I didn't think of this at all as a "play with music." Especially during the second act, I was wishing for significantly more dialogue to flesh things out.
As it was, I just barely caught the fact that the mine is already useless. And, when, at the end, Zorba says to Santino Fontana's character (approximately), "I've never loved a man as much as I love you," it didn't work (for me) because the relationship as portrayed had been so minimal.
Also, regarding the tone of the piece -- I think they were simply presenting the good and the bad in an intentionally "indiscriminate" way, to match the idea that "Life Is" a bunch of different things, and some of the good ones (falling in love) can lead to some of the bad ones (suicide, feuds, etc).
That's also why I would have been in favor of a beginning like the one in the Tony Awards presentation -- it's a miniature version of the whole play, I think (for instance, an image of lovers out walking is immediately followed by "my fist in your face").
I also didn't find Zorba's character problematic. He struck me as someone with believably good and bad traits. And the statements he made often seemed reasonable, especially when he explains that he isn't going to try to punish the murderous townspeople because they, in turn, would try to kill him and/or his relatives.
To me, the biggest problem with the widow storyline was the obviously contrived manner in which Zorba gives people he's just fought with access to a knife and then tells their soon-to-be victim, "Follow me." He is obviously smart enough to hold onto the knife and have the widow walk in front of him while they warily leave the scene.
In any case, I did not get the sense of a hippie-ish '60s sensibility, or too much preachiness, from the show last night. However, I did find certain aspects of the Encores choreography pretentious -- particularly the slow dancing with highly amplified, over-emphatic "breathing" that opened the show.
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