“Dear Evan Hansen” is an emotionally powerful and highly entertaining stage musical, one telling a contemporary story of teen loneliness and suicide that folds in how social media can affect people both positively and negatively.
In 2017, it won six Tony Awards, including those for best musical and Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical — for Ben Platt.
Platt is front and center in the titular role again in the film adaptation hitting theaters this week.
While he remains excellent as the incredibly socially anxious Evan — and while the show’s outstanding songs by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul are as lovely and dynamic as ever — something is lost in the move from stage to screen.
Written by the author of the musical stage play’s book, Steve Levenson, the new take on “Dear Evan Hansen” suffers from uneven direction by Stephen Chbosky (“The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” “Wonder”).
Makers of movie musicals have the unenviable task of figuring out how to make it feel natural when their characters break into song, and, much to their credit, some do it quite well.
Chbosky struggles greatly.
On stage, when a character — most often Evan — breaks into song, the dramatic lighting and often bare-bones set help to create a heightened environment that serves to sell the musical number. In this film, on the other hand, Evan will start singing during an emotionally delicate moment — in an ordinary bedroom or in an ordinarily lit dining room — and it simply can feel a little strange.
The musical numbers work best cinematically when the setting is evolving around Evan or when Chbosky is jumping from character to character when more than one is singing, such as with the quietly gorgeous “Requiem.” Those approaches pull you out of a strict reality and allow you to become immersed in the song.
For example, Chbosky gets it right with the movie’s opening number, the unforgettable song “Waving Through a Window,” with its stays-with-you-for-days melodic hook. It begins with Evan alone in his room, with his prescription medication, and concludes with him at high school, surrounded by other students and with anxiety coursing through him.
The therapist Evan has been seeing — at the behest of his loving, hard-working single mother, Heidi (Julianne Moore) — has given the assignment of writing optimistic letters to himself. The letters begin “Dear Evan Hansen,” but they do not all turn out to be so encouraging.
Evan writes one at school and includes a reference to Zoe (Kaitlyn Dever), a girl who, like most there, has paid him little attention. Unfortunately, Zoe’s brother, Connor (Colton Ryan, “Uncle Frank”), is in the same room and finds the note at the printer. And although the two only moments before had engaged in pleasant conversation — Connor even had signed the cast on Evan’s broken arm — Connor concludes Evan must have written it to mock him and furiously storms out of the room with it.
Evan fears what Connor might do with the letter and scours the web to see if he may have posted it somewhere. However, Evan soon learns that Connor has since taken his own life. And immediately after being delivered this awful news by a school administrator, he’s brought in an office to meet with Connor’s distraught mother, Cynthia (Amy Adams), and his stepfather, Larry (Danny Pino).
Believing the letter must have been from Connor to Evan, Cynthia hopes Evan can provide her with any new window into the life of her late son. She had no idea, for instance, that Connor had a close friend. Evan feebly tries to tell her he didn’t actually know Connor, but the fact that ‘CONNOR” is Sharpied on his cast in giant letters makes that a hard sell. Evan decides to tell Cynthia what she wants to hear, and the lie lands him an invited to dinner with the family.
In the family dining room, Zoe, who didn’t have a healthy relationship with her brother, finds the revelation of this mystery friend hard to accept and casts a suspicious eye on Evan.
Nonetheless, Evan begins to enjoy the attention from the family — and values the chance to be close to Zoe — and he decides to keep building upon his fabrication instead of coming clean.
Over the course of “Dear Evan Hansen,” what may have begun as a well-intentioned lie will lead to greater complications. And while Evan is enjoying his life like never before, he also is increasingly weighed down by guilt.
It is hardly surprising Platt (“Pitch Perfect,” “Politician) again is terrific as Evan, even if, well into his 20s, he looks a little old for the role. Thanks to his performance, you can’t escape the idea that it generally is exhausting to be Evan.
A quartet of ladies stands out in the film, as well. Largely through her facial expressions, Adams (“Enchanted,” “Hillbilly Elegy”) conveys so much grief as Cynthia; this is a woman desperate to understand the son she’s lost. Dever (“Booksmart,” “Unbelievable”) conveys all the confusing feelings Zoe experiences throughout the story, and it’s all impactful. Moore (“The Glorias,” “Lisey’s Story”) is so good in limited screentime that you wonder if the role of Heidi shouldn’t have been beefed up a bit. And Amandla Stenberg (“The Hate U Give,” “The Eddy”) makes an impression as Alana, a student who works to turn Connor’s death into a social crusade and who possesses some characteristics that differ from the overly ambitious stage version.
Plus, their voices are lovely whenever they get to sing.
Alana is given one of two songs written by Pasek and Paul (“La La Land,” “The Greatest Showman”) for the film, “The Anonymous Ones.” It and Connor’s “A Little Closer” aren’t quite as strong as the original batch. And, to that end, fans of the stage work may be saddened to learn four songs — including the effective show-opening “Anybody Have a Map?” — do not appear in the film.
If you can get past the film’s few stumbles, there’s still so much that works in this screen version. Just as it is on stage, mid-story number “You Will Be Found” — surrounding a moment when Evan goes viral — is stunningly moving.
At that moment, you’ll be glad you got to know “Evan Hansen.”
‘Dear Evan Hansen’
Where: Theaters:
When: Sept. 24.
Rated: PG-13 for thematic material involving suicide, brief strong language and some suggestive references.
Runtime: 2 hours, 17 minutes.
Stars (of four): 2.5.
