The musical “Kimberly Akimbo” wastes no time in staking a claim to both exuberance and the weight of the world — as well as about a thousand other feelings that its titular lead, her teenage friends and, arguably, the rest of us are awash in.
That David Lindsay-Abaire and Jeanine Tesori’s musical about a teenager with an extremely rare disease and her dysfunctional parents (less rare but oh-so challenging), can be soul-affirming without losing its edge and ouchy-ness is an achievement, one that speaks to the elasticity of the musical genre. And one that the American Theatre Wing and the Broadway League recognized when they awarded “Kimberly Akimbo” five Tony Awards in 2022. Among that trove were statuettes for best musical, best leading actress, and best featured actress.
On Thursday, the national tour launched at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, inviting theatergoers to ache and laugh and ache and, yes, laugh again.
From left: Nina White, Bonnie Milligan, Fernell Hogan, Michael Iskander and Olivia Hardy in the original Broadway company of “Kimberly Akimbo.” (Joan Marcus, provided by The Denver Center)
The show opens at the Skater Planet in Bergen County, N.J., a haunt that isn’t as happening as the town’s mall. Kimberly Levaco (Carolee Carmello), soon-to-be 16 years old, stands by herself, waiting. Although her face is that of an adult, everything about her tentative posture and awkward lonesomeness screams teenager.
High schooler and ice rink worker Seth (Miguel Gil) takes the microphone to announce a Zamboni timeout. A quartet of teen friends — Delia, Martin, Teresa and Aaron — chatter with an electric energy and then launch into “Skater Planet.” (“It’s Saturday night in Bergen County. There are parties everywhere, but we never get invited.”) The words are cute-sad, but the ridiculously upbeat tune sets the tone for an infectious glee that permeates so much of “Kimberly Akimbo.”
While there is a genetic disorder that ages people prematurely, the show’s makers chose not to name Kimberly’s ailment. We do know that for every year in her life, her body ages five years, and that her life expectancy is dramatically abbreviated.
At school, Seth tells Kimberly in front of the lockers, “I thought you were the lunch lady.” Think of it as a version of kids saying the darndest things. That’s before Kim and Seth become lab partners on a biology project about diseases, before they are friends and maybe more. Gil does wonders as the sweetly polite, tuba-playing, anagram-addicted Seth.
For show choir kids Delia, Martin, Teresa and Aaron (the charming ensemble of Grace Capeless, Darron Hayes, Skye Alyssa Friedman and Pierce Wheeler), the vectors of fondness veer hilariously off their mark. For Kimberly and Seth, whatever is gently going on between them is as subtle as it is true.
Carmello takes on the beautifully daunting and tricky work of being 16 going on 70. It’s an illusion that one buys into or doesn’t quite. I didn’t when I saw a very good understudy do the role on Broadway (and still loved the show). I did here.
Certainly, Kimberly’s wardrobe (costumes by Sara Laux), a believable mashup of patterns and textures, plaid shirts and combat boots, helps. But it’s the three-time Tony nominee Carmello’s way of inhabiting Kimberly’s fears and yearnings that convinces. Whether she’s composing a letter to a social service organization (“Make a Wish”) or crushing out on Seth (“Anagram”), her voice bubbles up and out, going from tentative to expectant.
Broadway veteran Carolee Carmello portrays the titular star of “Kimberly Akimbo.” (Provided by The Denver Center)
Kimberly’s mature for her age, much the way children are forced to be when their parents aren’t mature for their ages. Mom Pattie (Dana Steingold) is pregnant, and from the video she’s surreptitiously shooting for the anticipated newcomer (“Hello, Darling”), she sees the next child as something of a do-over. But don’t judge Pattie too harshly; she follows a reprise of the self-absorbed “Hello Darling” with a ballad of remarkable tenderness about “Father Time.”
Dad Buddy (Jim Hogan) acts too much like a pal and not enough like a reliable father. He drinks. He’s late. He makes promises he won’t keep. His most paternal gesture is worrying that Seth might have a crush on his daughter. He sings “Happy for Her” as he drives Kimberly and Seth to school.
Because Kimberly can be so can-do and her parents are often woefully childish, it’s easy to forget that Pattie and Buddy have also been living with the burdens of their daughter’s fleeting life.
There are other dramas, too. For reasons they want to keep hush-hush, they uprooted Kimberly from Lodi to their new town without leaving a forwarding address.
The mystery of that abrupt departure is solved when Kimberly’s aunt Debra (Emily Koch) tracks down her niece at her new school. Debra wheedles information from Kimberly about the location of her sister and brother-in-law’s new home. It becomes clear quickly why the Levaco family doesn’t want Debra around.
“When life gives you lemons … you gotta go out and steal some apples,” she sings in “Better,” preaching to the quartet of show choir kids. Think of her as an Artful Dodger by way of the Jersey Turnpike, the Cat in the Hat out on parole.
The second act brilliantly balances Seth and Kimberly’s growing fondness for each other with the criminal enterprise that Debra’s concocted. She’s created an assembly line for check kiting, having enlisted the teen quartet in her scheme. (Hey, they need money for their costumes!)
When they start to balk, she prods them by reminding them that another school’s show choir would have this funny business down pat. Like Debra’s other song and her constant wisecracking, “How to Wash a Check” is hilarious. Its darker implications fade in part because her “crew” is so inept at the task, but mostly because Koch’s and director Jessica Stone’s comedic timing is ace.
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And the timing here needs to be crisp. Because “Kimberly Akimbo” constantly mixes moods — up and down and sideways. Kimberly knows that time, however sped up, delivers the existential alongside the joyous. She wants us to know that, too.
Lisa Kennedy is a Denver-based freelance writer specializing in theater and film.
IF YOU GO
“Kimberly Akimbo”: Book and lyrics by David Lindsay-Abaire. Music by Jeanine Tesori. Directed by Jessica Stone. Featuring Carolee Carmello, Miguel Gil, Grace Capeless, Darron Hayes, Skye Alyssa Friedman, Pierce Wheeler, Jim Hogan, Dana Steingold and Emily Koch. At the Buell Theatre at the Denver Performing Arts Complex through Oct. 5. For tickets and info denvercenter.org or 303-893-4100