At the same time, it makes some half dozen changes that sometimes provide a fresh perspective most often offer a new emphasis on what’s always been the strongest aspects of the musical and only occasionally go too far. Yet the show retains all 13 of Sherman Edwards’ original, often bright and tuneful songs from the 1969 production, and also most of the sometimes goofy humor. The “1776” revival has a minimalist design on a muted theme of Americana the curtain suggests faded fragments of the red, white and blue - as if shying away from overt patriotism.
I count the effort of both creative teams largely if not entirely a success.
Page and Diane Paulus, directors of the Broadway revival that is opening tonight at Roundabout’s American Airlines Theater, apparently saw an almost opposite challenge: How to update this sturdy but sometimes corny Broadway entertainment so that it reflects the changed aesthetics of Broadway - where the go-to musicals about American history have become edgier fare like “Assassins,” “Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson” and especially “Hamilton” - and so that it also embodies the changed, and charged, politics of the moment. The original challenge to the creators of “1776” was how to make a commercial musical comedy out of something as somber and dry as the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
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