Spinning Magic

Metro Theater Company’s Spells of the Sea enchants, giving loss and grief a tender touch

Written by TINA FARMER

Spells of the Sea

Written and composed by Guinevere Govea.

Directed by Julia Flood. Presented by Metro Theater Company through Sunday, March 5. Tickets begin at $25 for adults and $20 for children.

Celebrating its 50th anniversary season, St. Louis’ Metro Theater Company presents Spells of the Sea, a new musical for younger audiences. The imaginative musical thoughtfully addresses a bevy of emotions and experiences centered on fear, loss, grieving, acceptance and regaining hope. The performances capture the emotional tone of the script and integrate wonderfully with director Julia Flood’s fluid staging, simple but fanciful choreography by Tyler White and music director Deborah Wicks La Puma’s enveloping soundscape.

The loss of someone dear is difficult, no matter a person’s age. Playwright, lyricist and composer Guinevere Govea, with creative contributions by Anna Pickett, touches on the universal by placing relatable, realistic characters in a magically enhanced world. Finley Frankfurter, daughter of the town’s primary fisherman Ferris Frankfurter, is no longer a little kid and not yet a teen, and she feels thoroughly unremarkable and discouraged. When her father suffers a significant health crisis, her world spirals downward until a friendly mermaid, in the guise of a quirky shopkeeper, offers her hope.

The shopkeeper gives her a magic potion or two, then sends her to the lighthouse to find a secret map that will lead to a magic elixir Finley could use to save her father. At the lighthouse, she meets H.S. Crank, the older, outwardly gruff keeper of the lighthouse. After squabbling over the map and learning more about each other, the two work together to follow it, collect the required ingredients and find the elixir. Moments of genuine pain and loss are interspersed with fanciful dives under the sea and catchy,