With eyebrows too dark and skin too perfect, Darren Criss’ Oliver stands up smoothly but mechanically. He talks to his houseplant Hwaboon. He listens to the jazz stylings of Gil Brentley (Dez Duron). He brushes his teeth, then his eyes. In the precise, effects-filled Maybe Happy Ending, Criss is the best special effect.
For Oliver is a Helperbot 3, living freely in the Uncanny Valley somewhere on the outskirts of Seoul, Korea. Every move Criss makes has a fluidity humans don’t normally have. Right down to offering his hand: his fingers seem to wrap around space one by one. As Claire, a Helperbot 5, costar Helen J. Shen has it easier. 5s blend in better with humanity. The catch is a shorter shelf life. It seems a few decades from now, we still haven’t gotten over planned obsolescence.
Both Helperbots exist in a “retirement home,” discarded but not yet disconnected. At least humans have the kindness to let them live out their existence even though they’ve outlived their usefulness. Not all of Oliver’s quirks are programming. He learned from his owner James (Marcus Choi) and holds onto the belief that one day James will return for him. Claire knows this is it for her, for reasons that slowly unfold over this bittersweet, heartwarming, and heartbreaking science fiction musical.
When Claire’s power charger malfunctions, she risks crossing the hall for help from Oliver. The “meet cute” starts the beats of a traditional romcom. But with the focus on these artificial intelligences learning to live and love in the face of obsolescence, it’s a romance in the vein of John Green.
That slight distance from being human dulls the sting a bit. We mostly see the former owners through memory files, though both James and the 1950s jazz crooner Gil appear on stage. The play takes its time clarifying whether or not humans even still exist, though in Oliver and Claire it’s obvious humanity has the potential to still thrive. Else why would Oliver’s supposed programming be indistinguishable from social anxiety?
Oliver determines he will cut to the chase and visit James on Jeju Island, though it’s been at least 12 years since his beloved owner left him. That dovetails with Claire’s desire to see fireflies once more. Once they were everywhere; now Jeju Island is the last place (on Earth?) they live out their brief lights and lives.
Yes, there’s a predictability to Maybe Happy Ending. The two Helperbots fall in love despite their determination not to, but it’s countered by great performances, great direction by Michael Arden, and an infectious score by Will Aronson and Hue Park that mixes faux-Sinatra with modern musical sensibility. The beauty of the music almost lets you forget that as one song says, eventually we all have to let go. That song, “Then I Can Let You Go,” and a few others could become standards in regional theater auditions.
It’s hard to say if the show itself will become a standard. The current production feels too beautifully technical to be recreated, yet allegedly it will tour in 2026. Can the combination of Dane Laffrey’s scenic design, Ben Stanton’s lighting design, and George Reeve’s video design go on the road? Together they create the effect of pages from a manwha, appropriate for a show developed for both US and Korean audiences.
If you can catch Maybe Happy Ending at the Belasco Theatre in New York, do. Like a firefly, it’s uncertain how long it will stay alight, but it’s wondrous while it is.
Nerd History: From the moment artificial intelligences were conceived of, writers discussed what might happen if they fell in love. (Notice our current AI conversations don’t seem to cover that.) Take a look at Karel Capek’s seminal 1920 play R.U.R. ; it’s also where the word “robot” comes from. Heck, if you consider the creature in Frankenstein to be an artificial intelligence, he too is driven by love.
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