We saw “The Last Ship” in Chicago last night. It was surprisingly good. Very good, in fact.
I’ve been a Sting fan for several decades, so we got tickets just because it seems unlikely that he’s ever going to rise in popularity again enough to do a big tour. I’d listened to previews of the music in advance and I thought it was so-so, thus I expected the show would be similarly OK-but-not-great. But instead the production holistically was a big win. The set is truly remarkable — simple, but extremely flexible and very mood-invoking. The choreography was clever and quite amusing in several places. And the songs fit into the story very well, including some old Sting songs that had subtly-changed lyrics (notably Island of Souls and When We Dance).