broadway

NEW YORK — What makes life worth living? For hard-core “Harry Potter” fans with money to burn, it might be getting Broadway tickets to interact fleetingly with Daniel Radcliffe in “Every Brilliant Thing,” an ingenious and touching solo performance piece written by Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe on the subject of suicide — or more precisely, on the ordinary joys that militate against such a drastic step.

Radcliffe was breathlessly scampering up and down the aisles of the Hudson Theatre before the show began, enlisting audience members to be participants in the play. Having seen “Every Brilliant Thing” twice before, once at the Edye (the black box at Santa Monica’s BroadStage) starring Donahoe in 2017 and once at the Geffen Playhouse’s intimate Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater starring Daniel K. Isaac in 2023, I knew exactly what he was up to.

The play revolves around a list that the narrator began at the tender age of 7 after his mother first attempted suicide. While she was still in the hospital, he started compiling, as much for her benefit as for his own, sources of everyday happiness.

Ice cream, water fights, kind people who aren’t weird and don’t smell unusual. These items are given a number, and audience members assigned a particular “brilliant thing” are expected to shout out their entry when their number is called.

The list gradually grows in complexity as the narrator gets older. Miss Piggy, spaghetti bolognese and wearing a cape give way to more sophisticated pleasures, such as the way Ray Charles sings the word “You” in the song “Drown in My Own Tears” or the satisfaction in writing about yourself in the second person.

Music plays a prominent role in “Every Brilliant Thing,” which was adapted from a monologue/short story Macmillan wrote called “Sleeve Notes.” The narrator’s terribly British father takes refuge from the emotional storms of his household by listening to jazz records in his office. John Coltrane, Cab Calloway, Bill Evans, Nina Simone are favorite artists, and the narrator can tell his father’s mood simply by the record he’s decided to play.

The production, directed by Jeremy Herrin and Macmillan, involves every level of the Hudson Theatre. I assumed I would be safe, occupying an aisle seat in the murderously expensive prime orchestra during a press performance attended by critics. But I wasn’t flashing a pad as my colleague across the aisle from me was doing to ward off any intrusions. And just before the show was about to start, Radcliffe was suddenly kneeling beside my seat asking if the person I was sitting with was my partner.

I told him that we weren’t a couple, just friends, and that I would be the worst person he could possibly ask to perform anything. But Radcliffe wasn’t so easily put off. “Let’s just say that you’re an older couple who have been together for some time,” he whispered. “And all you have to do is hand me this box of juice and candy bar when I refer to the older couple.”

OK, what harm could there be? Little did I know that “older couple” was to become “old couple,” a term that seemed to be repeated incessantly, at least to my Gen X ears not yet accustomed to scurrilous millennial attacks! I composed myself by pretending that we were in the world of anti-realism. But in truth, I would like to be the kind of person who would offer an anxious kid in a hospital waiting room a juice box and a candy bar, so maybe the casting wasn’t so far-fetched after all.

Daniel Radcliffe in the Broadway production of “Every Brilliant Thing.”

(Matthew Murphy)

A theatergoer was called upon to play the vet who euthanized the narrator’s childhood pet, a dog named Indiana Bones that was symbolized by a coat someone volunteered from the audience. It was the boy’s first experience of death, a difficult concept for a young mind but an important precursor for a boy not given the luxury of existential innocence.

Other audience members, particularly those seated on the stage, played much more elaborate roles. One man, first invited to serve as a stand-in for the narrator’s father, was asked instead to play the boy. He was given one word to say in reply — “Why?” — as his father tries to explain the reason his mother is in the hospital. This same enlisted actor was later called upon to play the dad giving a toast at his son’s wedding, one of the rare occasions when he was able to summon language for the kind of deep feeling he would normally only be able to express through his records.

One kind and patient spectator conscripted to play the school counselor had to remove her shoe to improvise a sock puppet, one of the tools of her empathetic practice. Another audience member sensitively played Sam, the narrator’s love of his life, a relationship that reveals the long-term toll of being raised by a parent suffering from suicidal depression.

Radcliffe’s audience wrangling was as intuitively sharp as his deeply felt performance. He has the comfort of a good retail politician, who’s not afraid of making direct contact with crowds. Two-time Tony winner Donna Murphy, in the house at the reviewed performance, gamely went along when Radcliffe briefly enlisted her luminous services.

Obviously, Radcliffe is the main reason “Every Brilliant Thing” is on Broadway. The show, which began at Britain’s Ludlow Fringe Festival in 2013, is a gossamer piece, a 70-minute curio best experienced in close quarters without the high expectations and ludicrous prices of New York’s turbo-charged commercial theater. The Hudson Theatre lends a mega-church vibe to the proceedings, but the spirits of theatergoers are nonetheless moved.

A scruffy-faced Radcliffe, twinkling accessible geniality in jeans and a sweatshirt, zips up and down the cavernous theater as though waging a one-man campaign against the isolation epidemic. There’s no denying that Harry Potter has matured into an assured stage actor. His Tony-winning performance in “Merrily We Roll Along” should have put to rest any doubts, but the glare of his fame can still obscure his serious chops.

Sincere yet never smarmy, ironic without ever being cynical, well-groomed though far from swank, he’s a more glamorous version of the character than the one originated by Donahoe, the British comedian with an everyman demeanor whose portrayal seemed so genuine at the Edye that I mistakenly thought that the play was his personal story.

Donahoe’s performance was filmed for HBO, but “Every Brilliant Thing” is meant to be experienced in a theater. The whole point of the show is to transform the audience into an impromptu ensemble, a group of strangers emotionally united through the story of one young man’s intimate knowledge of suicide, a subject that Albert Camus called the “one truly serious philosophical problem.”

I’m of two minds about “Every Brilliant Thing.” I was moved once again by the piece, but I’m grateful I didn’t have to wreak havoc on my credit card to pay for my seats. I love the interactive, gentle humanity of the play, but I was also acutely aware of how the work has been commodified. I applaud Radcliffe’s willingness to carve an independent path as an actor, but I might have been more impressed by his adventurousness had he decided to perform in a pocket venue that didn’t have the tiers of pricing I associate with airlines.

Yet launching a conversation around mental health with an audience magnet as powerful as Radcliffe is on balance an excellent thing. And Radcliffe’s compassionate portrayal of a survivor recognizing that he’s not out of the woods just because he made it into adulthood is one of those things that makes a theater lover just a little more appreciative of the humanity at the center of this art form.

As a powerful blizzard blankets the East Coast in snow, another force of nature is preparing to take over the chilly streets of Manhattan.

Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Gaby Moreno will make her Broadway debut as Persephone, the leading lady of Anaïs Mitchell’s Tony Award-winning musical “Hadestown,” beginning Tuesday at the Walter Kerr Theatre in New York City.

Exploring themes of climate change to a New Orleans jazz- and American folk-laden soundtrack, “Hadestown” — a retelling of the Greek myths of Hades and Persephone, as well as Orpheus and Eurydice — will open just as New York transitions out of the harsh winter. Moreno, 44, takes a video call from The Times during her second day of rehearsals, as she is learning how to play Persephone, goddess of spring — and in this play, a wine-drunk lush.

“For the first few minutes I was like, ‘Can I do this? I feel like a klutz,’” she says of her character’s flailing steps, meant to distinguish the inebriated goddess, who splits her time between the underworld and the surface of the Earth.

“I’ve never been drunk because I don’t like the taste of alcohol,” says Moreno, giggling. “But there’s a lot of numbers where I’m drunk-singing and dancing around, so that’s the acting part.”

As a theatrical performer of her own songs, Moreno feels firmly in her element on Broadway. But she arrives as a decorated musician who has woven Latin American, blues and soul traditions into nine bilingual albums — including her 2024 Grammy Award-winning acoustic album “X Mí.”

For Moreno, who was born in Guatemala City, passion for musical theater was seeded during a trip to New York City with her family when she was 13 years old. That’s when they saw “Les Misérables” and “The Phantom of the Opera” on Broadway.

“I went back home [to Guatemala] thinking, this is a dream of mine,” she recalls.

But the trip to the Big Apple also illuminated another path for Moreno. Then just a starry-eyed Catholic schoolgirl, she remembers walking down Times Square and hearing a woman singing in the streets in a style unknown to her. Curious, she went up to the busker to ask her what type of music she was singing; it was the blues, she says.

Moreno scored blues compilation albums she would bring back to her native Guatemala. Locked in her bedroom, the first track that played was Koko Taylor’s 1965 rendition of “Wang Dang Doodle,” the party anthem originally composed by Willie Dixon.

“That’s the moment I’ll never forget,” says Moreno.

She would absorb every cadence of the African American folk genre, transfixed by the bewitching vocals of 1920s blues icons like Bessie Smith and Ma Rainey, as well as luminous jazz ballads by  Ella Fitzgerald,  Billie Holiday and Nina Simone.

“Every musician should always try to find the roots to see where all that comes from,” says Moreno of her early musical explorations. “You might discover something completely new.”

Growing up as the proud daughter of Lucy Bonilla, one of Guatemala’s most charming radio broadcasters, Moreno starred alongside her mother and sisters in a series of cheeky Salvadoran seasoning commercials. She even recorded voice-overs for Central America’s most beloved chicken restaurant chain, Pollo Campero.

At 10 years old, she performed as an opening act for Ricky Martin in 1991, to the credit of her father, a concert promoter who reeled international stars to Guatemala.

“It was such a wonderful experience. I got to discover that I loved singing on stage,” says Moreno, who sang Disney songs as well as her own compositions. “I felt right at home.”

Yearning to start a music career in the States — “that’s where the [music I like] comes from,” she says — Moreno recorded a cover of a popular Guatemalan waltz called “Luna de Xelajú.” Her mother sent her demo to a producer in Miami, who then linked the young singer to a music manager in Los Angeles.

At 18 years old, she signed a recording contract with Warner Brothers and moved to L.A. There she enrolled in the Musicians Institute’s Vocal Certificate program, which allowed her to apply for a student visa and remain in the U.S.

With a deep passion for American blues and folk traditions, Moreno wondered if she could integrate those sounds with elements of Latin American folk music. But her label discouraged her from doing so, believing it would “confuse [the] audience,” she says.

“It took a while for me to find my own voice and to find where I belonged in this music world,” says Moreno. “Because at the beginning, [labels] were telling me you can’t sing in both languages — you gotta pick a lane.”

Following a disastrous 2001 merger between AOL and Time Warner, Moreno’s recording contract fell through. She later signed with Epic Records under Sony Music Entertainment — then run by Chairman and CEO Tommy Mottola — but they dropped the singer, following the decline in CD sales and rise of digital file-sharing sites like Napster and Limewire.

“I didn’t even get past recording an album,” she says of this period in her life.

Behind the scenes, Moreno formulated her own Spanish-language takes on jazz, which listeners can hear in the 2006 funky, spy-like chromatic track “Escondidos” — which includes a kazoo solo in its outro. The enigmatic song earned her the Grand Prize in the John Lennon Songwriting Contest that year, making it the first time a Latin category took home the top prize.

“People kept telling me what to do, how to sound, what kind of music I should do, how I should dress. Blah, blah blah,” says Moreno when she was under a label. “At some point I said, ‘Screw it.’”

With nothing to lose — and no label looking to strip her of tender heart and free spirit — Moreno saw an opening to release music independently on MySpace, where she uploaded her 2008 debut album, “Still The Unknown.” (Much of Moreno’s music is still archived on the social network.)

“If all should fail you, there’s still the unknown,” sang Moreno with a warm, coffeehouse-friendly cadence in the title track.

“Maybe it’ll work out, maybe it won’t, but at least I’ll be doing something that I really love,” she adds, looking back on that time. After its debut, she says she gave a copy to her friend, composer Patrick Warren, who was touring with Tracy Chapman. The “Fast Car” singer heard the LP and asked Moreno to open for her Our Bright Future tour in the summer of 2009.

“It was just me and my acoustic guitar, going with [Chapman] for three weeks all over the U.S.,” says Moreno.

Moreno’s ingenuity as an independent bilingual creative allowed her to freely partake in various opportunities in entertainment. Some might recognize her bubbly folk theme from the NBC mockumentary sitcom “Parks and Recreation,” which stretched across seven seasons between 2009 and 2015.

Others might recall her smokey vocals in the song “Mal Hombre,” as featured in Guillermo del Toro’s “Cabinet of Curiosities” — or in the final season of Netflix’s “Orange is the New Black” which featured her heart-wrenching cover of the traditional Mexican huapango “Cucurrucucú Paloma.” She can also be heard in the 2022 animated film “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish,” singing a swooning ballad titled “Por Que te Vas.”

Still, Moreno declares she hasn’t found mainstream success as a musician.

“I’m perfectly fine with that. I am so happy at this point in my life where I can make music for a living, [which is] hard to do as an independent artist,” she says.

For an indie artist, Moreno boasts an impressive slate of accolades. She’s earned three Grammy nominations, including in the category of Latin pop album in 2017 for “Ilusión” and Latin rock/alternative album in 2022 for “Alegoria.” In 2024, she finally took home the gramophone for Latin pop album for her album “X Mí (Vol. 1),” an acoustic medley of all her previously recorded songs, including the song that started it all: “Luna de Xelajú.”

“She’s powerful the way that water is flowing and it’s light, but it’s unstoppable and effervescent,” says award-winning actor Oscar Isaac.

A Guatemalan-born musician himself, Issac befriended Moreno in 2013. Emmy-nominated for his role in “Scenes From a Marriage,” the actor was in town for the 2022 awards show when he and Moreno recorded “Luna de Xelajú” at the Palace Theater in downtown L.A. The two would later perform the ballad live on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in 2024.

For Isaac, the stresses of everyday life melted away when the two got to jam together. They’ve performed a handful of times over the years, including live at the Lincoln Center for its American Songbook series in 2019.

“When I think of her, she feels very much like home,” he adds.

Guatemala — which is also known as the “Land of the Eternal Spring” — is always on Moreno’s mind.

Last year, she starred in “Lamento,” a musical short film made inside an abandoned Guatemalan beach resort; once a popular seaside destination known as Turicentro Likin, it is now tucked away behind the mangroves. Starring a stacked Guatemalan cast, including actor Tony Revolori, the project underlined the encroaching impacts of climate change that corrode once treasured memories, including those of Moreno, who grew up visiting the vacation destination.

“It’s something that brings me joy to work with people from my country,” she says.

It was only fitting that the folk-soul singer would be selected to represent Persephone in “Hadestown” — a victim of environmental destruction, yet whose duality brings life and prosperity back to a world that is constantly freezing or aflame.

Yet before she can truly represent both the queen of the underworld and goddess of spring, Moreno must first survive the gauntlet that is the New York winter.

“One thing I can tell you is: I cannot wait to bring on the spring,” she says.