The Man with the Golden Heart: glorious music, voices and hope
14 Jul 2023

by Drew Rowsome - Photos courtesy of Andrew Seok

Before The Man with the Golden Heart begins, writer/composer/director Andrew Seok (Unravelled) addresses the sold out audience packed into a very warm church, saying that he wrote the musical "to give hope." And then the sumptuous, unabashedly romantic musical begins. Any show that begins with the reliably remarkable Bruce Dow (Diana the Musical, Uncovered, Dr Silver, James and the Giant Peach, Sextet, Pig, Of a Monstrous Child: A Gaga Musical) shaking the rafters with an exposition-heavy 11 o'clock number and doesn't let up from there, is an experience to be savoured. Dow's character was "born with a golden heart and can help people who are hurt and struggling. But each time he helps someone he gives away a piece of his heart and it kills him a little." In the opening number he is struggling with guilt about being unable to "stop the darkness." If only he listened to his thrillingly-voiced mother, Charlotte Moore (Sunday in the Park with George, Spend Your Kids' Inheritance), who warns him that he "can't give what they want, what you want, only what they need. You can't save everyone."

From there Dow, and Moore, fade into the background as Dow interacts with three different storylines. Initially this feels as if Seok had three separate musicals that were in development and he threaded them together with the Golden Heart plotline. The plots are disparate in tone and subject matter and slightly unbalanced in terms of urgency. The fate of Chinese workers during the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway—with a propulsive chorus "inch by inch, spike by spike, nail by nail, mile by mile"— has more dramatic heft than a couple in the throes of separating due to the stock market crash of 1929. But all three stories deal with separation, by death, by financial ruin, by being conscripted into the first World War. And this is a musical, it only has to make emotional sense which it does thanks to Seok's music. While always tuneful and easy on the ear, there is a certain sameness to the melodic structure and tempos that proves fraudulent when The Man with the Golden Heart reaches its climax. The three musical themes are restated, revealed as distinct, and intertwined with the mother's gorgeous, and hooky, ballad. Artful construction for maximum emotional impact.

Seok himself takes the lead role of the Railway Husband and he is fine-voiced, vulnerable and affecting. Finely matched by Rhoslynne Bugay as the Railway Wife, who gets to let it rip in a wrenching moment. Tess Benger (who is also the assistant director) is feisty and fun as the wife left behind who turns out to be a master battlefield strategist. There is real affection between her and George Krissa, who, a survivor of the Hallmark Christmas debacle The Holiday Sitter and a Stratford and Shaw veteran, is too handsome for his own good. Fortunately his vocal pipes warm up to match his biceps and the two sing gloriously. The couple shattered by the stock market crash is difficult to explain out of context, but Dow's golden heart works some magic so that past and present co-exist and interact. That makes for a roundelay of humorous and heartfelt duets and quartets from Scott Beaudin, Rachel Delduca, Tristan Hernandez and Sarah Horsman. Dow and Moore do return as interstitial links with Moore showing everyone  how its done in an unmiked vocal entrance and sashay that fills the cavernous cathedral with sublime sound.

Those of us who love musicals, particularly those who love swelling strings and building vocal lines, will love The Man with the Golden Heart. The structurally complex but easy to follow plot is completely overwhelmed by the sheer joy of hearing powerful, plaintive voices in full flight. I left singing "You are always a part of me/Wherever you go, whatever you do." And full of hope.