Review: Jelly’s Last Jam Not Only Blows the Roof Off City Center, It Obliterates It

The ceiling at New York City Center is notoriously high. It would take a lot of might to bring it down. But the phrase “they blew the roof off” must have been coined with crowd-pleasers like Jelly’s Last Jam in mind. Robert O’Hara’s powerful new staging of this 1992 George C. Wolfe-Susan Birkenhead-Luther Henderson musical for Encores! not just blows the roof off the joint, it completely obliterates it.

A stylized profile of musician Jelly Roll Morton, the show is predominately remembered as having been a vehicle for iconic tap dancers Gregory Hines and Savion Glover, who played older and younger versions of the pioneering jazz artist. In our current era of theatrical and cinematic hagiographies, Wolfe’s book still proves innovative three decades later as it confronts Morton’s legacy in this revolutionary Black American artform with his history as a denialist of his background.

That is to say, this isn’t a show that lets Ferdinand La Menthe Morton off the hook because of his accomplishments; it’s a warning about how denying your past can lead to the ruination of your future. A mixed-race, light-skinned member of the New Orleans French Creole gentry, the show introduces the young Morton (the smashing tap dancer Alaman Diadhiou) as he embraces his musical roots in the juke joints of the bayou. His discovery of the blues from trumpeter Buddy Bolden (Okieriete Onaodowan in a stately cameo) and singer Miss Mamie (Tiffany Mann, one of many in the cast who sing the house down) leads to his getting disowned by his family matriarch (Leslie Uggams in a cameo that shows how stillness can be scarier than anything else).

In return, the adult Jelly (Nicholas Christopher), who hits the road with darker-skinned musical partner Jack the Bear (the beautifully sympathetic John Clay III), chooses to forget his Black roots, embracing the Creole part of his background so fully that it leads him to spurn both Jimmy and Anita (Joaquina Kalukango), the woman he loves in fits of racism and braggadocio. At the end of his life, Jelly is provoked by the mystical Chimney Man (a glimmering Billy Porter) into looking backwards and inwards to admit to his real heritage.

Under the confines of the 10-day Encores! rehearsal period, director O’Hara and his team have come up with a precis of a production that’s pretty fabulous. Edgar Godineaux’s dances are nothing short of thrilling, vigorously building until they pop off the stage like magic. You can practically see the heat lines rising from the floor as the cast performs Dormeshia’s unbelievable tap choreography. The two movement specialists come together for the show’s absolute highlight, “That’s How You Jazz,” a number that keeps topping itself as the dancers transform their bodies into a whole ragtime band (the actual 15-member orchestra, conducted by Jason Michael Webb, is equally electrifying).

O’Hara, a longtime mentee of book writer and original director Wolfe, has a stirringly Brechtian take on the piece itself, complete with a wall of harsh spotlights (Adam Honoré did the fascinatingly accusatory lighting) and a stately gateway to heaven or hell upstage center (Clint Ramos did the unchanging set). I’d kill to see his ideas developed further in full: this is a start, and it will only get better. Really, the only downside was Megumi Katayama’s sound: ear-piercing in some spots, too low in others, mixed in a way that never quite allows us to hear Birkenhead’s smart lyrics (the music itself is all Jelly Roll, with embellishments by Henderson, and orchestrations by Henderson, Daryl Waters, and William David Brohn). That part was a real disaster, and I found myself struggling to catch what was being said.

And that’s the real shame, because not being able to understand what they’re singing took a lot away from the three stirring central performances. As Anita, Kalukango is at turns sexy and empathetic, her life-building expertly aided by Dede Ayite’s spot-on costumes and J. Jared Janas’s generation-spanning wigs. Porter is perhaps the best he’s ever been as the literal angel/devil on Jelly’s shoulder, slithering on and off stage with power and intensity. Christopher, who spent the month preceding this playing both Sweeney Todd and Pirelli a few avenues over, is just plain amazing, infusing Jelly with enough compassion to get us on his side, while scarily pulling the rug out. I can’t believe these three actors found such full characterizations in under two weeks.

Scene after scene, Jelly’s Last Jam left me on the edge of my seat; not bad for a 32-year-old show. This is the kind of theatrical deep cut that Encores! does best, and if you’re a fan of the American musical, you better not miss it.