‘Falling for Eve’ musical debuts

‘Memphis' writer Joe DiPietro revisits the Garden of Eden

BY MICHAEL SOMMERS

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

OFF BROADWAY REVIEW

Best known for writing the long-running "I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change," Oradell's own Joe DiPietro is enjoying considerable success with the Broadway musical "Memphis," which just nabbed him a shiny pair of Tony Awards for its book and lyrics.

DiPietro now contributes the script to "Falling for Eve," a new tuner on a Garden of Eden theme with music by Bret Simmons and lyrics by David Howard (also credited with the original source for DiPietro's libretto). Presented by the York Theatre Company at Saint Peter's, where the show opened Thursday, the musical turns out to be a pleasant but curiously unmemorable 90 minutes.

In brief — it's meh.

Speaking of brief, Jose Llana and Krystal Joy Brown make quite an attractive Adam and Eve and naturally both wear very little. Speaking otherwise of sex, there's scarcely a breath of it in this terribly innocuous affair.

A playful rendering of mankind's first romance, the story also features God/He (Adam Kantor) and God/She (Sasha Sloan) characters plus two semi-comic angels (Nehal Joshi and Jennifer Blood). The midpoint plot twist sees Eve alone munch the apple and wander off into exile while Adam misses her.

Simmons' easygoing 16-number score prettily traverses a range of pop styles, Howard's lyrics often are neatly rhymed and DiPietro's dialogue rolls along nicely. Staged with clever touches by director Larry Raben and some amusing scenery by Beowulf Boritt — the Tree of Life is partly a lava lamp - the musical is ably performed by all concerned.

So why does this thoroughly professional entertainment fail to beguile? Could it be a general lack of urgency? Is it an oddly facetious quality that creeps into the production's tone? Dunno, frankly. Apologies for being so uncharacteristically wishy-washy but sometimes an otherwise okay show simply doesn't grab a person and that's my case here.

"Falling for Eve" continues through Aug. 8 at The York Theatre at Saint Peter's, 619 Lexington Ave. at 54th St., New York. Call (212) 935-5820 or visit www.yorktheatre.org.