WHISPER HOUSE at 59E59?

Has anyone had a chance to see the new staging of Whisper House at 59E59? Thoughts/reviews?

I saw this in London. Being a fan of the score and his music for Spring Awakening, I went in with high hopes and was disappointed. Hopefully, they’ve made substantial changes.

I agree with a lot of what sethepstein12 said, and while I wanted to like this, I just didn't find it very engaging. The first few songs felt like they were focused more on creating an ambience rather than setting up the story and characters, which I don't necessarily fault them for, but at a running time of 90 minutes (or even shorter, as I think today's production was), that takes away a lot of the chance we have to get to know the people in the show. This was probably the biggest flaw of the show for me, as I really didn't care overtly so about any of the characters because we never got a chance to know them (the slight exception being Mr. Yasuhiro who gets a full song to himself, though to be honest I can't quite recall what it was about). Even the ghost characters who function somewhat as a Greek chorus have a backstory that's quickly glossed over by the sheriff and I wish we at least got to see them more as actual characters, seeing as they were the ones telling the story.

The plot when it does kick in feels almost a bit abrupt, since the beginning was so slow it felt a bit like we were suddenly hit with overlapping plot threads, though I'll say I definitely like the songs in the second half better as they seem a bit more plot-driven. In particular, there's one that the ghosts sing probably entitled something like "What You Have to Do" (there's no song list in the program) that I found actually generated a bit of suspense. The ending as well felt a little abrupt to me, and a little confusing on what the takeaway is supposed to be. I think there's a lot of interesting things touched on in the piece but none are expanded to a point where they feel satisfying, and it seems to struggle between whether it wants to be seen as a ghost story or if it wants to deliver fully realized characters and events using the WWII time period.

I will say that I thought all the actors were fantastic, and I had a particular fondness for Samantha Mathis's Lily. And I agree that the scenic design was beautifully done and the space used in a wonderful way. The music in general was listenable if not memorable, and many of the songs sounded fairly similar to me with some slightly predictable lyrics, though I did appreciate the orchestrations (I always love a French horn in modern musical theater).