‘The Last Five Years’ Broadway Review: Nick Jonas & Adrienne Warren Make Love in Reverse

I reviewed the world premiere of Jason Robert Brown’s “The Last Five Years” when it opened Off Broadway in 2002. Back then, I came up with a way-too-cute alternate title for this two-hander musical. I called it “I Do! I Don’t!,” a reference to the 1966 musical by Harvey Schmidt and Tom Jones that starred Mary Martin and Robert Preston.

That show never entered my mind when, last week, I saw the first Broadway production of “The Last Five Years,” which opened Sunday at the Hudson Theatre. Instead, I kept thinking of another show, one by Stephen Sondheim. Maybe it’s because the Tony-winning revival of “Merrily We Roll Along” opened at the Hudson only a season ago. Maybe it’s because Brown’s show tells the woman’s story, but not the man’s, in reverse à la “Merrily.” And maybe it’s because both musicals are about showbiz. In Brown’s musical, for which he wrote the book and the songs, the last five years is actually her story; his is the next five years. This musical finds its clever balance in the music. While she’s singing downbeat songs as the relationship disintegrates, he’s being very upbeat in the first throes of love; that dynamic is reversed in the show’s second half.

The only time the characters Cathy Hiatt and Jamie Wellerstein actually “meet” is at the show’s halfway point, when they get married. It was a truly magical moment back in 2002 when “The Last Five Years” starred Sherie Rene Scott and Norbert Leo Butz under the direction of Daisy Prince. I wrote that the musical was “never more poignant than during ‘The Next Ten Minutes,’ which begins with Jamie in a rowboat in Central Park as he points out the apartment buildings of the rich and famous to an imaginary Cathy, who only later appears in the person of Scott. He proposes, she accepts, and they are married. Then Cathy steps into the receding rowboat as she remarks on the Central Park West landmarks pointed out to her by an imaginary Jamie, who is no longer present in the person of Butz.”

The Broadway revival eschews the rowboat and the revolving stage. Nick Jonas as Jamie wears a tux and Adrienne Warren as Cathy wears a white wedding dress (costumes by Dede Ayite) and the two of them get to roll around on a big bed (scenic design by David Zinn). They sing magnificently and there’s real chemistry between the two of them, but Whitney White’s direction is literal and unimaginative to the extreme. There’s no emotional payoff in these two stories traveling in opposite directions.

It’s the worst of two possible worlds: the production is minimal while also being messy. Little doll houses on stage represent those famous CPW apartment buildings, and Jonas has to jump way up to enter his apartment, which is on a platform that awkwardly rolls on and off stage. At one point, fortunately, he is able to use one of the doll houses as a balcony.

There’s a toxic back story at play here with this roman à clef musical. Brown and his former wife, Theresa O’Neill, sued each other over “The Last Five Years” and changes were made in the show to make it less obviously about her. Jamie is a very successful novelist; Cathy is a not very successful singer/actor. What kind of a guy writes about his success and his ex-spouse’s lack of it?

Brown wrote “The Last Five Years” when Woody Allen remained a much-lauded icon. Today, the Jewish man teaching the “Annie Hall” shiksa about life is a tired trope.

In her professional failure, Cathy complains about the audition process: “When I walk in the room/There’s a table of men/Always men, usually gay.” And usually Jewish, which goes unmentioned.

The show’s toxicity has apparently affected at least one of its performers. Jonas and Warren are both strong singers, but Warren possesses the better voice. And she doesn’t mind proving that fact. Warren hangs on to high notes, and her fan base is prone to rewarding her with vocal outbursts and applause while she distorts the musical line. In her final duet with Jonas, at the preview I attended, Warren held a high note long after he concluded his. That’s grounds for divorce in the musical theater.

“The Last Five Years” is now open and runs 14 weeks through June 22 at the Hudson Theater on Broadway.

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