Review: ‘How to Dance in Ohio’ Is Broadway’s Most Original New Musical
The meaningful, welcome impact of How to Dance in Ohio is the twinned jolt of emotion and insight into a world you may not—if you are not autistic—have had much notion of. It’s that wonderful jolt you get when you hear or see or understand a new story, or a set of new perspectives. By the end of Rebecca Greer Melocik (book and lyrics) and Jacob Yandura’s (music) zesty, powerful Broadway musical (Belasco Theatre, booking to June 16, 2024) you will see the world if not differently, then in a more expansive way. It will stay with you.
Hopefully you will learn something, with—at different times—misted-up eyes and a huge smile on your face. And if you do know the world of these experiences, it will provide a different kind of cheer—an affirming one, of finally seeing a diversity of representations of the world you know on stage. (The theater has special spaces for those to rest and recharge for those who need them. This show proudly walks its talk.)
For this and many other reasons, How to Dance in Ohio, based on the award-winning HBO documentary of the same name, is the most original new musical on Broadway, featuring a group of young people with autism, facing various new chapters in their lives—independence, education, work, sex, self-expression, and love.