Fun Home
The Huntington, Boston, MA, November 21, 2025
Reviewed by John Amodeo
Photos by Marc J. Franklin
Something transformative is happening right now at the Huntington Theatre, and it isn’t just its extensive lobby renovations. It is currently presenting the Tony Award-winning musical Fun Home in a production that is at once tragic, cathartic, and overwhelmingly joyful. What is transformative is that many members of the audience became a different person, after having experienced first-hand the show’s themes of creative inspiration, self-esteem, guilt, self-discovery, and self-love. As the main character traveled through each theme, not always in linear fashion, so did we. When the entire audience instantly stood up en masse at the curtain call to cheer while they wiped away tears, we knew we had just witnessed something extraordinary and were changed for the better.
On paper, Fun Home, doesn’t sound, well, fun. Based on Alison Bechdel’s graphic autobiographical novel of the same name, the show opens with the protagonist, Alison, a middle-aged graphic novelist, standing at a drafting table struggling to come up with her next work; her creative block is triggered by her guilt over her father’s suicide more than 20 years before. She somehow feels responsible, having come out to him as a lesbian shortly before he killed himself. While these themes are treated seriously, book writer and lyricist Lisa Kron, who won a Tony Award for her work here, knew that one way to break through depression and guilt was to use humor and joy. Jeanine Tesori’s Tony Award-winning music for the score worked hand-in-glove with Kron’s lyrics to infuse the story with jubilant buoyancy.
As Alison narrates, her story is told only through her eyes. As she relives episodes of her past, we meet her two younger selves: Small Alison in childhood and Medium Alison just entering college. Glimmers of self-awareness emerge as Small and Medium Alison try (and fail and then succeed) to come to terms with their sexuality. They are also becoming aware that their father, Bruce, an English teacher and owner/operator of the funeral home that is in the family house, has a secret of his own that he is struggling with. Meanwhile, Helen, as wife and mother, tries desperately to hold the family and herself together. I told you this doesn’t sound like fun when written down. But through the eyes of Alison’s younger, less jaded, more innocent selves, the show soars.
The Broadway production of Fun Home, which ran for 18 months from 2015 to 2016, won five Tony Awards: Best Musical, Best Book, Best Score, Best Director (Sam Gold), and Best Actor (Michael Cerveris). Following handily in Gold’s footsteps is director Logan Ellis, who directed the Huntington production as a well-crafted fugue; each vignette snapped into clarity by contrast with the others. The 1-hour-40-minute running time, without intermission, flew by thanks to Ellis’ skillful work. At his direction, the entire cast, including the three children (no small challenge that) did what must have been their finest work.
As adult Alison, Sarah Bockel was solid as she portrayed a tough, thick-skinned woman whose armor was slowly cracking. Bockel managed to find Alison’s vulnerability and her universal truths, and we were in her pocket from her “hello.” Once she sorted through her muddled past, her catharsis was ours. Joined by her younger selves in the finale, “Flying Away,” Bockel’s Alison rose like a phoenix from the ashes. As she sang with understandable intensity, the finale became the celebration of self we were all waiting for.
Nick Duckart was every bit Bockel’s foil and played Alison’s father Bruce, with equal intensity. Cerveris may have won the Tony Award for the role, but Duckart was more sympathetic. He allowed the space for the tender moments with his young children, made even more precious in contrast to the harsh scenes where he lashed out at each family member with misdirected self-loathing. It can be a thankless role, but Duckart gave it depth and dimension, especially in his heartbreaking final number, “Edges of the World.”
Another thankless role is that of Helen, Alison’s put-upon mother, played masterfully by local favorite Jennifer Ellis. Ellis has found the core of every character she has played and this was no exception. Her aria “Days and Days,” in which she recounted her own struggle, was riveting and was made richer and more poignant by her expressive singing.
And here’s where the joy comes in brought in by the youngest cast members. Maya Jacobson was completely winning as Medium Alison, teetering on the verge of coming out during her freshman year in college. Tesori and Kron reserved their most euphoric numbers for the youngest characters, further illuminating the joy and innocence of youth, and Medium Alison sure got a doozy. Her “Changing My Major” became a one-act play in Jacobson’s hands. As she exalted over her discovery of love and lust, she swept us right off our feet.
We learned early on that Alison had two brothers, one older, Christian, played by Odin Vega, and one younger, John, played by the scene-stealing Caleb Levin. Together with Small Alison, played by the whirling dervish Lyla Randall, the three of them raised the roof with “Come to the Fun Home,” a mock commercial they were filming for their dad’s funeral home, which they’ve nicknamed Fun Home. Choreographer Travon Gamble worked magic with them; he had them popping up out of coffins, break dancing, and table leaping through five minutes of unbridled childhood charm.
Bockel’s adult Alison may be the protagonist,but the real star of this production was Randall. As Small Alison, she showed an incredible range of emotions through widely varying circumstances from sibling dynamics to intimate moments with her father to an epiphany of her own when she noticed the ring of keys on the belt of a female delivery person. This was her “Aha!” moment in the show’s most revelatory number “Ring of Keys,” which just about stopped the show.
Tanya Orellana’s handsome set and Celeste Jennings’ period costumes perfectly evoked the 1970s of Alison’s youth, underscoring young Alison’s and her father’s struggles with sexuality, something we may take more for granted today.
This may not be the story line you might expect from a musical that ushers you into the holiday season, but I couldn’t think of a better way to experience the joy of the season than to see Fun Home at the Huntington Theatre.
Fun Home is running through December 14, 2025 at the Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA, 02115. Tickets: $29-$204. For reservations, visit www.huntingtontheatre.org
