Review: Fantasticks

Fantasticks, a fun crazy club

Let’s take a stupid girl and a boy and their crazy fathers and one vagabond who makes the whole group’s lives mess up, but in the end that’s exactly why they get on the right track. Add beautiful music, plenty of comedy and absurd theatre, and you get the musical Fantasticks.
The success of the musical, composed by Harvey Schmidt and written by Tom Jones, in New York is unparalleled: the work was performed from 1960 to 2002.
The popularity is understandable, as Fantasticks is a funny and humane musical. The rather small presentation apparatus gives an intimate atmosphere. In addition, Harvey Schmidt’s music is rich but pleasantly unpretentious.
Actually, music is reason enough to head to Studio Pasila on Ratamestarinkatu to see Fantasticks, which is now playing in the Helsinki City Theatre’s repertoire.
In Studio Pasila, the orchestra played absolutely delightfully. The combination of piano, harp, bass and percussion conjures up an ear-pleasing musical world.

History of the theatre


Fantasticks borrows from the history of the theatre here and there.
The characters in the play are almost like straight out of the commedia dell’arte’s gallery of characters. Limiting the performance to “stage on stage” and emphasizing the theatrical situation with interjections and conscious presentations of theatrical effects is also old.
Shakespeare quotes fly around; In this Finnish translation, there are also cult lines from Finnish dramas.
There are lovers Luisa and Matt (Mia Hafrén and Antti Timonen), whose fathers (Jarkko Rantanen and Markku Huhtamo) hold hatred in the style of Romeo and Juliet. At least it seems so at first. The fathers of the lovers play the role of a jester, which is stated in the play.
The narrator also plays El Gallo (Sami Hokkanen), an itinerant con artist and mercenary who pushes relationships on new paths. The theme of the story is that change is necessary and that growing up always hurts. In between the events, you will hear hilarious thoughts about gardening and raising children. The ending is happy.

Comedy at its extreme

Neil Hardwick’s direction emphasizes the comedic nature of the work. This is the biggest difference from the performances of the Heinola Revelation Theatre in the mid-1990s, which were directed by Salla Aas.
In Helsinki, the fun turns to the grotesque from time to time, and the viewer is alienated from the sensitivity of the young people’s love story even more effectively than in Heinola. To sum up, the new Fantasticks is a fun crazy club.
Mia Hafrén jumps and whims just as a sweet 16-year-old should, and Antti Timonen convinces as a young Matt whose heroic role sometimes slips into the jester department. The voices of the main couple are in great harmony with each other, and all in all, the vocal numbers from beginning to end are great to listen to.
However, the whole show is carried by Sami Hokkanen, known from the Heinola Summer Theatre, as the romantic villain hero narrator El Gallo. Hokkanen’s intense approach does not waver for a moment, the singing flows handsomely and the physical expression is flexible.
The story’s headstrong gardening fathers are portrayed by Jarkko Rantanen and Markku Huhtamo in an absolutely sympathetic manner.
Mika Eirtovaara plays an unforgettable role as a shabby, itinerant actor. To be more precise, the man hums, storms and rages around the stage. Eirtovaara seems to have elicited the sweetest laughs from the audience at the premiere. He also proved how incredibly an actor can alter his voice.
Fantasticks in Helsinki has made a peculiar decision by leaving out one of the touring actors. I wondered why, as the double role takes Mika Eirtovaara’s manic rampage almost to the limit. But maybe that’s what the director wanted, in the name of comedy.

Lots of movement

You can’t talk about Fantasticks without mentioning Anneli Rautiainen’s choreography. Sami Hokkanen shows his skills as a juggler, dancer and fencer. Mia Hafrén whirls in her emotional turmoil like a spinner; The whole movement language is credibly that of a 16-year-old.
Mika Eirtovaara doesn’t seem to stop for a moment when he’s on stage, and his movements often go to the side of acrobatics. Antti Timonen also has plenty of speed. The dance role is also played by Mykkä, Helena Haaranen.
Teppo Saarinen’s lighting works like classic theatre lighting, purposefully and without attracting attention.
Studio Pasila as a space is likely to just cross the line where you can’t manage without amplifying the sound. Listening to Ari-Pekka Saarikko’s well-mastered sound ensemble, I was reminded of how delicious Fantasticks’ music with its harps and other wonderful chords would sound without electronic adjustments.

The premiere of the musical Fantasticks at the Helsinki City Theatre’s Studio Pasila on 7 October 2003. Music: Harvey Schmidt, lyrics and songs: Tom Jones, translation: Esko Elstelä, director: Neil Hardwick, conductor: Lasse Hirvi: set design and costumes: J-P Kiljunen, choreographer: Anneli Rautiainen, lighting: Teppo Saarinen, sound: Ari-Pekka Saarikko. Cast: Sami Hokkanen, Mia Hafrén, Antti Timonen, Jarkko Rantanen, Markku Huhtamo, Mika Eirtovaara and Helena Haaranen.