While loosely based on the Greek play Medea, it is set in the 1890s, in New Orleans and Chicago, and draws heavily on the biographies of (and the mythology about) a historical mother and daughter, both named Marie Laveau, who were famous practitioners of voodoo.
Following the success of Michael John LaChiusa's 1993 musical Hello Again, which premiered at Lincoln Center Theater directed by Graciela Daniele, LaChiusa and Daniele decided to develop a new musical work based on a classic text for Audra McDonald (who won her first Tony Award in the acclaimed 1994 Broadway revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel, produced by Lincoln Center Theater).
[1] When a production was eventually mounted, it was at the Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it followed Parade - another large, new musical created at LCT and written by a young composer, Jason Robert Brown.
Both works shared similar themes and stories of racism, misogyny, and redemption in the American South.
An original Broadway cast album was released by RCA Victor following the show's closing.
Her mother warned her that although they know magic, they are still human and can make great mistakes ("Ton Grandpère est le Soleil (Your Grandfather Is the Sun)") In 1894, Marie meets Dante Keyes at Blue Rose Park on Lake Pontchartrain, just outside of New Orleans ("Beautiful").
Their white father left their mother and had Paris and Jean work as his servants, which made them quite wealthy.
Jean is having a party later in the month to celebrate his engagement to Beatrice, a woman of class and stature befitting a man of his social standing.
Marie is increasingly enthralled by Dante ("When You Look At a Man"), who arrogantly tells of his skills as a sea captain ("The Storm").
At a brothel run by Magdalena ("Cincinnati"), Dante, advised by political boss Charles Gates, campaigns for the position of alderman ("You're Looking at the Man").
She reveals how she cast a spell on the daughters of the man who cheated Dante to make them kill their father ("Lover Bring Me Summer").
Marie is worried her children will end up servants like her brothers and decides to take Magdalena up on her offer ("You Can Taste the Blood").
Marie is haunted by her family and Lisette, who tell her she has gone too far ("No Turning Back") and cannot return ("Silver Mimosa" / "Before the Morning (Reprise)").
Marie meets Dante and asks him to allow the boys to give Helena a wedding gift to show how well-brought-up they are.
She admits that she will always love him, and that she is doomed to life alone, reliving her past and unable to change it ("Beautiful (Reprise)").
Dante runs in and reveals that the present Marie had given Helena turned out to be cursed and burned her alive ("Your Name").
[5] Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times: "When Audra McDonald sings her first notes as the Medea-like heroine of Marie Christine, Michael John LaChiusa's solemn, sometimes somnolent musical tragedy at Lincoln Center, there is clearly sorcery at work.... Marie Christine ... is a resounding confirmation of Ms. McDonald's status as a vocal artist of singular skills and sensibility.... As a musical portrait of an individual, Marie Christine is stunning; as a compelling, complete production, it still feels oddly unfinished.
Despite ravishing orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick, the score rarely achieves much momentum or intensity on its own, and its recurrent motifs don't haunt the imagination as they should.
"[6] Michael Feingold, reviewing for the Village Voice, wrote: "Proficient, skilled, and imaginative, LaChiusa marshals an enormous panoply of approaches to tell his tale, but it doesn't hold together, even with the towering talent of Audra McDonald at its center, because the myth won't supply what he needs from it; his constantly shifting strategies only diffuse it further.