Rebekah Scallet knows how to pick ’em.
As artistic director of the New Jewish Theatre, Scallet decides which shows the company will produce. Her five selections for the 2024 season included only two well-known titles, but Scallet knew what she was doing. The three unfamiliar shows were deeply rewarding.
The latest discovery is the season-ending “First Date.” The musical with a cast of seven opened on Broadway in 2013 and ran for only five months. Scallet shrewdly recognized that the musical’s intimate scale may be too small for a Broadway house but is just right for the Jewish Community Center’s Wool Studio Theatre. NJT’s superb production brings out the best in the show.
| RELATED: What to know before you see ‘First Date’ at the New Jewish Theatre
Director-choreographer Lee Anne Mathews gives “First Date” an immersive staging that is not hinted at in Austin Winsberg’s book. It specifies that the setting is a New York restaurant and that the tables are onstage.
Mathews relocates the setting to St. Louis and the tables to the floor between the seating and the set. Audience members occupy two of the four tables. The other two are reserved for cast members who are sitting there before the show begins. The action frequently spreads to the central aisle. Blurring the line between the action and the audience makes the production highly involving.
The characters who meet at the restaurant on their first date are Aaron and Casey. He is self-conscious, conservatively dressed and reluctant to get back into dating. She is a self-possessed serial dater who exudes hipness.
The audience sees what the apparently mismatched couple is thinking as well as what it is doing. The action frequently stops to dramatize the imaginary conversations Casey and Aaron are having in their heads with friends and relatives. These anguished inner dialogues have the ring of truth. Eavesdropping on them is a hoot.
Initially, the humor comes from the couple’s missteps and fantasies as they deal with their uneasiness. The show grows in stature as Aaron and Casey present truer pictures of themselves, recognize what each other has to offer and overcome their self-imposed barriers to connecting. The hard-won conclusion is both believable and satisfying.
The NJT production is ideally cast. Molly Wennstrom as Casey and Mitchell Henry-Eagles as Aaron develop their characters with consummate skill. The progress of their relationship from awkwardness and discord to appreciation and romance is totally convincing. Will Bonfiglio’s portrayal of the supremely knowing waiter is comic tour de force.
Jayson Heil, Drew Mizell, Greta Rosenstock and Grace Seidel are all excellent in multiple roles. Heil and Casey are hilarious as imaginary confidants. Rosenstock is a riot as the formidable ex-fiancée who still haunts Aaron. Mizell is delightfully flamboyant as the friend who grows increasingly alarmed when Casey fails to pick up her prearranged bailout calls.
Musical director Larry D. Pry leads the band in a bracing account of the score, which has engaging music and lyrics by Alan Zachary. All seven performers are splendid singers and dancers in Mathews’ exuberant choreography.
John Stark’s scenic design has three levels, including the theater floor where the tables are located. The stage is a raised platform with the double doors to the kitchen on one side and the band on the other. In front of the stage is a slightly lower, semicircular platform with footlights. The multiple levels would be impractical in an actual restaurant but work beautifully in the theater.
Costume designer Michele Friedman Siler leaves no doubt about Aaron and Casey’s contrasting personalities by putting him in a subdued sport coat and her in a splashy leather jacket. Denisse Chavez’ lighting, Katie Orr’s props and Amanda Werre’s sound are all very helpful.
I know nothing about two of the five plays in NJT’s 2025 season, which has just been announced. Based on the success of this year’s unfamiliar shows at NJT, I’m looking forward to the discoveries that await me.
