Music’s great in ‘Simon & Garfunkel,’ but their story’s seldom told

Concert-style theater show.

That’s how “The Simon & Garfunkel Story” is billed. And yes, the production, which opened Wednesday night at the Broadway Playhouse at Water Tower Place, is a tribute concert of sorts, filled with some of the biggest hits (and a few lesser-known cuts) from the greatest duo in the history of folk-rock.

But the story of Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon? That’s a bit of a stretch.

The show is not so much the story of Simon and Garfunkel as it is the story of their music. That’s not a bad thing by any means. But the songs’ stories are inextricably linked to the journey of the two men who breathed life into them. The career trajectory of the real-life duo is rife with drama, yet none of that is conveyed to any great extent as the two actors — Taylor Bloom and Ben Cooley (who affect a semblance of their real-life counterparts) — deliver the songs as Simon and Garfunkel, respectively, and then step out of their characters to deliver the story as Bloom and Cooley. The third-person narrative thus becomes a series of factoids recited by the two actors or scrawled across a video screen. It’s one thing to describe what happened, it’s another to bring to life the two men who lived it and whose “voices” should be telling the tale.

Against a backdrop of newsreel footage, photo projections and iconic TV commercials of the 1960s (everything from the Kennedy presidency and the civil rights movement to Haight-Ashbury and the Vietnam War protests are featured in a timeline that freely moves forward and back), the story actually begins in 1957, when Simon and Garfunkel are 17 years old, in high school and starting out on their musical road as Tom & Jerry. Songs such as their single, “Hey School Girl,” make little impression. In 1964, using their real names, they release their debut studio album, “Wednesday Morning 3 a.m.,” which features “The Sound of Silence,” but still goes nowhere. Soon Simon is off to London to find himself and take a deep dive into his music, while Garfunkel is off to Columbia University, where he majored in architecture, art history and mathematics. Flash forward to 1966, and the album is re-released with a newly redubbed version (and now a radio smash hit) of “The Sound of Silence,” and Simon & Garfunkel are on their way.

The hits, or as we’re told, their “intelligent songs,” keep coming: “He Was My Brother,” “Bleecker Street,” “I Am a Rock,” “Scarborough Fair,” ‘Homeward Bound,” “57th Street Bridge Song (Feeling Groovy).”

The show’s fast-paced second half takes us from the soundtrack of “The Graduate” to the duo’s split in 1970 to their solo careers and ultimate reunion in 1981 for a benefit concert in New York’s Central Park. Along the way we’re treated to the iconic “Mrs. Robinson,” “America,” “Fakin’ It,” “Cecilia” and ultimately the song everyone came to hear – the hauntingly beautiful “Bridge Over Troubled Water” — from one of the greatest, not to mention best-selling, albums of all time. An “encore” of “The Boxer” is the icing on the cake.

Bloom and Cooley are two talented singers and, in the case of Bloom, a quite capable guitarist. They deliver the familiar S&G harmonies in fine fashion, a daunting task for sure, and they navigate the songbook with much aplomb, backed by a rockin’ four-piece band: Alec Hamilton on keyboards, Bob Sale on drums, Marc Encabo on bass and Josh Vasquez on guitar. Diehard fans will find little fault with what they hear, while newbies will come to know the mighty Simon and Garfunkel songbook, which became the music of a generation, the mirror of a most turbulent era in America’s history.

You’ll walk out of “The Simon & Garfunkel” feeling groovy, for sure. But you’ll also leave wanting more. So much more.

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