More than just a joy ride
Aurora Adachi-Winter and Artistic Associate Matthew C. Yee in Lucy and Charlie’s Honeymoon at Lookingglass Theatre. Photo by Matthew C. Yee.
Lucy and Charlie’s Honeymoon, a new musical by Matthew C. Yee, is in its final week on stage at Lookingglass Theatre. The show goes beyond what audiences expect from a musical. The songs don’t break out to fill in dialogue, the love onstage transcends happily ever after and audiences stroll out of the theatre with more than just a snippet of a tune to hum on the way home.
The play follows Lucy (Aurora Adachi-Winter) and Charlie (Matthew C. Yee) as they embark on their honeymoon after their swift nuptials. They don’t have to worry about plane tickets or passports, what is really on their minds is coming into the funds to embark on their trip. But after their act as renegades goes viral, they are thrown into - or welcome - one compromising situation after another, robbing them of their desired trip, but forcing them to face the music of their choices.
The plot is filled with unforgettable moments both powerful and fun. Played by characters that run the gamut from not-so-typical granny (Wai Ching Ho), one foot steady in tradition and shoveling snacks, the other stealthily making deadly moves in video games, to a likable delinquent son (Matt Bittner) trying to impress his life-of-crime father, and a sister (Harmony Zhang) desperately trying to find her way to her other half. Amongst the chaos and calamity, Lucy and Charlie always find their way back to each other, each time recognizing something new yet familiar in their partner in crime. “The bond between Lucy and Charlie came first. I knew I didn’t want to tell the story of a young couple who falls in love, then fall apart, and then come together again,” said Yee. “I wanted their relationship (as thin and fresh as it is) to be home for them, and everything else that happens in the story to be a challenge they face together. There is also Charlie and Peter’s family, (Grandma and Uncle Jeff) which, while they have their issues, is the strong center of the story.”
Audiences may leave Lookingglass feeling somewhat lighter after the romp of a play they just saw, but the nuggets of darkness, of societal woes, of systemic wrongs are what make this musical more than entertainment. In this day and age, the consumption of purely frivolous art is no longer a privilege we should abide by. Yee has found a way to talk about terrible things, to share a needed perspective, but to package it in a way that allows audiences to ingest the show fully without flinching from the uncomfortable. “I always try to walk the line between comedy and darkness. It’s super challenging but very rewarding when it works,” said Yee. “The subject matter the show deals with is very serious, but the characters are funny. As long as the humor is character driven the tight rope act of dark comedy usually works out.”
The levity that is brought by Yee’s lovable and humorous characters is the honey that lets us swallow the sour medicine and also the reason that each character is relatabley flawed. Not one is perfect or tidy, not one knows who they are. They simply know what they should be, what someone else wants them to be, what they wish they could be. His characters, like the rest of us, are walking around trying on costumes, masks, and traits, trying to see what fits best in the world, on their bodies, and what will get them through another day. In the moments that matter most though, their truth emerges, letting us in on the shared charade of self. “It is definitely inspired by my own search for self. I think many of us embark on a search for ourselves at some point in our lives (often times more than once),” said Yee. “The characters in my story believe that by declaring their identity it makes it true, but who we are is not a statement, it is determined by how we respond to what happens to us.”
