Going West

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The billboard on the theater in New York City reads: A R RAHMAN'S BOMBAY DREAMS. The locals may scoff. A R Who? He's a Broadway composer? He is now, and musical theater has rarely been so lucky. The most geriatric genre of American culture is getting a transfusion of world music. And when Rahman makes that music, it's truly world-class.

Fans of Indian movies need no introduction to Rahman. Like Gershwin, Puccini or Lennon-McCartney, the name stands for melody, quality, energy, instant hummability—a sound both personal and universal, devouring older forms and transforming them into something gorgeously new.

Rahman's lyrical prodigality was evident from the score for his first film: Mani Ratnam's Roja, the tale of a woman whose lover is kidnapped by terrorists. Through this grim political parable, Rahman laced some spectacular melodies that not only serve the drama, they create their own—as in the duet ballads Yeh Haseen Vadiyan and Roja Janeman, which first are grounded in recitative, then soar into celestial melody. The soundtrack parades the composer's gift for alchemizing outside influences until they are totally Tamil, totally Rahman. He plays with reggae and jungle rhythms, runs cool variations on Ennio Morricone's scores for Italian westerns, fiddles with Broadway-style orchestrations. An astonishing debut.

Rahman has said his work became "a little repetitive and monotonous" with the spate of commissions that followed Roja. Composing for 50 movie scores and more than 200 songs will sap any man. But each film contains a sprig, often a full bouquet, of musical inspiration. The terminally goofy plastic-surgery movie Vishwavidhaata boasts a ravishing number, Kal Nahin Tha, with the vocalist Sujatha whispering, then warbling her heart out. Taal birthed two instant classics, Ishq Bina and Nahin Samne, both of which Rahman would adopt as signature ballads for Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Bombay Dreams.

As Western film cultists discovered India's pop cinema, they also found a master composer. If one song triggered Rahmania among non-Indians in the West, it was Chaiyya Chaiyya, from another Ratnam terrorist tragedy Dil Se. Shahrukh Khan stands atop a speeding train and (using the thrilling voice of Sukhwinder Singh) performs this update of a Sufi chant. It remains Rahman's most pulsing, irresistible piece, and when it opens the second act of Bombay Dreams, it has audiences stamping their feet and cheering.

Not after the song—during it.

In its transfer from the West End to Broadway, the show has lost a lot of its Bollywood sass—American audiences don't know enough about Indian musicals to get the jokes—and, crucially, a half-dozen solid Rahman tunes. To compensate, there's a wet-sari dream embodied by sultry Ayesha Dharker.

She and Anisha Nagarajan, the show's sensible heroine, are the main acting attractions in this no-star musical.

So Webber is taking a little risk: a $14 million musical with unknown actors, an unfamiliar foreign milieu and a who-he? composer. Still, anyone with half an ear will hear the most vibrant, varied new score in ages. Audiences will walk out of Bombay Dreams humming Rahman's songs and singing his praises. If music is the crucial part of a musical, then Rahman's genius will ensure that Bollywood conquers Broadway.