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NSMT unveils rebuilt theater

There's a press shindig today with officials and assorted polls unveiling the new look of the North Shore Music Theater as it rises from the ashes of this summer's devastating fire. I was going to go and give you a report, but the news seems to have been covered quite thoroughly in Sunday's Globe. Maureen Dezell's Living/Arts story tells you pretty much everything you need to know, and Wendy Killeen's piece in Globe North goes even further, quoting artistic director Jon Kimball as saying "we came really close to closing." But - like those Hurricane Katrina refugees Barbara Bush encountered in a shelter - the NSMT seems to be coming out of its own disaster in better shape than you'd think.

Theater: More on "Carol Mulroney"

I wasn't the only one who found the Huntington's "Carol Mulroney" underwhelming. In today's papers, the Globe's Louise Kennedy was also struck by the void at the heart of Stephen Belber's play. And the Herald's Terry Byrne just nuked it.

Music: MLB wants YOU to buy a Jimmy Buffett CD

You've gotta figure they're getting a piece of the action. Synergy is the order of the day, and that's the only conceivable reason for the email I just got from RedSox.com imploring me to pre-order the new Jimmy Buffett   "Live at Fenway Park" double-CD/DVD package, taken from his Sept. 10 and 12, 2004 concerts at the lyric little bandbox.

Preorder the album at $24.95 (PLUS shipping and handling) from MLB.com here and you'll also get immediate access to 10 audio streams from the album, free live streaming audio of every regular-season MLB game next season and a free 2004 Red Sox World Champions hat (the black one nobody likes). Plus you'll be entered in a sweepstakes for opening-day tickets or a Buffett-autographed Red Sox jersey. I'm exhausted just thinking about such a bounty.

The Mailboat Records album - which features 31 songs, plus a 14-song, 55-minute DVD - will be in stores on Nov. 15. You can pre-order it from Amazon.com right now for $21.49; spend another $3.51 and you'll qualify for free Super Saver shipping. I'm just sayin'.

Theater: Might as well jump

Carol Mulroney is the archetypal sad girl whose "fall" from her beloved urban rooftop is the fulcrum of the new play by Stephen Belber that bears her name. But in the Huntington Theatre Company's world-premiere production, the depths of Carol's "inexplicable sadness" (as Belber calls it in the program) remain a bit blank despite her personal problems. And though there's a lot to like about this production, that's a fatal flaw. The dialogue about the siren song of the edge doesn't really connect with the character. We're left with the feeling that if she'd opted for Zoloft instead of beer and vodka, a life might have been saved.

Carol's in her 30s and coping with a collapsing marriage by hanging out up on the roof, with the stars and city lights. Her husband, Lesley, feeling something hollow at work and at home, has announced he wants to grow potatoes and harvest honey on the rooftop. He wants kids and she doesn't. Carol talks it all over with her friend Joan, who drops by with a six pack and a fifth. Meanwhile, Carol's pot-puffing dad, Hutton, is deciding whether to give a promotion to Lesley or to buppie Ken. There are a couple of revelations looming, none of which will come as a great surprise to anyone who's been going to plays over the last 20 years. And after Carol finally goes over the parapet, there's grieving and lots more talk and a bit of comedy with her ashes.

That tone is another problem with "Carol Mulroney." There's a lot of laughter, especially early on in response to sitcommy punchlines. There's some angsty realism. And there are moments of wacky absurdity. You never know quite how to feel.

 Johanna Day (especially) and Reuben Jackson are fine as Joan and Ken. Tim Ransom as Lesley is a rather generic self-doubting yuppie rat, but that may be the play, not the actor. Familiar face Larry Pine instantly establishes Hutton with that kind of effortless authority that good character actors seem to acquire, although I never for a minute believed this gray-haired salesman as a midnight toker.

There are a lot of familiar contemporary tropes in the play, starting with the random weed smoking and the yuppie who wants to get his hands back in the good earth. As good as Day is, I feel like I've seen Joan a bazillion times: (Spoiler alert!) the hard-drinking best friend who commiserates with her pal while sleeping with her pal's husband. And there's something familiar about Ken, the nice young black man who's conflicted about his attraction to a white girl. You can be pretty sure he won't be arguing that O.J. was innocent.

That leaves us with Ana Reeder as Carol. The character is supposed to be 32, I think, but she's somehow juvenilized here, if that's a word. She's dressed in jeans and this longish shirt that hangs about her hips just so - she looks a teenager, and her dreamy dissociation makes her seem like one, too. Reeder does her best to make us feel her hurt, but the play leaves us waiting for something more.

A wild theory here: One or two clues make me think there is a more concrete explanation for Carol's fate, but either Belber decided to keep it totally off stage or else a more explicit explanation was edited out somewhere in the creative process.

Sexual abuse is also a favorite topic of contemporary dramatists, whether by priests, driving instructors or family members. And though cheery Hutton is at times the most appealing character on stage, there's a weird daddy-daughter thing going on here. Carol's mother killed herself, leaving the two of them to cope together, and Carol's belated discovery of her mom's suicide note seems to be the main explanation for her current mood.

Toward the end of the play, there are three repetitions of a scene in which a younger Carol and her dad find themselves enjoying the view from the ass of a giant theme-park elephant. (There's that wacky absurdity I was talking about.) Hutton keeps pushing Carol to say she's having a good time; there's something intimately claustrophobic about the scene. And once on Wednesday night, when he leaned in to kiss her, it looked as if he was going for the lips before detouring to the forehead.

Not much to build a case on, I know. Probably I'm seeing something that's not there. And maybe if I'm right it was better edited out; we've seen that play already, haven't we? But as it is, "Carol Mulroney" is too much of an enigma.

Music: NEC student takes third in Tbilisi

I don't keep close track of piano competitions in the Republic of Georgia, but...the New England Conservatory reported today that NEC graduate student Dizhou Zhao, 26 and a native of China, took third place in the Tbilisi International Piano Competition that ended Oct. 15. Zhao, who also earned his bachelor's and master's from NEC, is a student of Alexander Korsantia. He takes home $5,000 for his efforts.

Music: JT in NH

James Taylor has added a Dec. 20 show at Manchester's Verizon Wireless Arena to his holiday rounds. Tickets, $45.50-$65.50, go on sale Oct. 28 at noon at the box office, Ticketmaster and www.teapartyconcerts.com.

The morning papers

Mastery but no magic in the first Cream reunion concert at Madison Square Garden, which I mention only so I can quote this line from Joan Anderman's review: "This mix was so democratic one imagines that lawyers were involved." ... Richard Dyer says Boston Baroque's "Agrippina" on Saturday night was "the finest local operatic performance in several seasons." ... David Weininger gives thumbs up to Michael Gandolfini's chamber work commissioned by the St. Botolph's Club and performed by the Boston Symphony Chamber Players over the weekend.

In the Herald, Donnie Wahlberg talks about why he took sleazoid horror flick "Saw II." ... Terry Byrne likes the Lyric Stage's production of the creepy clone drama "The Number." ... And we're reminded to brace ourselves for "American Idol" tryouts here on Thursday.

The Globe's Steve Morse praises Bonnie Raitt's gig Sunday at the Orpheum but between the lines he makes it sound like a bit of a beautiful snoozer, at least until James Montgomery joined the fray. The Herald's Chris Blagg was even more positive. But only the Patriot-Ledger's Jay N. Miller called it a "scorching....barn-burner."

The morning papers

Over the weekend, the Herald's Ted Medrek rhapsodized about Joanna Porackova's performance as Magda in Opera Boston's "The Consul," calling it a "firmly definitive" version of the role. ... In Sunday's Globe, Ed Siegel had an interesting piece touting "Cinderalla Rocks" at Machine and a Holyoke "Macbeth" as the "most emotionally fulfilling, artistically engaging" experiences her's had lately. ... The Patriot Ledger's chock full of local arts stories, including a piece about a South Shore art glass collector and one about Hingham Symphony conductor Jin Kim's music-education outreach program, which finds him teaching a group of retirement home residents how to listen to classical performances. The Local News section also includes the latest chapter in the story of the blind, autistic musical savant Tony DeBlois of Randolph. Now his life is a book.

Bring out your Revels

Tickets went on sale today for the 35th Annual Christmas Revels, Dec. 16-30 at Sanders Theatre. This year the Cambridge tradition focuses on a medieval English theme, with the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance, the Boar's Head Carol, the Shortest Day Poem and many other fun things with less troubling names. There will be upwards of 80 performers from Pinewoods Morris Men, the Cambridge Symphonic Brass Ensemble and many more, and of course the Revels Chorus. Tix, $20-$42 for adults, $12-$32 for kids, are available at the Harvard Box Office by phone (617-496-2222) and at the Holyoke Center Arcade, or online at www.revels.org.

Music: New leader at Coro Allegro

Coro Allegro, Boston's chorus for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community, has named a new general manager. Andrew Azzarello was previously a director and performer with Chicago-area choral groups, including the Skokie Concert Choir, and served as human resources director for a non-profit organization there. He'll be meeting to Coro Allegro audience at the group's Nov. 20 concert at the Church of the Covenant. Tickets and information at the web site or 617-236-4011.