A Garden of Good and Evil sprouts up at the Goodman

A musical version of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil offers a taste of Savannah, Georgia to the Windy City this summer. John Berendt's 1994 book with the same title turned 30 this year and some things have remained the same. Unfortunately, classism, racism and homophobia are still alive and well in the Deep South. While an evil garden continues to grow in startling ways in real life, a new musical springs up onstage to highlight the dire situation that continues to thrive.

The trans community is still misunderstood and drag artists are under attack, especially in the southern region of the United States. This makes it more unnerving than ever to tell stereotypical jokes about effeminate gay men and make light of the fact that many citizens own a personal firearm.

The Clint Eastwood 1997 film is thrown out the window as is much of the source material with this theatrical version. For example, an hour of courtroom scenes is chopped down to a brief reference and the focus is shifted to a debutant subplot.

This production takes the dramatic source material and then tries to shoehorn Kinky Boots into it.

It's a slow start for this story set in 1981 followed by a long finish with multiple endings. Minerva the Voodoo Priestess might have magical powers but she doesn't stand a chance to outshine J. Harrison Ghee as The Lady Chablis.

Anyone who has seen the HBO documentary Taylor Mac's 24-Decade History of Popular Music knows that the writer of this version of Midnight can entertain crowds for long periods of time. In this particular production, the numbers are made palatable for the drag brunch crowd and veer at times toward being offensive. Chablis is surrounded by cartoon characters who are easy targets and one singer is so off-key that it's cringe-worthy. Sour notes are not the norm though from the majority of the cast and Tony Award winner Ghee earns their paycheck with powerful vocals and antics. The crowd interaction and concert turn at the top of the second act is plainly a page from Mac's playbook.

Instead of being loyal to the original book the audience is addressed as an author eliminating the need for John Cusack character's John Kelso from the movie. Breaking the fourth wall to accomplish this must have been a thorn in the side of the creators and was a glaring misstep.

The costuming and sets are where this garden blooms, but the storyline is spoiled with no eventual redemption for the quirky menagerie of characters.

Recent transfers of movies to musicals Death Becomes Her and Beetlejuice fared better in Chicago because they honored the longtime fanbase dedicated to the films. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil as a musical forgets its dramatic roots and tries to plant something completely different with comedy. This approach only leaves a few bits to harvest before migrating the show from the Albert Theatre to other stages in the future. The producers have until August 11 to dig deeper into the plot and audiences can judge for themselves with tickets at goodmantheatre.org.