Anne Frank’s Diary in Song

It’s a heck of a thing, making a musical about Anne Frank based on her famous diary.

The topic is not exactly uplifting. The setting is claustrophobic. None of the characters are in danger of breaking into a show-stopping song-and-dance number, though all them could be discovered and deported to concentration camps. Which they were. Only Otto Frank, Anne’s father, survived.

Credit composer Michael Cohen and librettist Enid Futterman for mostly succeeding at this daunting challenge in “Yours, Anne,” which debuted in a revised version in a preview by Half Moon Theatre on March 25. The creators attended the show.

Half Moon Theatre has been bringing lively performances to the Hudson Valley for 10 years. Since 2014, the company has been based at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., in a beautiful auditorium inside the Marriott Pavilion.

Much of the success in “Yours, Anne” was due to a tremendously affecting performance as Anne by Emily Wexler, described in the program as a “NYC-based actor/singer/educator.” Wexler truly inhabited the role. Her transformation in the course of the family’s internal exile, from naive kid to worldly adolescent, was tangible. Of all the people hiding behind a bookcase in a warehouse annex in Holland, only Anne stubbornly refused to give in to despair.

The show takes place from the moment the Franks (Anne, her sister Margot and her parents) and their friends, the Van Pels (Mr. and Mrs., and their son, Peter), arrive in the annex, later joined by a dentist (Mr. Pfeffer), to the dreaded moment they are found out. The libretto was assembled from excerpts of “Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl” and the stage adaptation, “The Diary of Anne Frank” (by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett).

Whether by design or not, the claustrophobia problem does not entirely go away from the audience’s point of view. Sitting through a play with the same people in the same room for 90 minutes is not easy, especially when they are — understandably — getting on each other’s nerves. Through the use of some creative lighting effects, Director Michael Schiralli tried to overcome this by spotlighting each combination of characters as they come to the foreground of a scene or a song. I’m not sure it was worth the effort, though; it tended to further heighten the feeling of being in a shrinking space.

Similarly, the pacing of the show and the sparseness of the libretto creates some difficulties. The spacing of the dialogue and songs seemed too regular, draining some energy from the performance.

But Cohen’s score explores an admirable range of emotions and colors, drawing the audience deep into the story. There is a touching little lullaby, “Schlaf” (Sleep), sung beautifully by Christy Morton as Mrs. Frank, and a sweet duet between mother and daughter about the difficulty of their relationship (“She Doesn’t Understand Me”). The wistful “I Remember” sung by the company harkens to better times, and the stirring “When We Are Free” beckons hope when news of D-Day reaches the annex.

That number is preceded by “We Live with Fear,” as the families’ increasing tension translates into startling at every bump and creak they hear. Wexler, as Anne, does yeoman’s work, with a half-dozen “Dear Kitty” solos interspersed throughout (“Kitty” was what Anne called her diary), the last one at the somber end of the show, while each character exits the stage, his or her final fate recited by Otto (David Sitler).

“Yours, Anne” runs at Half Moon Theatre through April 2. Call 845-235-9885 or go to www.halfmoontheatre.org.