Fun Home
I was late to Fun Home . I don’t mean I arrived late to the Public Theater, where Fun Home is having its world premiere (perish the thought); I mean I saw Fun Home late in its run, once critics and artists had lavished praise on the new Jeanine Tesori-Lisa Kron musical (often in the form of inclusion on best-of-the-year lists). It’s good, but I wouldn’t add to the superlatives. Based on Alison Bechdel’s book, Fun Home focuses on Alison’s life. We meet three Alisons, noted in the Playbill as Alison (Beth Malone), Medium Alison (Emily Skeggs) and Small Alison (Sydney Lucas). (That would be Alison at about 43, in college and as a kid, 7 or 8 years old.) Alison is a lesbian and a cartoon artist, neither of which ever sat right with her parents, Bruce (Michael Cerveris), and Helen (Judy Kuhn). Alison’s home is like a museum, much to the delight of her father and chagrin of her mother. Mom is an actress and trying to keep things together for Bruce. Dad is a little bit of everythi...