Brooklyn: The Musical (2004 Original Broadway Cast)
WhenBrookyn the Musicallanded on Broadway, many reviewers said that theAmerican Idolsound had come along with it. It¹s hard to disagree, especially when Eden Espinosa, playing the title character, opens her mouth. Espinosa, who learned the performing ropes in California theme parks, is an unfocused belter who mistakes grandstanding melisma for emotion. And overemoting is the last thing you want to do when you have to deliver lines such as "This weight in my heart/This ache in my soul/This yearning in my heart just keeps on going on/There's a voice deep inside/And it cries and it cries." Unfortunately, the tunes (mixing rock, gospel and R&B;, and recorded in front of a live studio audience) don't make much of an impact. Newcomers Mark Shoenfeld and Barri McPherson have come up with a well-meaning show that brims with enthusiastic naïveté but ultimately fails to convince.--Elisabeth Vincentelli