White Noise Royal George Theatre center
But this new show, behind which Whoopi Goldberg has put her cash and cachet, recovers from its ridiculously miscalculated opening. To some extent, at least. Written by Matte O’Brien, with music and lyrics by Joe Shane and twin brothers Robert and Steven Morris, White Noise is problematic in many, many ways. One thing it isn’t, though, is a Mel Brooks-style joke—inadvertent or otherwise. In fact, it’s so serious that the press kit comes with a study guide on hate speech, prepared by the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Teaching Tolerance project.
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Elements like the symmetry between the Blood Bruthas and the Siller sisters—whose band Max names White Noise—make it clear that this show is meant to be taken as a fable and therefore forgiven some of its excesses. But those excesses quickly get, well, excessive—starting with Max’s seemingly limitless ability to intimidate everyone around him. For much of the show, he’s not merely a Svengali but a god. More to the point, he gives the impression of being the owner of the only record label on earth. Nothing else explains the hoops people jump through to please him. White Noise is set in the present, and the present is a time when the Internet has fragmented the music industry, DIY releases are commonplace, and, in fact, a whole hate-rock subculture is already thriving online. Under those circumstances, it’s passe to pose Max’s conventional methods as the only route to stardom. Yet the Bruthas throw over their whole act for him, the members of White Noise change lyrics for him, and his supremely talented producer, Jake, dishonors himself for him.
