Under the Radar Review: Show/Boat: A River, a Public Domain Reimagining of Show Boat

Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II’s Show Boat exists in multiple versions. Licensing organization Concord Theatricals offers two editions for production, including Harold Prince’s celebrated 1994 Broadway revival and Rob Ruggerio’s chamber revision, which premiered in 2011 at Goodspeed, in Connecticut. There’s also the original 1927 text of Show Boat, which requires no licensing fees: It entered the public domain in 2023.

That’s the Show Boat that adapter and director David Herskovits and his company Target Margin Theater are utilizing for their Under the Radar presentation, titled Show/Boat: A River. Described in press notes as a “daring reimagining” and a “bold adaptation,” which “promises the company’s trademark extravagant theatricality, intricate design layers, and a vibrant celebration of language, song, and spirit,” the finished product accomplishes none of those things, making for a long and frustrating evening at NYU Skirball.

Kern and Hammerstein’s adaptation of Edna Ferber’s novel was the first musical to fully incorporate songs into a narrative and was the first Broadway musical to portray an interracial marriage and feature a racially integrated cast. Spanning five decades in the lives of the showfolk and stevedores aboard the traveling riverboat Cotton Blossom, Show Boat centers on the romance between Magnolia, the captain’s daughter who dreams of becoming an actor, and Gaylord Ravenal, a charming gambler hired as her leading man after the previous stars are forced to leave due to accusations of miscegenation. Its beloved songs include “Ol’ Man River,” “Life Upon the Wicked Stage,” “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” and “Only Make Believe.”

In a style reminiscent of Daniel Fish’s Tony-winning experimental revival of Oklahoma!, Herskovits strips Show Boat of its period trappings. Kaye Voyce’s minimal set is dominated by a sheer scrim featuring two entrances, one for the Black characters, the other for the white ones. Dina El-Aziz’s costumes mesh 1920s and 2020s; the most prominent pieces being sashes labeled “White” that the multiracial actors don while portraying Caucasian characters. These sashes spend the entire evening falling off the actors’ bodies — it’s a show in itself to watch them wriggle back into them.

Herskovits’s choices might spark lively discussion in the rehearsal room, but their onstage execution is perplexing. The decision to cast two actors, J Molière and Suzanne Darrell, as Magnolia’s mother Parthy — though only in select scenes — adds to the confusion, especially since Darrell also portrays Queenie throughout. Having the actors speak the opening line of each song to heighten the drama comes across as more collegiate than what one would expect from a production of this caliber. Ultimately, if you don’t know the whole story of Show Boat going in, you won’t get a sense of it in the room.

That said, Dan Schlosberg’s orchestrations for six players are terrific, emphasizing the beautiful nuances within Kern’s eternal score (and he’s amazing to watch when your mind wanders). Dionne McClain-Freeney’s vocal arrangements are filled with gravitas, and I’d love to hear them performed by a large company of singers that could seriously handle them, of which there are few here. The most notable is Alvin Crawford, who wraps his splendid baritone around both “Ol’ Man River” and our hearts, making us long for more voices of his caliber in the 10-member company. Philip Themio Stoddard comes closest as Ravenal; his “Make Believe” and “You Are Love” are hunky.

The difference between Herskovits’s Show Boat and Fish’s Oklahoma! is that the latter not only had something to say about America, but it did so clearly and concisely, using only what was provided in the original text. Unfocused and smug, this Show/Boat: A River sinks under the weight of an artist trying to save the show from itself, rather than embracing its strengths and addressing its flaws in a way that illuminates the material for contemporary audiences. Herskovits either needs to go back to the drawing board or jump ship.