Although it is possible that seeing an abridged Concert Reading of the musical Final Day at Midtown International Theater Festival lent itself to a misinterpretation of the show’s quality, one would think that an author and director would put at least some, if not all, of the best parts of a show, especially a musical, on display in a reading.  If what was seen on July 19^th was the best that Final Day has to offer, then the show needs a lot of work.

What we can agree on is that the premise of Final Day could and should be an excellent basis for a compelling love story.  Unlike a Beautiful Future which postulated that Nazis and French Collaborators deserve love too, Final Day’s story of a German regular army soldier, in this case a Lieutenant (Johann), growing up next to and falling in love with a Jewish neighbor (Hannah) is altogether realistic. That he and his General father went to war is equally plausible.  That her father was a physicist who the Nazi’s needed for work on weapons projects is also realistic.  But that is where the story that Curtis tries to tell loses its focus and wanders into parts unknown.

Even as Jewish forced labor, Hannah’s family would not have been kept in a Concentration camp. Hannah’s father was going to work alongside non-Jewish German scientists in the search for weapons that would win the war.  Hannah’s family would not have been afforded the same comforts as their German counterparts, but would have received a lot more privileges than Jewish manual laborers who were also in the camps.  The class differential probably would not have even seemed that strange in a class based society like early 20^th century Germany.  Curtis fails to embrace this reality and what would probably be a sometimes unfavorable impression of Hannah and her family.

He also seems to want to give us a history of the war and how a man could become a NAZI.  Both of these things are distracting and do nothing to drive the story.  If an audience member does not recognize that NAZIs were (and are) inherently evil, a description of the Commandant committing a heinous act is going to have the unintended effect of individualizing rather than universalizing that evil.

A Concert Reading can be used to either sell the show or get feedback or both.  In any case, it should highlight the best songs in the show.  Currently, Final Day apparently lacks a hook song and lacks songs that drives the narrative. The songs seem more appropriate for a club act than a staged musical.

If Curtis wants to make this show work he is going to have to start at the finale, perhaps after the finale and work backward.  Maybe start with Hannah and Johann relating their war experiences to their children or grandchildren at their home in Munich or New York or Washington.  Then moving backwards from the day of their reunification and the mutiny of the Commandant’s troops through their personal war experiences.  A much smaller and more intimate tale than Curtis has pursued to this point, but much more compelling.