Parcel from America is a new musical but it feels old, sepia old. Not in the beautiful music, which is Irish in tone but in keeping with contemporary musical theatre in lyrics and performance. It’s the simple, uplifting story that seems from another era, reminding me of when I saw a play version of O. Henry’s short story The Gift of the Magi at the Lamb’s Theatre decades ago, an experience that has stayed with me all these years. What a perfect time for this show to open on Theatre Row, under the direction of J.R. Sullivan. I don’t know of any other like it running now.
I didn’t see any children in the audience on Thursday night but this is the kind of old-fashioned show I’d like today’s children to see. Set in rural County Limerick in the 1950s it feels older because the poverty of the village’s residents leaves them without electricity or running water.
Writers Jahnn Beecham and Malcolm Hillgartner were inspired by hearing Irish storyteller Tomáseen Foley recount a childhood memory about a young boy, a lonely widow and a parcel from America that changed the lives of the entire village. The story stayed in their hearts but it was more than two decades before they considered transforming it into a musical. Longtime collaborators on books, plays and musicals, they joined with fellow writer Michael J. Hume and Irish composer Kevin Corcoran in 2018 as a way to bring together the musical theatre world with the traditions of Irish storytelling and music. Corcoran provides the music direction and arrangement for this production.
The Narrator (Michael Grennell) tells us of this world in the west of Ireland that was theirs. “All our neighbors had lived there for generations, too, and most of them are still there to this very day, still farming those same small fields.”
The full cast of 12 proudly joins him in singing “The Shelter of Our Neighbors.”
In the shelter of our neighbors
Lies the heart of where we live
And the fruit of all our labors
Is the gift we have to give
Your neighbors were your life insurance, health insurance, your old age pension and everything else, “all rolled into one,” they tell us.
In the shelter of our neighbors
We can watch our lives unfold
In the shelter of our neighbors
We can find a hand to hold
They happily perform a traditional Brush Dance; choreography by Barry McNabb.
The discordant note to this harmonious village is Liam Óg (Ethan Jack Haberfield), the spoiled ne’er-do-well teenage son of Bridge (Alex Sharpe), whose real name is Brigid but who insists on being called Bridge. She has doted on Liam Óg since her husband died on Christmas years before. She allows her son to skip school for so long he can’t read or write or make anything of himself. One morning she finds he has gone, along with the few pennies she had put away and the cow that was her only source of income.
Scenic designer Harry Feiner creates a lovely backdrop of rolling fields and hills. In the forefront are two wee houses, Bridge’s, which is more like a hut, is on the left and on the right, the home of the Kelly family – one of them. We are told practically everyone in town is named Kelly and most are related. In this one is Sean (Aidan McCracken), a sensitive teenager who tells the town’s story in the future as the Narrator. The communal life takes place in the center of the stage where folks gather to sing, dance and wait for letters and parcels from family in America, brought by the bicycle-riding postman Davey (Michael Mellamphy).
Being the caring community they are, the villagers come up with a plan for finding Liam Óg, whom they assume has emigrated to Springfield, Massachusetts, just as all the Kellys who have left have done.
“Surely if Liam Óg is looking for work in Springfield, Massachusetts, someone must have seen him,” Davey says.
Father Tom (Daniel Patrick Sullivan) agrees. “Every soul in the parish has a tree full of relatives who might have seen him.”
Sean’s father, Michael (Gregg Goodbrod), suggests “we should each write a letter to spread the word” and they sing:
Spread the word over the waters
Spread the word up and beyond
Spread the word over the sea
To the ends of the world
Where the daughters and the sons have flown
The word, we’ll send them a letter
Spread the word, no matter how far
Spread the word and here is the message
We want to know
Where that boyo of Bridge’s has gone.
Before those letters are sent, though, a letter from a cousin in Springfield arrives saying he ran into Liam Óg on a footpath but before he could get a phone number or address the boy “fumbled and stumbled” some excuse and was off.
Sean is sent to tell Bridge the good news that Liam Óg’s in Springfield and assures her he will surely get a friend to write a letter to her from him. Father Tom backs him up. Sean says it will be at Christmas time. “Doesn’t everyone hear from everyone at Christmas?” He adds that there may be a parcel from America as well.
This brings the Narrator on to comment: “Now that was gilding the lily entirely. For that meant that Liam Óg would be sending Bridge a big pile of clothes and maybe an envelope stuffed with dollars. The same Liam Óg who never worked day in his life.”
But in her cottage Bridge has perked up with with the possibility and she, Sean and Father Tom sing about this parcel from her boy that will arrive on Christmas Eve.
As time passes, though, and no letter arrives, Bridge falls into a depression her neighbors can’t shake her from. When the question is asked, where are her people, Sean’s sister, Nell (Serena Parrish) answers, “I think you’re looking at them.”
Sean is overcome with guilt for giving Bridge false hope, as is Father Tom. But then a parcel that does arrive on Christmas Eve fills Bridge with joy, a joy and love that spreads throughout the community.
Bringing Parcel from America to its present form was an eight-year journey spanning two continents, bringing together American theatre writers, Irish musicians and an international cast. The creative process had musical sketches crossing the Atlantic, repeatedly being dismantled and reconstructed as the collaborators developed their sound. It premiered in Dublin in 2022.
The band members need to be acknowledged. They are Corcoran on piano, Isaac Alderson on whistle/uilleann, pipes/Irish flute, Aimée Farrell Courtney on bodhrán, Tom Fitzgerald on mandolins/fiddle and Katie Wasko on fiddle.
This show would be a wonderful first musical for a child 6 and older. The running time is just under two hours with an intermission. The theatre is small so any seat should be good and the space won’t be as overwhelming as a large Broadway theatre. The theme of loving and caring for those in our community would be great for after-theatre discussions.
I’m sorry this show isn’t running through the Christmas weeks. It’s scheduled to close Nov. 22.
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