"Pippin" Revisited

PIPPIN

I hate to say goodbye to PIPPIN, unexpectedly one of my favorite productions of the last few years.  Having seen Fosse’s original, I was dubious about the reinterpretation, but was happily blown away by almost every aspect.

Long-run-itis takes a heavy toll on some shows (it did on the original CHICAGO, NINE, and many other shows I’ve seen multiple times.) Maintaining the original impact and excitement of a production is hard, if not impossible. One of the few exceptions in my theatre-going career was A CHORUS LINE, which was in as tip-top shape at the end of its fifteen-year run as it was when I saw it pre-opening (I can’t vouch for what happened in between.)

As PIPPIN prematurely ends its Broadway run:

John Dossett remains perhaps the best character-slash-leading-man in New York, playing every role he does with 100% integrity and consistency; he holds down the fort with his Charlemagne, less campy-winky-nudgy than his predecessor, and he brings out the best in his merry compatriot Charlotte D’Amboise (as he did with Bernadette Peters in GYPSY, doing what I call “Acting For Two” and making her performance seem far better than it was.)

Priscilla Lopez is a fine Berthe and I’m thrilled I got to see her do the part, having seen her 39 years ago in the original A CHORUS LINE in the aforementioned pre-Broadway days. The part is served best by a true yakka-yakka-yakka vaudevillian, but they’re in short supply in 2014; we’ll take the musical comedy legends as and while we can.

I greatly miss Matthew James Thomas in the title role; he was gorgeous, sang like crazy, danced like crazy, had a twinkle in the eye, a sense of the offbeat, and a sincere wistfulness that perfectly complemented the wild circus surrounding him.  One Josh Kaufman plays the role now, and he sings pretty well, goes through his scenes pretty well, dances notably less well – he lacks star quality in both his everyday suburban-guy-at-the-supermarket-cash-register appearance, general energy, and acting chops in terms of vividly relating to his stage family.  You know my shtick: far too few musical theatre performers go to acting class, to the tune of practically none.

Unfortunately I saw an understudy for the Leading Player; I have to cut the gal a break, since it was her first performance in the role, and she certainly gave a creditable rendition of the part; but there’s just no way to have PIPPIN without a true star up front, taking the audience by the throat and threatening to strangle them and throw them into the firepit in the Finale with her/his bare hands.

Some of the production choices bother me more now than originally, partly because of my repeat visits, and partly because new surrounding weaknesses accentuate others.  The heavily truncated, mangled, hurried “War Is A Science” seems as if they could barely be bothered to do it at all, and wanted it over with as quickly as possible – unfortunately unaware that the extended original (available on YouTube and DVD) was one of Bob Fosse’s most ingenious creations ever, and Stephen Schwartz’s lyrics were well worth the trouble. Likewise, removing the war-statistics context for the famous “Manson Trio” does it no favors, stripping it of exactly what Fosse was saying (people routinely mistake Fosse for a choreographer, when he was above all a writer, sociologist and social critic.) The heavily reduced orchestra is no asset, despite terrific playing by all, and the expert re-orchestration by the always expert Larry Hochman, forced to do a great deal with a tiny group to work with.

I doubt there’s been a director in the house for some time. It’s subtle; a little loose in pace and electricity. Saddest of all is the change in one of my favorite performances in years, that of Rachel Bay Jones as Catherine; where her original characterization was hugely original, hugely funny, risky, on the edge, but just inside the edge, ultimately moving and bordering on heartbreaking, enlivening the potentially dreary “Act Two” – repetition, a long run, and probably the absence of a director’s return has tipped the scales towards a FORBIDDEN BROADWAY pastiche of her original performance, hugely jokey, over-the-top, exaggerated out of all proportion and outside the show.  And yet – perhaps because her incredible original performance is indelibly imprinted on my mind – when Pippin finally turns to see her in the Finale, and realizes what’s important in life, I still felt a huge gulp in my throat and a tear in the eye, same as when I saw the show in previews and fell apart.  So she’s still got something.  And for that type of moment, I say to PIPPIN: Adieu, and thanks for the memories. 

© 2014 Fred Barton 

"On The Town"

I used to get into all kinds of trouble with the theatre reviews on my website, back in the 1990’s, before the hideous word “blog” had even been invented.

I miss all that.  It was fun.  Let me roll up my sleeves and get into some trouble again.

ON THE TOWN

There is a school of revivals in which the perpetrators do something to the show – rather than that antiquated concept called: Doing The Show.

I love ON THE TOWN.  My first exposure was the 1971 revival, with a bunch of pros named Phyllis Newman, Bernadette Peters, Marilyn Cooper, and Kurt Peterson, directed and choreographed by Ron Field, only five years after his triumphant greatest success, CABARET (which people forget he choreographed long before Bob Fosse adapted it.)  I turned thirteen the night my parents took me, so I’ll defer to some older experts who say that the 1971 production wasn’t all that; but I loved it – and it was ON THE TOWN, straight up, no cherry.

The second revival was an atrocity and richly deserved its ignominious fate.  First of all, the geniuses decided to re-orchestrate the shattering score for a run-of-the-mill big band.  Now I love big band more than just about anything, but the dimwitted thinking (“It’s WWII 1944, let’s do big band!”) was an idiotic, utterly tone-deaf mishearing of that rich, largely symphonic score, young Leonard Bernstein’s little warm-up for WEST SIDE STORY (some of which it resembles) thirteen years later.  The cast was barely memorable between one scene and the next, there wasn’t a laugh to be had from curtain up to curtain down, and the questionable Lea DeLaria’s aggressive, acting-free mangling of Hildy, and her “I Can Cook Too” song, is still referenced in any discussion of ON THE TOWN past and present.

So maybe third time’s the charm?

But how can you do a successful production ON THE TOWN if you don’t really admire or appreciate it to begin with?

Here’s how I know the current people don’t, and it’s sad, since there are so many positive assets on board.

You can just hear the chatter at the production meeting.  “This will be New York City seen through the eyes of bumpkins.”  So the set is a fantasy New York depicted by a shimmering, garish, plexiglass-and-projection contraption colored like a pack of Starburst candies.  I loved it for a while; the last time I saw terrific dancing reflected from behind in plexiglass was the original CHICAGO in 1975.  It’s a stunning effect.  But as ON THE TOWN wore on, I began to weary of Fake Exaggerated Cartoon New York.

Fake Exaggerated Cartoon is the modus operandi of the production – it’s big and bright and blue and red and dazzling, but it ain’t New York.  And ON THE TOWN is about New York – not a fake one; the real one. And this is important for any number of reasons, not the least of which is that the centerpiece fantasy ballet of Act Two takes place in a fantasy version New York (“Coney Island, Playground Of The Rich,” in Gabey-the-sailor’s mind.)  We lose a lot if the whole show already takes place in an exaggerated fantasy.

And Fake Exaggerated Cartoon is clearly the approach taken by the misguided director and most of his unfortunate cast, with some notable exceptions listed below.  See above, vis-a-vis YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU, and nailing the fine line between madcap and heart. The former without the latter is superfluous.  The dead giveaway is the ubiquitous presence of Jackie Hoffman, whom consensus (if not the audience) has anointed New York’s perennial cut-up. Is a broad Jewish comic appropriate for Madame Dilly, opera-diva, dubious alcoholic grande dame, dispensing strict vocal training and imposing moral (and financial) ethics on her unfortunate student? This part is not just for laughs – she’s the critical fulcrum of the romantic plot of the show. I know the Broadway insiders think Hoffman is the funniest woman who ever lived, but I prefer Comden & Green’s satire on the Madame Dillys of this world (one of their classic creations – remember “Round tones, Miss Lamont?”) to Hoffman’s insane, anything-for-a-laugh-every-three-seconds drunk shit, which occupied twice the stage time of any Madame Dilly I’ve previously seen, to no added effect and some imbalance, over-dominating the two young lovers’ precious little stage time together.  Hoffman is likewise inappropriate casting for the nightclub torch singer (twice) – unless the goal is to burlesque what is already a satire.

I tremendously admire and admired Elizabeth Stanley, one of the great underutilized talents of our age. She sings better than just about anybody, looks like a million, and she’s a wonderful actress. For these reasons, I regretted the decision to turn her Claire DeLune pretty quickly into a burlesque comic, with all kinds of vocal exaggerations and lowdown deliveries; under a different production team, she could have been stellar. Picture Betty Comden originating that role; hers was a refined, urbane comedy, and didn’t need lowbrow shtick to draw her characters, already written with a keen eye and ear for classic Comden & Green satire without burlesque on top like chocolate sauce on chocolate. 

That’s really the point here; I don’t believe Comden & Green need the help; this production team does.

I admired Alysha Umphress’s direct, unadorned reading of Hildy, the taxi-driver, although we can vividly imagine the added dash of urgent comedy Nancy Walker probably featured, since she sold that commodity her whole career. But when “I Can Cook Too” reared its ugly head, the hackles rose for both my guest and me (ardent musical theatre and Bernstein fans spanning countless decades) – and our hostility spread like a virus all over the evening.  What is it about this song that so utterly defeats condescending revivalists, same as in the previous revival with the inappropriate Lea DeLaria? Listen, people.  Use your heads and your ears.  It’s a largely symphonic score depicting both Big City and a forlorn romantic tale (that’s the show in a nutshell, plain and simple.) Then along comes this nymphomaniac picking up a nerdy, dopey sailor.  Bernstein wrote a surprise swing jazz number, and Comden & Green wrote a double-entendre lyric. The writers did the job, kids.  Just sing the fucking song.  It’s ALREADY jazz, it’s ALREADY hot, it’s ALREADY dirty. Turning this undersexed, eager comic broad into some kind of Harlem sophisticated Ella Fitzgerald scatting nightclub performer is completely unnecessary, and an extremely unwelcome intrusion; it’s not in period, not Bernstein, not Comden & Green, not the character, not the show. Stop it and stop it now and sing the fucking song and let us hear what they wrote and let us react as they wanted us to react. Do your club act at 54 Below and I’ll buy the first ticket. Do it in the middle of ON THE TOWN and I’ll recommend no one buy a ticket.

Before I get to the good stuff, one more little bone to pick.

Phillip Boykin is one of the finest voices and performers in New York City, as anyone who saw PORGY AND BESS can attest. He does ON THE TOWN a heroic favor right off the bat with his electrifyingly terrific rendition of the first strains of the show, “I Feel Like I’m Not Out Of Bed Yet” (a sure sign in the writing that the show’s creators had something better in mind than just some screwball evening.)  Between this outstanding performance, and the beautiful Brooklyn Navy Yard set, and the full orchestra in the pit, I started the night on a huge high and all kinds of optimistic.

Imagine my shock when the very same performer came out as the Announcer for the Miss Turnstiles Ballet, playing this role as the most effeminate, jokey-sissy-faggotty-faggot stereotypical mincing queen you ever saw on any Broadway stage.

What in the world were these people thinking? In what world of either 2014 or 1944 would this ever be considered an acceptable portrayal or interpretation, and to what purpose and effect on audiences of either era? There is no plot point at issue (this is not THE BIRD CAGE or LA CAGE); this is a completely gratuitous, leering, limp-wristed guffaw-at-how-homosexual-he-is stereotype for cheap laughs (there were no laughs). It makes no sense for this formerly august, authoritative announcer to be a fucking airborne queen, and this kind of gratuitous homo bullshit is fucking offensive – so my hostility was aroused even before the scatting started. And a minority actor performing this travesty at that! I wonder how it would go over if a gay actor was asked to portray the Announcer as a knuckle-dragging Stepin Fetchit. Shocked at my language?  Unclutch those pearls, ladies; I hope you deplore gratuitous, dated, demeaning, cheap, lowest-common-denominator stereotypes as much as I do, and there isn’t one more acceptable than the other.  And that ain’t all; throughout the evening we also had two chorus boys mincing about in ascots and pencil-mustaches, kissing each other, doing a homosexual burlesque of the Flossie-“And-Then-I-Says-To-Him” dialogue, making goo-goo eyes and carrying on, cardboard-stereotype-style. To what end? Other than to earn my disrespect for the production, no doubt to say to the audience: “Look how hip we were at the production meeting, where we decided to jive-ass and hip up ON THE TOWN with all kinds of gay shit and have the principals take off clothes and have sex and stuff, and sing Happy Birthday to audience members in the middle of the show, because the original would be a bore!”

I don’t think ON THE TOWN is a bore and I wish the current team didn’t either.

Hats off to the magnificent Tony Yazbeck, finally getting the chance of a lifetime and his long (young) career, delivering a 100% terrific performance as Gabey, the leading man. I don’t know how he managed to escape whatever cheap stuff he might have been given to do, but he holds 100% to the role and the real show, delivers his songs beautifully, dances like a dream, and stays true acting-wise to the essential romance of the piece – and ON THE TOWN is fundamentally a bittersweet romance (as most people could tell by listening to what Bernstein wrote.) 

Qualified hats off to the gorgeous Jay Armstrong Johnson, cutest guy in New York, who treads perilously close to the notorious line of “Is It Real Or Is It Camp,” tipping over the line a few times, but basically holding it together; a more secure director who liked the piece would have really enabled him to be 100% Chip and nothing but, and less of a jazz-dancing, acrobatic car-jumping, jive enthusiast of Scat Hildy, and maintaining that tour-guidebook-touting simpleton role throughout, growing into the romantic complication – but quibbles aside, he’s something to see (as he was in SWEENEY TODD at Avery Fisher and MOST HAPPY FELLA at Encores.)

Clyde Alves is a stalwart, disdaining the gratuitously goofy in favor of a real guy, and real guys are most welcome in this production (although his admirable straightforwardness does make Elizabeth Stanley’s burlesques seem even more unnecessary than they already are.)

And kudos to Allison Guinn, funny as the saftig reject from the outrageously homosexualized Miss Turnstiles contest, and witty likewise as Lucy Schmeeler – although no one but Marilyn Cooper in 1971 could have gotten the biggest laugh I’ve ever heard in any theatre on a three-word line: “I’m – going – out.”

Joshua Bergasse’s choreography is miles higher than the industry standard today, reminiscent of Jerome Robbins and largely illustrative of story if not always reflective of music. His Pas de Deux for Gabey and Ivy in “Imaginary Coney Island” is the greatest dance on Broadway today, with a striking lighting change borrowed (effectively) from the identical drastic shift in Robbins’ “Somewhere” ballet in WEST SIDE STORY.

And speaking of WEST SIDE STORY, there’s ON THE TOWN’s full orchestra, which unfortunately is now a news headline in those few shows that furnish top-dollar-paying audiences with what used to be a reasonable and unremarkable expectation.  Like the SOUTH PACIFIC revival, if the ferocity and vivacity in the playing of the score is mysteriously a notch or two below the readily-available earlier Broadway renditions preserved for us by Columbia Records, we can still be hugely grateful for the opportunity to hear the score played full-out in the original orchestration.  How I wish the production had as much faith in every element of the actual real show as they did in its orchestration. 

© 2014 Fred Barton

"You Can't Take It With You"

I used to get into all kinds of trouble with the theatre reviews on my website, back in the 1990’s, before the hideous word “blog” had even been invented.

I miss all that.  It was fun.  Let me roll up my sleeves and get into some trouble again.

YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU

Terrific shows aren’t as much fun to write about.  So this will be no fun at all.  YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU is terrific.

There are three kinds of actors in the cast: dead-on perfect, functionally really good, and pretty damn good.  

An example of the first is Fran Kranz, in the most difficult role of the juvenile; he looks great, a slightly offbeat heartthrob, and utterly and completely sincere and true to every word and every suggestion of the character.  He and Australian actress Rose Byrne, playing his harried fiancée, accomplish exactly the essential thing required in a madcap comedy – they tread with laser precision the fine line of comic foil and sincerity, genuine romance and attractiveness, amidst all the chaos, that makes the audience truly care that all comes out well for them, no matter how far the play veers and careens around them from slapstick to mayhem to literally exploding fireworks and live kittens and ersatz snakes (well, the kittens and snakes don’t explode, but you know what I meant.)

James Earl Jones gives an unlikely career performance, likewise breezily fielding two and a half acts of backseat comedy before stepping forward to still the insane proceedings, and affect the pin-drop-silent audience, with a devastatingly quiet and simple delivery of the play’s moral – a moral that the many decades since the play’s debut in 1936 has raised to religiously epic importance.  Kaufman and Hart weren’t just kidding around here.

Even in the supporting roles written for high exaggeration, the likes of Reg Rogers (as the Russian) and the formidable Elizabeth Ashley (as the other Russian) stay exactly inside the line of “Is It Real Or Is It Camp?” – lesser performers in a lesser production would no doubt have landed in the latter to the detriment of the play’s essentially sentimental, sweet nature.

If Annaleigh Ashford is the play’s standard-bearer for the purely exaggerated Ridiculous, and nothing more, she delivers that choice with aplomb and commitment, much as I would have liked a real sister-daughter character in there as well.  She is blithely treated by her fellow expert cast-members as a moth perennially caught fluttering around a lightbulb too high to deal with, and the production is so fine in every moment that the ensemble’s perfection is undiminished.

Comedy is hard – dying, etc. etc.  Regarding Scott Ellis’s direction, I threw my hat so hard in the air, it flew away and never came back.  Inferior revivals laced with contemporary condescension are the insulting meat-and-potatoes of our age.  A revival absolutely packed with nothing but integrity, compassion, sincerity, true to the best of high comic traditions and supported by a genuine belief in its own crazy world and characters, and ultimately filling the audience with the masterful playwrights’ underlying human concerns, is a very rare bird indeed – especially when generously furnished with a sensational, magnificently detailed set and the best music currently on Broadway (mood-setting rather than the main event).  None of that cheap-shit blackbox bare-stage with a few card tables type of thing here. Full on, full out.

You can’t take it with you, so whip out that cash and buy tickets to this outstanding production ASAP.

© 2014 Fred Barton