Brooklyn Eagle interview with Daniel Messé, Amelie composer, lyricist, HEM band founder
A spoonful of whimsy seemed the perfect antidote to the cold and rain of a recent Saturday night. So, it was fortuitous that I was headed to the Walter Kerr Theatre to see the new musical “Amélie,” based on the wildly successful 2001 French film directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Guillaume Laurent that made an international star of Audrey Tautou, who was only 23 at the time. A hint of the capriciousness to come was signaled by the hopping rabbits and fluttering butterflies projected on the Walter Kerr stage curtain before the musical even began.
The film was a hyperactive, romantic confection set in 1997 Paris (we know this because Princess Diana’s death is a touchstone) that didn’t bear much resemblance to the real city. (But, then, no less an authority than Ernst Lubitsch once said “I’ve been to Paris, France and to Paris Paramount. I prefer Paris Paramount.”) The film was filled with Tautou’s adorable fourth-wall-breaking mugging. That, plus her Louise Brooks bob, chipmunk cheeks and rosebud mouth, made her completely irresistible.
Phillipa Soo, who plays Amélie in the stage version, has all of these attributes plus a gorgeous soprano voice. Naturally, the play cannot duplicate the hyper-kinetic cinematic shenanigans of the film, but it does retain the movie’s swooning sense of romance. The composer/co-lyricist Daniel Messé, who was the founder and principal songwriter of the Brooklyn band Hem, has co-written with Nathan Tysen a clever, enchanting score.