Chess is about a love triangle between two Grandmasters, Anatoly Sergievsky (Nicholas Christopher), a Soviet player, Freddie Trumper (Aaron Tveit), an American, and Freddie’s second, the Hungarian immigrant Florence Vassy (Lea Michele).  This is one of the few consistent elements of the musical, as there is no definitive version of Chess.  There is the concept album.  There is the original West End production, which introduces a CIA agent (Sean Allan Krill), and the original Broadway production, which reduces the number of matches from two to one and adds a prologue in Budapest.  Sometimes Freddie is an antagonist, sometimes he is sympathetic.  Florence’s father is being held in a Siberian prison, and his fate changes from production to production.

The current Broadway revival at the Imperial Theatre, with a new book by Danny Strong, is true to this tradition of change.  Like the 2018 West End revival, this Chess has expanded the role of the Arbiter (Bryce Pinkham), who is now also the musical’s narrator.  As written, and as played by Pinkham, the Arbiter resembles Joel Grey’s Emcee in Cabaret, a gleeful and cynical outsider host to catastrophic historical events.  “I know his name is Trumper,” he tells us in a typical aside, “but remember this show was originally written in 1984.”  The politics, too, are more central to this version, and both governments are deeply invested in the outcome of the two matches.  The potential for nuclear sits in the background at all times.

I don’t think these changes improve Chess.  Surely there are parallels between our time and the end of the Cold War, but the musical fails to illustrate these.  The Arbiter’s jokes rely more on topicality to provoke self-congratulatory laughter from the audience (he describes one alliance as “an attempted partnership so unusual it wouldn’t be seen again for many decades until RFK Jr. attempted to team up with the worm in his brain”).  Moreover, in the second act, the love story gets diluted by the machinations of spies who never prove interesting enough to draw so much of our attention.

Nevertheless, the music by Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, with lyrics by Andersson, Ulvaeus, and Tim Rice, is terrific, stuffed with moments that offer the three leads the chance to display spectacular power, lung capacity, and control over their voices.  The set design by David Rockwellis bright and dynamic, making good use of neon and filling the stage, no small accomplishment considering the subject might suggest a choreography of actors hunched around tables.  Ultimately, the music, the performers, and the production make up for the messy script.

Chess runs through May 3rd at the Imperial Theatre.  249 W. 45th Street  New York, NY.  2 hours 40 minutes.  One intermission. Photograph by Matthew Murphy.