Hit musical Dear Evan Hansen relatable to all – theatre review

By Alexandra Heilbron on March 29, 2019 | 4 Comments

Dear Evan Hansen opened last night in Toronto at the Royal Alexandra Theatre with a celebrity-filled red (well, actually blue) carpet reception, and ended with a standing ovation that continued long after the actors had left the stage.

The musical is a Broadway box office hit that earned six Tony awards in 2017, including Best Musical. The production at the Royal Alex features an incredibly talented Canadian cast of eight performers.

We meet Evan (Robert Markus), who’s a painfully awkward and introverted teenage boy. He’s so shy that he’d rather go without dinner rather than have to interact with a pizza deliveryman. It takes great effort for him even to greet his fellow students at school. He has a therapist who has asked him to write letters to himself about how his day is going.

At the end of the first day of school, in which no one wanted to sign the cast on his arm and in which he was shoved to the ground by another misfit named Connor Murphy (Sean Patrick Dolan), Evan is in the computer lab printing out the letter for his therapist. In it, he’s written about how his day wasn’t that great and he doesn’t anticipate things getting any better through the upcoming year. He wonders if anyone would notice if he disappeared. He also mentions Connor’s sister, Zoe (Stephanie La Rochelle), on whom he has a crush, because talking to her (she apologizes after Connor knocks him down) was the highlight of his day.

Connor enters the room and signs his name in big letters on Evan’s cast when he realizes no one else did. However, he then picks up Evan’s letter from the printer and when he sees Zoe’s name, he grows angry and tells Evan he’s keeping the letter. He runs out, and the next day, we hear that Connor has committed suicide.

We learn that his loving parents were always mystified by Connor’s anger and isolation; Zoe didn’t like Connor because he was abusive and nasty; and at school, everyone avoided him because of his antisocial behavior.

That is, until Connor’s parents discover Evan’s letter in their son’s pocket, which begins “Dear Evan Hansen” and is signed “Me.” They assume Connor wrote it to Evan and ask if they were friends, as they were unaware Connor had any friends.

Evan, eager to please, goes along with it, making up conversations and adventures he had with Connor. Connor’s name on his cast goes a long way to further this assumption. Even though Evan’s descriptions of Connor don’t correspond with anything the family has ever known about their son, they’re so grief-stricken, and so happy to hear that Connor actually had a friend, loved trees, and enjoyed many happy times, that they believe it. Evan even manages to convince Zoe that Connor actually loved her and said kind things about her.

As all of this is happening, there are screens facing the audience that show social media posts. When Connor’s death becomes a big thing at school, even though no one really knew him, we see it unfold over social media.

As Connor’s “only friend,” Evan, whose father abandoned him when he was seven, grows close to the Murphy family and even comes out of his shell at school. He no longer feels invisible and unimportant.

There are so many familial issues shown here (the anguish children go through due to parental abandonment, the loss of a sibling/child through either death or because they distance themselves from their family, the stress a parent goes through during a divorce, the struggle of a working single parent to provide everything their child needs, the isolation and loneliness people can feel), that every audience member will be able to relate.

The songs are so touching and emotional that it’s hard to keep the sniffles in and the tears from flowing.

What’s also mesmerizing is how the characters go through their lives feeling their own pain and loneliness and wanting desperately to be important to someone else, but not recognizing that same desire/need in others who are also desperate for connection. Through Connor’s death, they’re able to realize they’re not alone.

The production is absolutely stunning, from the songs to the story, to the sets that  swing in and out. It was fascinating every time Connor appeared onstage after his death — because he wasn’t Connor as he had been, but as Evan wished he’d been, if they’d been the kind of friends Evan has been describing to the Murphys.

Although the subject is a serious one, there are a lot of lighter moments that are hilarious, such as when Evan’s “family friend” Jared (Alessandro Costantini) helps him craft fake emails to show he and Connor shared a correspondence, with the help of Sean Patrick Dolan as Connor reading all the quickly changing versions. Some of the lines Jared comes up with are just hysterical.

Although there are themes that may have audience members shedding tears, in the end, you leave the theatre uplifted, because the message is one of hope, to inspire people to reach out to each other. No one should feel as alone as Evan did in the beginning or as isolated as Connor.

Dear Evan Hansen is playing at the Royal Alexandra Theatre until September 29, 2019. Seats are selling out fast, so don’t hesitate if you’d like to see this Broadway hit. Click here for more information and to buy tickets. ~Alexandra Heilbron

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1. JD • March 31, 2019 @ 6:02 PM

   Far more plot spoilers than I would want in a review. Since when did a site about movies start having reviews of Mirvish shows? Let the audience discover what the show is about beyond brief details and focus solely on themes and how it made you feel. I felt you told too us too much.

2. Shay • April 4, 2019 @ 9:48 AM

   Great review, I bought tickets after reading this. JD, possibly you’ve never read a stage review. Before people shell out $100 or more, they want to know what the show is about. Every theatre reviewer does the same. Check out the review in the NY Times, it gives away even more of the plot:
   https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/04/theater/dear-evan-hansen-review.html

3. Nicole Westre • April 4, 2019 @ 8:07 PM

   I’ve never seen the show but the Broadway soundtrack is amazing, I have to see this while it’s in town!

4. Amy • July 12, 2019 @ 8:58 PM

   OMG, what a great show, I saw it last night and it was totally worth the price of the tickets. I’d heard it won a lot of Tony awards, but I didn’t expect it would be that good, I actually was crying during the second act.

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