Great Casting Makes for a Great “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”

Although Hedwig and the Angry Inch originated in the late ‘90s as a (not-really-) one-(wo)man cabaret-within-a-cabaret, for most of us its primary valence is John Cameron Mitchell’s brilliant 2001 film adaptation, which fleshes out the story, themes, and even music in ways impossible to achieve onstage. The film is, quite simply, more. 

But in theory, the play is (still) good enough to stand on its own. Whether theory becomes fact, though, rests centrally on casting the title role. 

According to director Eric Hamme, he’s had Hedwig and the Angry Inch on his Garage Theatre bucket list for over six years, largely because he felt there was a great Hedwig in JT Stipp just waiting to come out.

Well, he’s out now. But it’s not just Stipp that makes this Hedwig sing.

The metafictional conceit that frames Hedwig has our titular chanteuse on a nationwide tour shadowing rockstar Tommy Gnosis, who just made headlines here in Long Beach for drunkenly ramming a short bus while a mystery woman was orally anointing his little bishop. We read about this in the papers, of course — otherwise, why would we be slumming at this divey…where are we: “The Garbage Theatre, is it? Garbage?” — and we want the deets on this obscure figure who claims she sired Gnosis and penned his biggest hits. 

So Hedwig regales us with tales of her origins (long story short: gay, young East Berliner falls in love with an American GI in the mid/late ‘80s and suffers a botched sex-change operation — leaving him/her with “a one-inch mound of flesh / Where my penis used to be and my vagina never was” — so they can marry and relocate to rural Kansas, where hubby abandons her/him just before the fall of the Wall), told in part by her musical stylings and interspersed with bits of Gnosis’s sold-out concert at Long Beach Arena every time she throws open the back alley door. But there’s a piece missing, and we are fortunate enough to be here to witness what happens when it’s finally found.

The demands of playing Hedwig are great. Despite all of Stephen Trask’s wonderful music (more on that anon), a huge chunk of Hedwig is not only pure monolog, but punctuated by silence. We should laugh both with and at Hedwig, and whether we do often hinges on the slightest nuances of delivery. We also need to resonate emotionally (I find Hedwig more touching than funny) with both story and song — all without sacrificing the pure sense of play that permeates the entire show.

Stipp delivers all of this. And although he’s fab playing what’s on the page, since I was already acquainted with the magnificence of the material, it’s probably his face — how he shows us the Hedwig behind those heavily painted eyes — that made the deepest impression on me. Clearly, Stipp and Hamme have done the work.

But Hedwig is not a solo act. Off to the side is a backup singer and devoted factotum Yitzhak, whom Hedwig married on one condition: on pain of deportation, donning a wig is streng verboten. Hedwig’s wicked little town just ain’t big enough for two femmes. Alyssa Felix Garcia creates a solid Yitzhak, particularly vocally, wherewhere’s she got to soar high enough so we get why Hedwig feels the need to clip their wings.

Smart as it is, Hedwig would be a drag (ha) if the songs weren’t so fine. Trask’s music, which draws as heavily on Sex Pistols and David Bowie as Mitchell’s book draws on Pink Floyd’s The Wall — all more as homage than derivation — is shot through with bona fide angst (“Tear Me Down”, “Angry Inch”) and affecting melodies (I can’t sing along to “Wig in a Box” or “Wicked Little Town” without tearing up). Although none of it is especially complicated, it’s finely constructed, and in a small theater, a band could easily muck it up, if for no other reason than failing to get the sound right. This iteration of the Angry Inch rarely suffers any such problems. Only “The Origin of Love”, a pivotal early number based on Plato/Aristophanes’ mythological account of sexuality, doesn’t quite come off.

For those who like a side of meta with their meta, staging Hedwig in downtown Long Beach is next-level. The queerness of our little Iowa by the Sea is fab enough, but if you know your geographical LBCs there’s the frisson of understanding that if you tore the roof off Long Beach Arena you really might hear Tommy Gnosis rocking his own side of epiphany every time Hedwig opens the Garage Theatre’s (set-fabricated) back door. 

Hedwig and the Angry Inch is a fantastic piece of work. Clever. Profound. Compelling. Sing-a-longeriffic. Fun. You’re cooking with gas when you do this show. But gas fires happen, right? And, wait, how do you put one of those out? Water? Baking soda? A fire extinguisher? Which type? Before you know it, your house is a smoldering ruin.

I don’t know what happens when you don’t have a great Hedwig to make this great work flesh, because I’ve seen only the film — and now, the Garage Theatre’s staging.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch at the Garage Theatre
Times: Thursday–Saturday 8:00 p.m.
The show runs through August 3
Cost: $30 (Thursdays 2-for-1); closing night w/afterparty: $35
Details: thegaragetheatre.org
Venue: The Garage Theatre, 251 E. 7th St., Long Beach