The beginning and ending of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical depict the legendary singer-songwriter at Carnegie Hall performing numbers from her multiple Grammy Award-winning album, Tapestry.
If those scenes are the standout highlights of the Maltz Jupiter Theatre’s new production, that is because they show King at the peak of her writing talent, because the stunning Brianna Kothari Barnes sings the hell out of these numbers and because Douglas McGrath’s account of King’s early career — rising from an introverted composer who peddled her songs for others to record to an empowered star who accepted her rightful place in the spotlight — has many of the sketchy, soap opera-like pitfalls so common to the jukebox biography genre.
What Barnes and the other 16 member of the cast present, as they sprint through nearly two dozen scenes that span from 1958 to 1971, is still undeniably entertaining. But before long one starts to wonder how much better it might have been if King were celebrated with a recreation of that Carnegie Hall concert, perhaps with biographical data interspersed between the songs.
Still, King’s prolific, melodic output is much in evidence in Beautiful. During the first act, we get a parade of 1950s rock ‘n’ roll classics many of us had no idea she wrote. We watch as she creates then peddles such catchy gems as “Some Kind of Wonderful” (to The Drifters), “Will You Love Me Tomorrow” (to The Shirelles) and “The Locomotion “(to Little Eva). They are presented in an unimaginative “And then I wrote…” chronology, but that doesn’t stop them from having their pleasingly nostalgic impact.
Feeling less confident about her lyrics, King hooks up with hit factory 1650 Broadway romeo Gerry Goffin (Jared Reinfeldt). They make beautiful music together, as they say, quickly marry while still in their teens and have a daughter, before he starts straying with other women and dabbling in drugs.
In the better second act, King eventually leaves Goffin and moves to California, where she pens and records the pain-riddled personal songs that become Tapestry. While Beautiful never really dramatizes King’s journey to self-empowerment, at least we see the result as Barnes takes the Carnegie Hall stage and belts out the show’s title tune.
Barnes carries the production handily, carving out King’s journey from ugly duckling to swan, finding her confident singing voice along the way. But Beautiful is by no means a one-woman show, with stellar support from Caiti Marlowe and David B. Friedman as Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann, the rival songwriting duo (“On Broadway,” “Walking in the Rain”) who become King’s closest friends.
Also an asset is Nicolas Rodriguez as record producer with an unerring ear for hits, Don Kirshner, as well as the ensemble of performers who morph into those 1950s chart-toppers, put through their iconic paces by choreographer Ariel Reid.
Matt Lenz (who directed the Maltz’s Billy Elliot) keeps the episodic narrative moving along smoothly, thanks in no small part to Ann Beyersdorfer’s kinetic set pieces and Lisa Renkel’s animated projections. Factor in Johanna Pan’s perky period costumes and you have an evening that – some cliched dialogue aside – is some kind of wonderful.
BEAUTIFUL: THE CAROLE KING MUSICAL, Maltz Jupiter Theatre, 1001 E. Indiantown Road, Jupiter. Through Sun., Jan. 28. $85-$150. 561-575-2223.