On the heels of the 2025 Tony Awards, where the delightful and surprisingly touching Maybe Happy Ending won the American Theater Wing's award for Best New Musical, Chicago welcomes the national tour of the 2023 winner of the same award, Kimberly Akimbo. Based on a 2001 comedy by David Lindsay-Abaire and adapted by him (book and lyrics) and Jeanine Tesori (music; Fun Home, Thoroughly Modern Millie), Kimberly Akimbo is a quick-moving contemporary American musical that successfully sends its audiences through every emotion: you'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll hug your loved ones a little tighter.
If you know anything about Akimbo, it may be the premise of its lead character: Kimberly is typically played by an older actor, as the show's conceit is that she was born with a rare genetic disorder called Progeria, which causes rapid aging and, in the show at least, results in 16-year-old Kimmy looking like she's in her 70s. Kimmy (played in the national tour by three-time Tony nominee Carolee Carmello) and her parents (narcissistic mess of a mom Pattie, played by Laura Woyasz, and drunk, unreliable dad Buddy, played by Jim Hogan) are newly relocated to a small town in New Jersey, hoping to escape a dust-up we don't learn the extent of until Act 2. At school, Kim has a presentation due for biology class, conveniently on diseases; classmate Seth (Miguel Gil), who has a thing for word puzzles and anagrams, suggests they partner up to present on her condition.
The cast is rounded out by Kimberly's aunt, Debra (Emily Koch), who may or may not have had something to do with the drama that drove them out of their previous town, and a few additional classmates. They are Delia (Grace Capeless), Martin (Darron Hayes), Aaron (Pierce Wheeler) and Teresa (Skye Alyssa Friedman), and they're given a cute subplot fueled by teenage hormones and anxieties. As the show progresses, all of the various storylines, for as busy as it makes the show overall, are kept miraculously clear and comprehensible. Debra has a plan to make some fast money; Pattie is very pregnant with a second baby and immobilized by casts on both hands following carpal tunnel surgery; Buddy's trying to do right by Kim but always seems to muck it up; the kids are trying to win a big show choir competition against their high school rivals. Amidst it all, Kimberly is turning 16 and confronting a scary truth: people with her condition don't live much beyond that young age.
I didn't catch Kimberly Akimbo during its Broadway run, and I find myself wondering if whatever earned it such acclaim and praise then (it ultimately won five Tonys that year) has been lost in the translation to its national tour. It's hard to put my finger on exactly what didn't spark for me, but I think that has something to do with just how busy the show is; there's so much going on and so many different plot lines converging that one never quite has the chance to invest in any of them, least of all Kimberly's own journey, which often feels like an afterthought.
That's not to say the show isn't enjoyable; the cast delivers on the comedic notes, and the bones are there: strong stage design by David Zinn takes us from local ice skating rink to the Levaco family home to school and back again seamlessly. Sarah Laux's costumes channel the show's 1999 setting perfectly, from choker necklaces to the lingering influence of grunge's flannels and frayed jeans. Tesori, who's no stranger to original musicals, finds clever ways to give each main character their own moment in the spotlight, including a bit with a camcorder that serves as an outlet for the characters and a conduit for us to get to know them better.
In the end, if Kimberly Akimbo as a whole is stuffed too full for any one story arc to stick, what does come across in full is the show's overarching theme of perspective, that depending on where you're coming from, your perspective will be vastly different from the person next to you. These moments, as when her classmates are dreaming of their futures and Kimberly's heartbreak over not having one is devastatingly written all over her face, are the show's most moving and poignant.
Kimberly Akimbo is presented by Broadway in Chicago and runs at CIBC Theatre, 18 W. Monroe St., through June 22. More information and tickets here.
For more information on this and other productions, see theatreinchicago.com.
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