THE GARDENS OF ANUNCIA
Book, Music and Lyrics by Michael John La Chiusa
Directed and Choreographed by Graciela Daniele
A Production of Lincoln Center Theater
Mitzi Newhouse at Lincoln Center
Reviewed by David Spencer
The Gardens of Anuncia is a sweet and intimate little musical whose appeal is that of a tone poem. That it’s directed and co-choreographed by Graciela Daniele is significant, because it’s also a story drawn from her life growing up in 1940s Buenos Aires; fatherless, but with her older sister (Andréa Burns), mother (Eden Espinosa) and grandmother (Mary Testa) to guide her. And argue with her too as she moves from child to young woman (Kalyn West).
With book, music and lyrics by Ms Danielle’s longtime collaborator Michael John La Chiusa, Gardens… is a memory musical, whose narrator is the present day, semi-retired Anuncia (Priscilla Lopez). The show contains little actual story per se, but the motion is supplied via the thread of Anuncia’s developing maturity and the equally developing complexity of her family relationships. Not an easy trick to pull off, but in this wise it reminded me of the musicalization of The Color Purple, which somewhat similarly tracks a young woman’s trajectory from victimized childhood to adulthood and agency without sprawling and diffusing focus.
The various males in their lives (Enrique Acavedo and Tally Sessions) sometimes appear as allusion, sometimes as specifically portrayed men, sometimes even anthropomorphized animals—and the hovering cloud of fascist politics is never far away. And an attractive score, heavily influenced by Tango and other Latin American rhythm-of-the-people styles, is an inextricable asset to the show’s continuous heartbeat.
The set (Mark Wendland) is simple, very nearly a black box, which allows the shift of locales to move fluidly, assisted by the audiences’s complicit imagination.
How much you take the show to your heart, though it is a heartfelt show, will depend on what it evokes for you, where it resonates with you. I found it pleasant and engaging; I know of others who felt it more deeply; and both are valid responses. What’s important is that The Gardens of Anuncia will indeed elicit a response, almost certainly a positive one…and may linger in your mind…as tone poems are wont to do…