Review: Dear Evan Hansen at the Liverpool Empire ****

On paper it’s not the most prepossessing of pitches. A musical that centres topics like mental health, loneliness, suicide and grief.

Yet for every down beat within its story there’s an up, and despite its characters’ hopelessness there’s also ultimately plenty of hope (as well as a good dose of dark humour along the way), which is perhaps why Dear Evan Hansen has become a much-loved modern musical hit, particularly with younger theatregoers.

It certainly seemed to strike a chord with the youthful audience at packed opening night of this inaugural UK touring production’s run at the Empire, who watched with rapt attention and responded with real warmth to Steven Levenson's story and particularly Benj Pasek and Justin Paul’s score.

At the centre of the show lies an empathetic performance from Ryan Kopel as the titular high school student.

Kopel brings an appealing, stammering vulnerability to the socially anxious teenager desperate to fit in and who becomes entangled in a complicated web of fibs after the death of similarly troubled high school student – and brother of Zoe, the subject of Evan’s affection - Connor Murphy (Killian Thomas Lefevre).

His squashed, apologetic Evan grows, literally, in stature as he blossoms under the attentions of Connor’s grief-riven family and the interest and friendship of fellow students who previously looked through him, to eventually become something of a monstrous and selfish validation addict.

One of the important lessons Evan eventually learns is that he’s not alone – and he’s not the only one craving to be seen.

Above: Ryan Kopel as Evan and Lauren Conroy as Zoe. Top: Kopel and the cast of Dear Evan Hansen. Photos by Marc Brenner.

Kopel’s rendering of Evan’s anthemic cri de coeur Waving Through a Window is a particular highlight, while his on-stage partnership with Tom Dickerson’s rude dude Jared – whom he ropes in to create a string of emails purporting to be from his secret ‘best friend’ Connor, brings some much-needed light relief.

The playful Sincerely, Me, in which Dickerson (hints of a Jack Black/Seth Rogen), Kopel and Lefevre as a sparkily spectral Connor deliver chirpy lines from the fake exchanges is a guilty pleasure.

There’s also pleasure to be had in the developing mutually-reliant relationship between Evan and the Murphy clan, albeit we know it's a relationship that’s based on a central lie.

Director (and LIPA graduate) Adam Penford keeps the plot pacing along, particularly through the first half of what is a long show - although after the interval the energy level dips somewhat as the musical seems to enter a holding pattern while the fallout from Evan’s on-the-spot decisions slowly unfolds.

Meanwhile Morgan Large’s set, sitting in the middle of the theatre’s wide stage, is anchored by sliding panels of blurrily smudged glass (not much seeing anything through those windows) or screens which broadcast the relentless online babble around what becomes ‘the Connor Project’.