New 'Side Show' brings thrills, chills, compassion

NEW YORK — It's impossible to see Side Show, the Bill Russell/Henry Krieger musical inspired by the real-life story of conjoined twins who attracted prurient interest as a performing act in the 1920s and '30s, and not marvel at how much pop culture and media have changed — not just over the past century, but also since the show premiered on Broadway 17 years ago.

Had Daisy and Violet Hilton lived today, when it's possible to measure our fascination with the foibles and misfortunes of others in clicks, they might have experienced levels of fame and humiliation far greater than those provided by vaudeville audiences and exploitation films such as 1932's Freaks.

Director Bill Condon's darkly glittering, substantially revised new production of Side Show (***½ out of four stars), which opened Monday at the St. James Theatre, doesn't acknowledge this irony outright. But it does invite us to question the increasing nonchalance with which we dissect and ridicule public figures of all sorts.

Condon, whose credits as a film director and writer include Gods and Monsters, Kinsey and Dreamgirls, worked with librettist/lyricist Russell to delve more deeply into the characters' backgrounds. A number of new songs have been added, from the cheeky Stuck With You, performed in the sisters' stage act, to All in the Mind, a more haunted account of their yearning — despite the emotional connection that also binds them — for independence and solitude.

The man running the side show is reintroduced as "Sir," a lout who insists he is the Hiltons' father, having won legal guardianship of them for life. After contesting this in court, at the urging of a slick talent scout, Daisy and Violet are granted the freedom to pursue richer careers and lives; even romantic love seems, briefly, within their reach. But dignity and compassion prove just as elusive.

Erin Davie and Emily Padgett make the Hiltons convincing as both sisters and wounded survivors. Their bright, resonant sopranos blend impeccably; Davie's Violet tackles the top notes with a delicacy and ardor that emphasize the character's fragility and fear, while Padgett gives Daisy pluck and wit.

Ryan Silverman brings a suave, slightly caddish quality to the scout, Terry, but also shows genuine and conflicted emotions, particularly in Private Conversation, a tortured appeal to Violet that remains one of the show's dramatic high points.

Matthew Hydzik lends sweetness and pathos to the part of Teddy's sidekick, Buddy, whose courtship of Violet is doomed by more than her condition, and David St. Louis imbues Jake, who leaves Sir to look after Daisy and pine for Violet, with a robust tenderness.

In the scorching finale, other members of the side show gather upstage as the Hiltons face the merciless glare of the spotlight with a chilling sense of resignation. "Come look at the freaks," they sing, but this Side Show reminds us, at every turn, of the humanity they share with us — all of us.