From left: RJ Christian as Bendemann, Zoe Siegel as K, and Monica Ho as Waitasec in Ben Beckley and Nate Weida’s new sci-fi musical In Corpo at Theatre Row.
Ben Beckley and Nate Weida’s In Corpo is a new sci-fi musical about human connection that will make some theatergoers smile and others wince. Directed by Jess Chayes, it draws on Franz Kafka’s unfinished novels The Castle and The Trial, Herman Melville’s short story “Bartleby the Scrivener,” and the artists’ own experiences navigating the corporate world. The piece grapples with corporate overreach, invasive technologies, and unresponsive bureaucracies to satirize how working in the corporate world can stymie one’s heart and soul. Its principals’ names, “K” and “Bartleby” (played by Austin Owens Kelly), are borrowed directly from Kafka (K. is the hero of The Castle; Josef K. of The Trial) and Melville’s 1853 short story.
Bendemann with Jessica Frey as Pepi in the new noirish musical In Corpo. Photographs by Bjorn Bolinder.
As the lights rise, the audience glimpses Corpo, the last corporation on the planet, where life is “great” and employees “happy.” K (Zoe Siegel), a survivor from the outside world of air pollution and drifting snow, arrives at Corpo’s gates at the bidding of her estranged father, a company manager who has mysteriously vanished. Once admitted into Corpo as a consultant, K encourages the employees of Sub-Sector 13-G to re-examine their highly efficient but mind-numbing jobs.
Despite the strong sources—they may include Fritz Lang’s 1927 silent film Metropolis as well—the principal characters need to be fleshed out more. Although the new interim company manager Bendemann (RJ Christian), who has replaced K’s father, is the man of the hour with his sudden promotion, one still knows very little about him, except that he enjoys being in the catbird seat.
There’s no paucity of songs in this two-act musical: 13 in Act I and an even dozen in Act II, and they thematically play off one another as the show progresses. Weida’s catchy score—a mix of bluegrass, folk, techno-punk, and operatic styles—also captures the innermost thoughts of employees, courtesy of a newly minted, hi-tech Thought Receptor. Although K opposes this kind of invasive technology, she can’t escape it within Corpo’s walls. Inevitably she finds herself singing her thoughts aloud, even those she would prefer to keep hidden. A case in point is when K meets Bendemann and snidely sings:
Ho (left) as Waitasec, Wesley Zurick as Offyago, and Siegel as K in In Corpo.
Inauspicious welcoming
Why’s this clown where dad should be?
He said he’d explain to me. . .
Joke’s on me then
Never trusting him again.
The main weakness of the work is that principal characters need to be fleshed out more. Beckley and Weida have endowed some of their characters with allegorical—or colorful—names. There is the silly Offyago (Wesley Zurick) and his sillier colleague Waitasec (Monica Ho). The aptly named Jelly Donut (Patrick Chan) is all fluff; Bennemann, though a serious-minded employee, is overly ambitious. Pepi (Jessica Frey), who starts out as Corpo’s dedicated human resource person, begins to have second thoughts about the corporation after meeting K. The reason, of course, is that she and K are becoming friends and confiding things to each other. K soon discovers, however, that Pepi is still very much tethered to the Corpo mindset. For, as Pepi says to K one day, when discussing her job, “I’m paid to follow protocol, not to think.”
The acting is serviceable, with no real standout performances. That’s not to say that this musical doesn’t have merit, it does. Beckley and Weida earnestly investigate the most vital problems in the current American workplace today, but they are issues that date back past Metropolis to Melville. There is a breath-catching moment when Bartleby (Austin Owens Kelly) refuses to work and soberly repeats the famous line from Melville: “I prefer not to.” Bartleby’s breakdown is particularly poignant because he starts out as Corpo’s star player.
Zurick (left) as Offyago, and Ho as Waitasec in Beckley and Weida’s new sci-fi musical.
Nic Benacerraf’s set—undulating rows of small green dividers on a raked stage—sturdily accommodate Corpo’s work /sleep pods, not to mention the modules for the synthesizers. Indeed, this whimsical set looks like something that has been plucked straight out of Six Flags Great Adventure amusement park.
In keeping with the style of the musical, Lisa Nevada’s choreography is eclectic and edgy. Although the stage set prevents any dancer from moving freely around the stage, Nevada has created sequences with reaching movements, which seem to suggest a longing for human contact. Costume designer Kate Fry outfits all the actors in identical pink onesies that add an extra dash of farce to this musical.
Buttressed by Melville’s and Kafka’s brilliant literary works, the Assembly Theater’s production of In Corpo, though flawed, burnishes the old message that life in the corporate world, with its technological seductions and limiting of self-expression, is a slippery slope.
The Assembly Theater production of In Corpo plays through July 8 at Theatre Row (410 West 42nd St.) Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Wednesday and 8 p.m. Thursday, Friday, and Saturday; matinees are at 3 p.m. Sunday. For tickets and information, visit assemblytheater.org or telecharge.com.
Book & Lyrics: Ben Beckley and Nate Weida
Music: Nate Weida
Director: Jess Chayes
Choreography: Lisa Nevada
