Off-Broadway Review—“Only Yesterday” by Bob Stevens

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Wednesday, 18 September 2019 21:05

Written by Kevin Filipski

Only Yesterday

Written by Bob Stevens; directed by Carol Dunne

Performances through September 29, 2019

Inspired by a couplet in Paul McCartney’s heartfelt 1982 elegy for John Lennon, “Here Today”—What about the night we cried?/Because there wasn’t any reason left to keep it all inside—Bob Stevens’ nostalgic Only Yesterday recalls an evening that Paul and John spent together in a Key West hotel room during the Beatles’ 1964 North American tour.

Freed from their responsibilities during the height of Beatlemania—and since the only local TV and radio stations are Spanish language and comprise mainly Fidel Castro speeches—the young men get to let their hair down, so to speak, and drink, smoke, sing and create new songs, argue, insult and berate each other: acting, in other words, like the close friends they are. Stevens confines the action, such as it is, to their room and allows only two other characters to intrude—the band’s unnamed road manager, and Shirley, a teenage Beatlemaniac who finds herself trapped in the air duct trying to sneak into their room and who ends up having a down-to-earth conversation with her least-favorite Beatles (she was hoping to get into George and Ringo’s room).

Although Stevens and director Carol Dunne nail the concept of two mega-celebrities being “normal,” if only for one night, they also take the easy way out, undercutting what is a diverting but ultimately sketchy show. When they finally get around to serious business, John tells Paul that he should start writing more substantial songs:

Do you want to keep writing love me do, ‘cause P.S. I love you and I want to hold your fookin’ hand for the rest of your life?!! Well, guess what? You can’t! Music’s changing. The lyrics have to mean something. You gotta keep up, mate!

Later, while discussing the untimely and premature deaths of their mothers—which has been an unspoken connection between them since they were teenagers—John tells Paul point blank that he should write a song about his mother Mary. So wouldn’t you know that, when the play ends and the lights fade, we hear the strains of “Let It Be,” Paul’s musical tribute to his mother—which he wrote several years later. Mission accomplished?

Only Yesterday is an enjoyable lark that blows up a tiny Beatles anecdote to 70 minutes, and it’s nicely acted by Tommy Crawford as a matter-of-fact Paul and Christopher Sears as a sneeringly acerbic John: although Sears inhabits John more comfortably than Crawford does Paul (at times, Crawford seems more George-like), they are both accomplished musicians—and Crawford is, correctly, a southpaw!—and their acting accurately dramatizes a brotherly bond that’s amusing and touching if (at least as presented here) ultimately superficial.

For true profundity, listen to Paul’s “Here Today”: he describes his relationship with John, with refreshing emotional directness, in less than three minutes.

Only Yesterday

59 E 59 Theater, 59 East 59th Street, New York, NY

59e59.org

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