Of all the musicals I saw at this year's Fringe Festival, this is the one I'd most want to see again after some more development. The characters - a world famous opera diva and the rocker teenage son she abandoned years ago - are extreme and don't behave as people are supposed to in musicals. Example: when mom and son are reunited his neediness is almost psychotic and she, not the least bit maternal, responds by locking him in a closet. The material needs plenty of work - his songs (which contrast with her opera arias) need to rock much harder, the quality of the lyrics is wildly variable, the show should be his story more than hers but is currently the opposite. And yet despite the hot messiness the authors have written a story that demands to be musicalized, and the parts that work are fresh and wildly entertaining.
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