Dear Evan Hansen

Reviewed by Katie Buenneke
Ahmanson Theatre
Through November 25

First things first: if you didn’t get the chance to see Dear Evan Hansen in New York, don’t worry. The first national tour of the show, currently playing at the Ahmanson, is nearly identical to the New York incarnation. Ben Platt got plenty of acclaim (and a Tony Award) for his performance as the title character, but Ben Levi Ross gives an almost indistinguishable performance from his predecessor.

So then if everything about this Dear Evan Hansen is, for all intents and purposes, imperceptibly different from the version I saw (and reviewed) nearly two years ago, I couldn’t help but wonder why I left the theater so unsettled this time.

The answer lies in the core concept of the musical. The first time I saw the show, I was so blown away by the performances, Benj Pasek and Justin Paul’s tuneful score, and Michael Greif’s brisk direction that I barely noticed the show’s huge, glaring flaw: Evan Hansen is deeply unlikeable, and so is nearly everyone around him.

It’s shockingly easy not to notice this while watching the show. The show’s book, by Steven Levenson, is filled out nicely by moments of deep pathos and necessary lightness, creating a complex world for the actors to play in, which they do adeptly under Greif’s direction.

The story follows Evan (Ross), a high school student with severe anxiety. His mother (Jessica Phillips) and therapist encourage him to start each day with a letter to himself: “Dear Evan Hansen, today’s going to be a good day, and here’s why.” When Evan’s first day back at school doesn’t go well, he writes a letter full of angst and anguish. His troubled classmate, Connor (Marrick Smith) plucks the letter from the printer and takes it home. After Connor takes his own life, Evan’s note (which is, after all, addressed to Evan, and only signed from “me,” not from Evan) is found in Connor’s pocket. Connor’s parents (Aaron Lazar and Christiane Noll) assume the letter is Connor’s suicide note.

This is when Evan does the unforgiveable thing: perhaps to make a mourning family feel better, perhaps to make himself feel better, or perhaps to sidle closer to Connor’s sister Zoe (Maggie McKenna), the object of Evan’s affection, Evan tells them that yes, he and Connor were secretly good friends. With the aid of his classmate, Jared (Jared Kleinman), Evan creates a lengthy fake email correspondence between himself and Connor. It works; Connor’s family takes Evan under their wing, as if he’s the well-behaved son they never had, he and Zoe grow closer, and Evan’s tics and anxiety start to quiet. But when a speech Evan gives about Connor goes viral, Evan’s lies start to spiral out of control.

Ross and the rest of the cast turn in very strong performances (indeed, it’s astonishing how Ross fits such a huge, smooth voice into such a slight, young, fidgety body). No one’s mining anything dramatically here that hadn’t been uncovered before it opened on Broadway, but given that this is most people’s first chance to see the show (tickets are a hot commodity both in New York and L.A.), that’s to be expected. Pasek and Paul’s music is both hummable and moving, one of the better scores Broadway’s seen in the past decade. And Greif’s direction is expert, fully examining various family dynamics (indeed, his work here brings back memories of his helming of Next to Normal).

But despite the best efforts of everyone involved, Evan and his peers are nearly insufferable. Perhaps Levenson is writing moody teenagers realistically, as they lash out at each other and their parents, but these high schoolers are more awful than I remember any of my peers being when we were juniors and seniors in high school, the same age as these characters. Their shortcomings are believable, but at the same time, they’re so huge that it’s hard to sympathize with them. Evan’s actions are terrible, but he’s egged on by Jared and a sanctimonious classmate, Phoebe (Alana Beck), whose desperation to get into an Ivy League school is as clear as day. Zoe might be the least egregious of her peers, but she feels underwritten. The parents, by contrast, are more sympathetic than their children, and it’s particularly easy to feel bad for Evan’s mother (Phillips), who’s doing her best, but constantly eschewed by her son.

Still, Dear Evan Hansen is the kind of show that’s worth seeing once. It’s got a catchy score, examines the family dynamic between teens and parents, and talks about mental illness frankly. But unlike Next to Normal, which tackles similar themes and opened nearly a decade ago, Dear Evan Hansen doesn’t hold up to repeated viewings.

Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N. Grand Ave., Downtown; Tues.-Fri., 8 p.m.; Sat., 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.; Sun., 1 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.; through Nov. 25. CenterTheatreGroup.org. Running time: two hours and 50 minutes with a 20-minute intermission.