Can a 1967 novel written by seventeen-year-old Susan E. Hinton — later transformed into a 1983 film and a 1990 stage adaptation — still speak to young audiences in the twenty-first century?
On the evidence of this opening night touring production, now on stage at the Princess of Wales Theatre, the answer is an emphatic yes.
With care, precision and a song-and-dance vocabulary that occasionally recalls West Side Story, The Outsiders proves that this nearly sixty-year-old story remains in remarkably sturdy shape.
Fourteen-year-old Ponyboy Curtis (Nolan White), the show’s narrator and emotional centre, enters from the audience and begins writing his way through a life shaped by loss. Orphaned after his parents are killed in a car crash, Ponyboy lives with his older brother Darrel (Travis Roy Rogers), who has become a parent in all but name, and his younger brother, Sodapop (Corbin Drew Ross).
In Ponyboy’s Tulsa, the social order is brutally simple: the lower-class Greasers on one side, the privileged Socs — short for “socialites” — on the other. Ponyboy belongs to the Greasers, a rough-edged chosen family led by Dallas Winston, known as Dally (Jaydon Nget, at this performance), with his loyal best friend Johnny Cade (Bonale Fambrini) close by.
The conflict ignites at the drive-in, where Ponyboy, Johnny and Dally cross paths with Cherry “Sheri” Valance (Emma Hearn), who is connected to Bob (Mark Doyle), the swaggering leader of the rival Socs. What begins as a charged encounter soon widens into a coming-of-age story in which nearly everyone on stage is forced to confront class, loyalty, violence and the cost of growing up too quickly.
Director Danya Taymor has a sharp feel for adolescent volatility — the bravado, tenderness and restlessness that can shift in an instant. Working with a formidable creative team, she gives the production a cinematic sweep without sacrificing the intimacy of Hinton’s story. Rick Kuperman and Jeff Kuperman’s choreography is jaw-dropping in its athletic clarity, while Justin Levine’s emotionally charged music supervision keeps the score grounded in youthful urgency. The opening number, “Tulsa ’67,” pulses with rhythm and momentum, and “Friday Night at the Drive-in” pushes the story forward with convincing teenage swagger.
The design work is equally persuasive. Cody Spencer’s pre-show music evokes the AM-radio past, while Hana S. Kim’s projections — including a gorgeous Act 2 sunrise — and Brian MacDevitt’s lighting of shadows, spotlights and hard sunshine make industrial 1967 Tulsa feel vivid and immediate. Sarafina Bush’s costumes and Alberto “Albee” Alvarado’s hair and wig design capture the period without turning it into a museum display: cuffed jeans, sneakers, short skirts and the unmistakable sheen of greased hair all do their work.
The company, made up of triple-threat adult performers, attacks the choreography with impressive fire, particularly in Act 2’s “Hoods Turned Heroes.” Vocally, the production often fills the theatre with a force that feels larger than the space itself; Travis Roy Rogers’ Act 1 reprise of “Runs in the Family” is one of the clearest examples.
If the first act establishes the show’s kinetic style, the second act deepens its emotional pull. The performances become more grounded, and the characters’ fear, grief and uncertainty on the edge of adulthood register with notable clarity. Around me, audience members leaned forward, listening closely, eyes fixed on the stage.
White makes Ponyboy an immediately trustworthy narrator, carrying the audience back nearly sixty years with unaffected warmth. His performance is likable without being soft, and his emotional shifts feel recognizably teenage rather than calculated. His drive-in duet with Hearn’s Cherry, “I Could Talk to You All Night,” is sweetly played without tipping into sentimentality, and Hearn answers that openness with quiet charm. Fambrini’s Johnny is a loyal, bruised presence, and his Act 2 “Stay Gold” with White lands as a vow of friendship under pressure.
There are strong supporting turns as well. Nget’s Dally is a streetwise hustler whose hardness never fully conceals his heart. Ross gives Sodapop an appealing, open-hearted charisma, and his Act 2 letter to Ponyboy is sung with sincerity. Doyle, meanwhile, makes Bob an effective embodiment of entitled menace.
What makes this twenty-first-century musical work is its refusal to treat the source material as a relic. Instead, it finds the urgency still beating inside Hinton’s story: young adolescent men trying to be seen, trying to survive, and trying to hold on to tenderness in a world eager to harden them. By the final moments, The Outsiders has earned both its applause and its renewed relevance.
Driven by muscular choreography, stirring vocals and a stronger second act, The Outsiders earns its standing ovation and may well help bring a younger generation back to the theatre.
Running time: approximately two hours and 30 minutes with one intermission.
The production runs to July 26 at the Princess of Wales Theatre, 300 King Street West, Toronto. For tickets: mirvish.com or call 1-800-461-3333.
DAVID AND HANNAH MIRVISH present
The Outsiders Book by Adam Rapp and Justin Levine
Music and Lyrics by Jamestown Revival (Jonathan Clay & Zach Chance) and Justin Levine and based on the novel by S.E. Hinton and the Francis Ford Coppola Motion Picture)
Directed by Danya Taymor
Music Supervision, Orchestration and Arrangements by Justin Levine
Choreography by Rick Kuperman and Jeff Kuperman
Further credits can be found in the show programme online.
