“Lazarus” sold out in hours thanks to three little words: David Bowie musical. Mind you, it’s by Bowie, not with him.
Now that the show’s opened, we see what lurks behind the buzz: “Lazarus” is a jukebox musical by and for people who think they’re too good for jukebox musicals.
Cooked up by Bowie and playwright Enda Walsh — who��d done better, or at least more intelligible work on his adaptation of “Once” — the story is loosely inspired by the novel “The Man Who Fell to Earth” and its movie version, which starred the Thin White Duke at the peak of his 1970s junkie hipness.
The source material’s sci-fi plot is largely gone, replaced with chic modernist alienation — and few are as good at that as director Ivo van Hove is, even if his Broadway revival of Arthur Miller’s “A View From the Bridge” packs 10 times the punch of this supposedly edgier fare.
Here, Michael C. Hall’s Thomas Newton spends his time wandering around a barely furnished apartment in brown loungewear. Rich, lonely and brooding, he survives on a diet of gin, Twinkies and television, seemingly haunted by visions of a lost, blue-haired love and a child who may be his daughter. As Newton’s assistant, Cristin Milioti trades the frozen tundras of TV’s “Fargo” for the chill of emotional bleakness.
Your guess is as good as mine as to what’s going on, though a handful of scenes will stick with you: black balloons spilling over the stage, a little girl whose blood runs white, red video static invading the walls.
The score is made up mostly of old Bowie tunes: some classics like “Life on Mars,” “Changes,” “The Man Who Sold the World,” “All the Young Dudes” and “Heroes,” along with lesser-known cuts such as “Where Are We Now?”
There are also four new songs, including one called “Lazarus,” which will be on Bowie’s new album, due early next year. The good news is that they don’t stick out, which is impressive considering the illustrious company they keep.
Equally impressive is how much Hall (last seen in “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”) sounds like Bowie when he sings. The effect is downright eerie — a lot more so than the show as a whole.
“Lazarus” is at New York Theatre Workshop through Jan. 20. Running time: 120 minutes, no intermission.