When, in December, several of “American Utopia” ’s cast and crew members were sidelined with COVID, David Byrne announced that the show would go on with a scaled-back band. “This is our opportunity to make lemonade from COVID lemons,” Byrne said.
David Byrne let his guitar slump on its strap for a moment, after opening his Broadway show, “American Utopia,” with a fiery rendition of “The Revolution.” He looked wearily into the audience and asked, “Wouldn’t it be heavenly if nothing ever happened?” People laughed. Byrne let out a hard snort. The joke, gift-wrapped as a question, needed no elaboration. The subtext, the audience understood, was “Treat yourself tonight, since the world is collapsing.
“Remembering the music! Remembering the lyrics!” Byrne said on the Zoom, chuckling. He’d been pleased to see a lot of younger people in the audience lately, and he noticed that other, older fans had come more than once. “I thought, Wait a minute. I’ve seen that couple at a previous show,” he said. “They’re back!”
On the third night of the experiment, the audience, many of whom were double-masked, was palpably nervous. Heads swivelled, as people reassured themselves that their neighbors had their masks on tightly enough. By the time Byrne sang the Talking Heads hit “Once in a Lifetime,” they relaxed. By the closing number, “Road to Nowhere,” the whole audience was on its feet and dancing. It was an anti-Broadway evening, an unapologetic display of solidarity and trust amid a cloud of anxiety. When the curtain fell, masks could not muffle the rapturous hollers.
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