There are many ways to respond to grief. Take Emma Portman, the central character in a new musical having its world premiere this month at the Kravis Center’s Rinker Playhouse.
When her daughter dies, Emma works through the pain of her loss by writing a musical that projects what the girl’s life might have been had she lived. But Emma’s healing soon halts as the realms between fantasy and reality converge.
The musical, Time Stops, is the brain child of Boca Raton resident Bonnie Logan, a follow-up to her first show, Boca Bound, which was first seen at the Wick Theatre three years ago. As with that musical, Logan has written the book to Time Stops and she has enlisted some of the same creative personnel – director Chad Larabee and producer/music supervisor Michael J. Moritz Jr. New to the team is composer-lyricist Brett Boles.
“Coming out of ‘Boca Bound,’ I knew I wanted to write another story, because I love the process so much that I wanted to, in some way, communicate what that’s like,” says Logan by phone from New York where the show is rehearsing. “The stories that I wanted to write are really issues about the human condition. I’m fascinated by how people make choices in their lives. And whether they want to face the things in life that are difficult, to be able to make themselves happier.
“To me, life is all about searching for happiness. Searching for a place where we enjoy life, that we look forward to every day,” she says. “And where we face the things that are tough to face. I’ve always been interested in that.”
If that sounds like Time Stops is a downbeat musical, Logan is quick to correct that impression. “This show is not dark. It is very healing. There are parts of it that are fun and joyful. There are moments that are very light and beautiful,” says Logan. “We all know that in life we have to go through some pain to get to the place we want to be. Nobody goes through life without experiencing some tragedy. Nobody goes through life without experiencing joy and bliss, hopefully. So the idea is: How does everybody get to a place where life is better for them?”
When Logan brought the idea for Time Stops to Moritz, he knew quickly that he wanted to be involved with putting it together. “I was really into it. I really enjoy musicals that deal with the complexities of life,” he says. “There’s a lot of the human element in there and those are the pieces that I’m drawn to. I love theater where you can kind of leave thinking about something, you leave with a question on your mind that sticks with you for a while. And maybe it affects change in your own life and lets you kind of ruminate on things.”
Reading her early drafts of Time Stops, Moritz sensed that Logan had come a long way since Boca Bound. “Oh, most definitely,” he says. “Tackling such a broader theme and a broader arc with such a character backstory, it was a big step forward for sure. It’s a much harder, broader scope, putting together a show like this. Because it’s so much truer to life.”
Time Stops follows the journey of Emma and her husband Charles, who lost their only child three years earlier. He “has done his best to move forward and grieve, but his wife, a famous playwright, couldn’t get past the loss. Consequently all the things in her life that used to make her happy she gave up,” explains Logan. “And then, through a set of circumstances, she gets the idea that she can change the outcome of her daughter’s life if she writes a musical about her and changes what happens to her. So she begins to enter this sort-of fantasy world. And while all this is happening, you’re learning what it is to write a musical.
“Then, the people that help her put this musical on also find themselves at a crossroads in their life. They begin to examine where they’re at, how happy they are, what’s happening in their lives, trying to make their own lives better.”
In need of a composer to collaborate with Logan, Moritz thought of Boles. “As soon as Bonnie gave me a very broad overview of what she was writing, I realized I needed to bring someone into the project who could write heart. I’d worked with Brett several times before and I knew he writes fantastic songs. Such beautiful music just flows from him and it is just so authentic and true to character. So for me, it was kind of a no-brainer. I was very happy when he agreed to do it.”
“With Brett, from really day one, we were on the same page,” says Logan. “He thoroughly understood the script, he feels most of the same things I do, we don’t have to explain emotions to each other. He was a real collaborator who makes everything better.”
Time Stops will have only five performances, from Friday, July 15, through Sunday, July 17, but Logan expects the show to have a life far beyond West Palm Beach. “I want to see ‘Time Stops’ go everywhere,” she says. “I want to do everything I can to see that as many people see it as they can. Because I think it’s something that people will feel good about and appreciate seeing.”
“It’s so incredibly moving,” adds Moritz. “There’s a depth to it, without feeling heavy. Everyone will find themselves in one of these characters. It’s incredibly relatable. For two hours, (the audience) can kind of immerse themselves in the magic of theater and leave with a very full heart. There’s a lot of resilience that comes through. And after the last two years that we’ve all had, we need that.”
TIME STOPS, Kravis Center Rinker Playhouse, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach. Friday, July 15 – Sunday, July 17. $45-$55. Call 561-832-7469 or visit www.kravis.org.