Billy Joel's stories in song make marvelous evening of dance

By Rich Copley RCOPLEY@HERALD-LEADER.COM

Billy Joel's public profile has always been that of a New Yorker, singing New York State of Mind from under a Yankees cap.

But he grew up on Long Island, not Manhattan, in a bedroom community not unlike suburbs across the country. And that is where so many of his songs are drawn from.

Most of our high schools had a Brenda and Eddie, "the king and the queen of the prom, driving around with the car top down and the radio on." And we knew a James, the young man, "living up to expectations," even if they weren't his own.

And we have those little Italian restaurants, where they will offer "a bottle of red" or "a bottle of white."

When Twyla Tharp decided she wanted to make a Broadway show out of Joel's music, those are the characters and stories she seized on. And that's why Movin' Out, like Joel's music, works as well here in Kentucky as it does in the Big Apple.

Amplifying the emotions is its arrival as the United States is at war, as it was in the late 1960s and early '70s, when Movin' Out takes place.

It's the story of Brenda and Eddie, the leading man and woman of the Joel classic Scenes from an Italian Restaurant, as well as Tony of the show's title song and James, the title character of an early Joel album cut. Their tale of hookups, breakups, breakdowns and ultimately redemption are told entirely in dance.

Sometimes the Lexington Opera House's Broadway Live series gets a show that benefits from the younger casts of the non-union tours it usually gets, and this is one of them. Many in this cast are on their first tours, and their enthusiasm and closeness to the age of the characters fires their performances.

None is more amazing than Andrew Pirozzi as Eddie. There are four Eddies listed in the program, and no wonder. It's a marathon of a role demanding everything from ballet to gymnastics to break dancing and little time for a break. All the major cast members and several ensemble players also get the spotlight, including a lovely ballet for Karolina Blonski as Judy and Eric Bourne as James to Just the Way You Are.

Joel purists might be a tad bugged by some songs taken out of context such as Big Shot and Angry Young Man, but then there are shattering interpretations such as Goodnight Saigon. Piano Man Matthew Friedman does Joel's music justice.

If there's a shortcoming in the music, it's that the band is a bit restrained, particularly guitarist Johan Nilson. This may have as much to do with arrangements as his playing, but there are several songs where the guitar is supposed to wail, like Big Shot, and, disappointingly, it doesn't.

Yes, it's a Broadway-style show. But as some guy from New York once wrote, "It's still rock 'n' roll."theater review | movin' out

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