drinking to have fun; she’s drinking to get through the day and it shows. You can barely bop along with it because you know that this is all artifice for Persephone because her marriage is falling apart.

During “Way Down Hadestown” this somehow gets even worse and it’s brilliantly played. Persephone slumps over when she hears the train coming and looks comatose until she slowly starts dancing in a way that builds and builds until it becomes this frenzied one woman performance that no one knows how to react to. It was some of the best choreography in the show and throughout the whole song you can see this mix of emotions Persephone is feeling. She doesn’t want to go back to Hades because it’s so hard being with him but she’s also sad because she wishes things were better between them, but she’s happy to be above ground but she can never forget her problems really.

“Why We Build The Wall” is such an intense thing in general but again, I was blown away by Amber and what she was doing. During the song, Persephone is now in her black dress (I thought the costume change would be after Act One but nope) and she’s standing to the left of Hades while he sings. It looked to me like the kind of positioning you see when a politician is admitting to something horrible so he has his wife next to him to make him look better. She sings with this expression that says she’s going through the motions, moreso than anyone else.

Then Eurydice comes into Hadestown and Persephone is shook. Initially it seems to be a sort of dull surprise and mild horror that Hades has made good on his statement about finding someone who will appreciate his town. At the end of the song proper, however, she slumps backwards as if she has given up, kind of an opposite slump to “Way Down Hadestown,” and as Hades passes her on his way up to his office with Eurydice, he taps her on the arm which seems to bring her back to life* and she moves downstage, trying to subtly wipe tears from her eyes. It’s kind of the first real moment in the show when you see how much Persephone cares about Hades and it really makes her “Anybody want a drink?” line similar to “Living It Up On Top”: fun in theory but masking a deep unhappiness. The audience still laughed though.

“Our Lady Of The Underground” is a show stopper. Amber sings the hell out of it, but there is this really great moment right at the end when the workers are all raiding her bag and she just looks like she has come down from her high only to have life hit her.

She’s still on stage during “Way Down Hadestown II” when Eurydice comes in now wearing her worker uniform. She lingers near Eurydice and listens to the fact that Eurydice didn’t actually do anything with Hades aside from sign a contract and die and that she’s not special at all but just another worker. When Persephone realizes that her husband didn’t cheat on her and that he was just trying to make her jealous, she kind of scoffs at Eurydice and walks off triumphantly.

“How Long” and “Chant II” I mentioned the staging of and oh, Amber sells the pleading and the anger.

I’ll talk about “Lover’s Desire” and “Wait For Me II” in Point Six.

That’s mostly it. At the end of the curtain call “I Raise My Cup” (which is a bit different and I should probably talk about it) Amber Gray drank from the cup and spilled water on herself. I don’t think it was on purpose but it was amusing and I was just surprised to see there was actually something in the cup.

Again, give her a Tony.

*The arm tap thing is interesting and I’ve thought about it a lot. On one hand, it could be Hades wanting to make sure she’s paying attention to the fact that he’s going to his office with Eurydice, which is a dick move but definitely in line with where Hades is at this moment. On the flip side, he could be trying to reassure her that he sees her and nothing is really going to happen with Eurydice and it’s just business. Clearly, she takes it the first way, but the intention really is ambiguous.

5. What did you do to the later half of act two’s best lyrics?! (AND MUSIC PARTS)

I mentioned most of these as they affect Orpheus and Eurydice’s relationship (“If it’s True”, “Doubt Comes In”) but I will call out a few new things.

“Epic III” is shorter for no reason.

“Promises” is cut in half and no longer has that moment of resolution in the first half that I thought was so amazing for showing the development of Orpheus and Eurydice’s relationship. Also, no string interlude.

The accordion interlude in “His Kiss, The Riot” is now really discordant and isn’t as good.

“Wait For Me II” suffers from revolution. Same with “Chant II”. “Chant II” also lost Persephone’s lines about banging Hades in a garden, which is probably because someone said, “Uh, Persephone says she’s going to give Eurydice advice and then doesn’t.” I mean, they’re right, but I didn’t see that as a problem.

And to note a dialogue change, when Orpheus turns around in the original there’s no dialogue, just Eurydice’s gasp, but there was a brief period of time where she said “You’re early” and he responded with “I missed you.” This was iconic and never should have been removed. Now he says “It’s you” and she says “It’s me” which is kind of a callback to what they say when he arrives in the Underworld but oh, the other dialogue is so much more on point. With a good subtle thing like that, maybe they could finally trash Persephone saying outright that Orpheus and Eurydice are just like she and Hades used to be (an additional bit of dialogue before “How Long” which is just lazy).

There’s a specific choice towards the end that I really want to address though. During “Road To Hell II” the show ends by restarting. In theory, this is a great idea because the show is cyclical in nature and with its themes. Eurydice comes in looking for a match in her original clothes. Persephone comes in wearing her green dress.

The problem with this is that they still sing “I Raise My Cup”. They changed some of the lyrics to be more universal but it still talks about where Orpheus is half the time and it’s like, um, he’s standing right there? It doesn’t totally work. I say one of these things need to be cut or “Cup” needs to be completely universal and not about Orpheus at all.

6. Why does the text imply that Hades is evil when his character is the same as it’s always been and he’s actually super sympathetic most of the time? (Feat. How Patrick Page gets Hades in a way no one else does)

I mentioned the disconnect already so I’ll just talk about Patrick Page.

Patrick Page, being that he possesses a voice that sounds like the rumbling of the Earth, primarily seems to play villains. I first saw him as Frollo in “Hunchback” which was great but it took a while for me to hear Hades and not Frollo when I listened to “Hadestown.” Because of this type-casting, he is clearly psyched to play Hades. His Twitter and anything he ever says about the show conveys how much he loves the show and loves the character. Specially, he seems to love the fact that Hades isn’t a villain and that Hades’ primary motivation is really his love for his wife with a secondary motivation of keeping his kingdom running smoothly.**

Like Amber, he has been playing this role since the beginning and it shows. Like Amber, he has all the subtle details down. I mentioned the standing up when Persephone is announced but in the beginning he also rolls his eyes when Hermes is playing to the audience and I’m right there with him honestly. He lowers his sunglasses at Eurydice in “Way Down Hadestown” in this intrigued way. He is genuinely scary during “Why We Build The Wall” and every aspect of act two shows how much he cares about Persephone.

My boyfriend particularly was effected by him in “Epic III” and how he loses his composure and reunites with Persephone when he makes the flower appear.

The dance in “Lover’s Desire” is interesting because it starts as a slow two step (they’re in step now, get it) and then escalates and ends with him really showing vulnerability by burying his face into her shoulder. Yes, I cried.

I think the prime subtle moment for Patrick Page though comes during “His Kiss, The Riot.” When he says the word “beautiful” he looks directly at Persephone before looking away on “poisonous”. Nice.

He also should get a Tony,

**The villain of “Hadestown” is doubt.

7. Andre DeShields is a totally different Hermes.

I have talked at length about the four main characters but technically there is a fifth and there’s kind of a reason why I saved him for last.

Hermes in the original felt very much like a part of the show because he is the narrator but was also very clearly present during all the action of the show. Whenever I see stills of the original show or the Canada show, Hermes is right there with everyone else.

This isn’t how he’s played now. Throughout almost the entire show, he’s stage right. He dances a little with Persephone during “Living It Up” and is actually on stage during “Way Down Hadestown” but even when Hades gives him his plan, Hades goes stage right to do it. Hermes offers all advice to Orpheus and Eurydice from stage right. Hermes even implies that he doesn’t totally know what’s going on until the end when he admits that everything is a cycle.

My boyfriend, a fan of Andre DeShields from “Fortress of Solitude”, said that it wasn’t that this was bad but that it repositions Hermes as more of a god figure than a god who lives in between. Before Hermes was a god like Persephone who will hang out with the commoners but now he is positioned above them. I had once joked that in the class system of “Hadestown”, Hermes is the one with the reasonable job. Even as my boyfriend explained this change from chill god to god who only interacts when necessary, I could see his resolve slipping as he managed to accidentally talk himself into realizing that Hermes was better before. Even the way he’s dressed is flashier and less like a rumpled middle class man in the 1930s.

Mythologically speaking, it makes more sense for Hermes to be the go between as he was the one who brought people to the Underworld. He would understand people and know their stories.

I have to wonder if this change comes from the casting of Andre DeShields who is a new addition.

9. Overall, the show is so freaking enjoyable and I will see it multiple times on Broadway BUT the lyrics and story changes have been detrimental to a show that was nearly perfect, mostly in the name of being more heavy handed and less subtle.

Like I will pay a lot of money because the good that has been untouched or added is so good even with all the problems.

And that’s how the story ends.