“Fun Home,” the new Broadway musical based on the graphic memoir of Vermont’s Alison Bechdel (“Dykes to Watch Out For”) won five Tony Awards at the June 7, 2015 ceremony, including Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score of a Musical, Best Director of a Musical and Best Actor in a Musical.
Boston Spirit magazine arts editor wrote in the May/June 2015 issue:
Based on the acclaimed graphic memoir by Alison Bechdel, Fun Home is a coming of age/coming out story centered on a young lesbian wrestling with her own identity, a closeted gay father, Bruce Bechdel (Michael Cerveris) who runs a funeral home and has secret affairs and a mother, Helen Bechdel (Judy Kuhn) who prefers denial to confronting reality.
Bechdel, a Vermont resident and author of the celebrated comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For, earned accolades and new fans with her graphic memoir Fun Home (2006) and its 2012 follow-up Are You My Mother? In the musical, three different actresses play Alison at various ages; one even gets a showstopper, “Changing My Major” — safe to say the only Broadway show tune ever penned about the thrill of a first lesbian sexual encounter. Two other numbers, “Al For Short” and “Ring of Keys.” comically and poignantly reveal Alison’s burgeoning queer identity.
The songs come courtesy of veteran Broadway composer and four-time Tony nominee Jeanine Tesori and book and lyrics writer Lisa Kron, the Tony-nominated actress and former member of the stage troupe The Five Lesbian Brothers. Tesori and Kron share Bechdel’s sensibility and life experience of growing up in the ’60 and ‘70s.
