Bohemian rhapsody
Synchronicity’s ‘Last Time’ plugs in for a rocky love story
There’s a fight brewing in a dingy apartment, strewn with dirty clothes and last night’s beer bottles. “You write words and it hurts when no one listens,” actor Kristina Adler sings, nearly lifting above the torn up loveseat, “but God, I listen.” Adler plays Grace in Synchronicity musical The Last Time We Were Here, and the mixture of heartache and spite in her delivery sums up the lovelorn angst that fuels the show.
Bar band frontman Jacob (Branden Hembree) provides the bulk of that. The arc of he and Grace’s love affair is told in flashback and through two sets’-worth of original songs. When Jacob sets his beloved Fender down for a moment, the story comes tumbling from his mouth as beat poetry. Adler plays Grace as a wide-eyed intellectual, a romantic who is nevertheless wise to her on-again-off-again boyfriend’s womanizing ways. Arguments that start with the smallest turns in quiet conversation become epic battles as Jacob sets them to music.
The show could be read as wish fulfillment for angry young men, with Jacob landing a beautiful woman way out of his league through the power inherent in electric guitars and unkempt hair. It could also read as a counter to those same self-destructive emo dudes as Grace repeatedly calls Jacob on his BS. At its center, though, it’s a love story characterized by the intense and almost painfully sincere guise of rock ‘n’ roll.
The music — written by a familiar face to Atlanta theater, Jeremiah Parker Hobbs (Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Rocky Horror Picture Show) — falls somewhere between Broadway, praise bands, and the coffee house. The score delivers electric moments as the two quarreling lovers duet, facing off and belting lines back and forth. And when the dust settles for a moment, there are sweet songs about just wanting to dance. Because what kind of rock opera would this be if the boy never asks the girl to dance?
Last Time is a collaboration between Hobbs and Atlanta actor Jessica De Maria. This new work is being staged in a stripped-down production with a full band for a single weekend. Catch this now and if (slash when) the show makes its way into some theater company’s regular season, you’ll be able to do what protagonist Jason might do: brag that you got to hear the demo first.
The Last Time We Were Here. $20-$35. 8 p.m., Fri., June 17, and Sat., June 18. 5 p.m., Sun., June 19. Runs 1 hour, 45 minutes plus intermission. Synchronicity Theatre, 1545 Peachtree St. N.E. www.synchrotheatre.com.