Cartoonist Alison Bechdel’s “family tragicomic” gets inventive stage treatment in this bold new musical

Perhaps the most over-trafficked subject matter among contemporary American dramatists is the dysfunctional family. So one of the many wonders of the haunting musical “Fun Home” is the unique perspective it brings to that theme, in a deeply personal story that marries the specificity of individual experience with an emotional universality that will find echoes in many of our lives. Composer Jeanine Tesori and writer-lyricist Lisa Kron have done something extraordinary here, reshaping cartoonist Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir into an unconventional memory play that seamlessly integrates music and drama. Full disclosure: I’m a late convert to this show about coming out, coming of age and coming to grips with the past, having caught it midway through the fall 2013 premiere run at the Public Theater. While ecstatic reviews had built up my expectations, I came away back then admiring the creative team’s craft, and their audaciousness in tackling such nontraditional material as a musical. But “Fun Home” didn’t move me. Whether it’s the benefits of second-time exposure or the skill with which director Sam Gold and designer David Zinn have reconfigured the production to play in the round, intensifying its intimacy, this time I found it a beguiling experience, almost unbearably poignant at times. Bechdel’s 2006 book is subtitled “A Family Tragicomic,” which is also a perfect fit for this musical adaptation. At the end of the opening song, the adult Alison (Beth Malone) looks back on her childhood in the family funeral home — the “fun home,” as the kids affectionately call it — and says: “My dad and I both grew up in the same small Pennsylvania town. And he was gay. And I was gay. And he killed himself. And I became a lesbian cartoonist.”