The Pirate Queen

Last Wednesday my friends Pat and Jane and I hopped on the Southshore to Chicago to see "The Pirate Queen" at the Cadillac Theater.

 

This musical is previewing in Chicago in anticipation of opening on Broadway in March.   If you have even one drop of Irish blood in you, you must see this play.   The Celtic music is hauntingly beautiful with harp and pipe; the Irish dancing is wonderful.   Not Michael Flatley wonderful, as his "feet of flames" Irish dancing is so tightly choreographed as to seem unreal.  This dancing is wilder, and thus seems more likely.

 

The plot is based on the real-life character of Grace O’Malley, or Grania, who was a Pirate Queen on the west seas of Ireland at the same time Queen Elizabeth I was on the throne.  The play juxtaposes the lives of these two powerful women.   Grania, played by Stephanie Block, has the better voice of the two, and what a powerful voice it is.   The male lead, Hadley Frasier sings equally well.

 

The play still needs some tightening up.   Its attempt to establish Grania as a tomboy is weak, thus making it difficult to understand how her father can just hand off the pirate ship to her.  Some of the lyrics are difficult to understand, and since the entire play is music–with no spoken dialect–it is essential to our understanding of the plot that we hear every word. 

 

I would love to see the play again after changes are made.  The critics from New York will be at the theater October 29, to make their final decision.  That gives the directors two more weeks of tweaking.  Wish them well, because this is a wonderful, vibrant play which deserves a wide audience.