What if a musical’s central character wasn’t a person, but an organ? Enter The Heart, a pulsating, if occasionally arrhythmic, new work that follows a day in the life of the body’s hardest-working performer. Forget an eight-show week. This gig is 24/7 until the curtain comes down permanently.
Based on Maylis de Kerangal’s novel Réparer les vivants, The Heart moves with a momentum that fans of HBO Max’s The Pitt will appreciate. A tragic accident leaves a 19-year-old brain-dead, while a national transplant waiting list stretches past 100,000 people.
An EDM pulse for the body’s hardest-working performer
Creators Kait Kerrigan (book and additional lyrics) and Anne and Ian Eisendrath (music, lyrics, and arrangements) lean into a synth-driven, EDM-inflected score, and it mostly works.
Simon (Nick T. Daly), a lanky, surf-obsessed 19-year-old, heads out before sunrise to catch waves at Tourmaline Surfing Park. A deadly car crash throws the lives of his divorced parents (Tony winner Joaquina Kalukango and Jason Tam) into a horrific tailspin as a transplant coordinator (Lincoln Clauss) steps in to ask the unthinkable. Would they consider donating Simon’s organs (the teen didn’t specify on his driver’s license)?
The musical kicks into high gear as the medical team (a multi-talented cast of nine nimbly moves between roles) identifies a transplant recipient, Claire (Heidi Blickenstaff), who’s celebrating what she thinks is her last birthday with friends, her adult children, and copious amounts of wine.
Anne Eisendrath has described the score as a “fully immersive and visceral sonic experience.” And to that end, The Heart pumps. So, too, does Kerrigan’s book. From a nurse who lingers after her shift so her preschooler will be asleep by the time she gets home to a surgeon’s promising second date cut short, the brisk musical offers us glimpses into the lives of medical professionals beyond their long days and nights at the hospital.
Director Christopher Ashley (Come From Away) and choreographer Mandy Moore smartly navigate the fast-paced character swaps with operating-room precision, supported by design elements that reflect the medical advancements that make such transplants possible.
You’ll need to suspend your disbelief when Blickenstaff, a fantastic vocalist, belts out the 11 o’clock number, “Too Young,” while sporting nasal tubing tethered to a portable oxygen pack. But The Heart’s final moment, when internal defibrillator paddles shock Simon’s heart into its second chapter, will leave you breathless, too.
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Is ‘The Heart’ worth seeing?
With a club-ready score, an ER’s sense of urgency, and a cast that never misses a cue, The Heart asks for a little suspended disbelief and pays it forward by the final heartbeat.
- Laura Pels Theatre, 111 West 46th Street, New York City
- Notable performers: Heidi Blickenstaff, Lincoln Clauss, Nick T. Daly, Drew Gehling, Joaquina Kalukango, Jason Tam
- Running time: 90 minutes, no intermission
- Performances through December 13, 2026
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