-- Alexander Woollcott

The grosses are out for the week ending 10/5/2008 and we've got them all

right here in BroadwayWorld.com's grosses section.

Up for the week was: THE LITTLE MERMAID (10.4%), EQUUS (8.7%), LEGALLY BLONDE (7.9%), THE SEAGULL (7.6%), HAIRSPRAY (6.5%), TITLE OF SHOW (6.3%), MARY POPPINS (4.7%), GYPSY (4.2%), MAMMA MIA! (2.8%), CHICAGO (2.5%), THE 39 STEPS (1.6%), SPRING AWAKENING (1.6%), WICKED (1.6%), THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1.1%), ALL MY SONS (0.8%), JERSEY BOYS (0.1%),

Down for the week was: AVENUE Q (-7.9%), 13 (-6.8%), TO BE OR NOT TO BE (-5.0%), A TALE OF TWO CITIES (-4.4%), BOEING-BOEING (-4.0%), AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (-1.1%), A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (-1.0%), IN THE HEIGHTS (-0.5%), SPAMALOT (-0.5%), THE LION KING (-0.4%), SOUTH PACIFIC (-0.2%), GREASE (-0.2%),

Posted on: Monday, October 06, 2008 @ 03:50 PM Posted by: Michael Dale

Set in the Brooklyn brownstone of Jan and Adam (Neil Patel's exactingly detailed set appropriately reflects the eclectic taste of only ½ the couple), the intermission-less piece takes place near-continuously throughout the first evening they've spent alone together since the birth of their nine-year-old son.  The gregarious, sexually aggressive Adam met his future wife as a casual elevator pick-up on a rare occasion when the more conservative Jan was willing to let loose for a crazy night with a stranger.  But now it seems sex has become the wall that separates them; his steady voraciousness clashing with her growing disinterest.

Passive-aggressive actions quickly give in to not so passive ones, as marital issues are hurled about between concerns about the boy.  And while the author's dialogue is sharp and realistic, the play sometimes relies on too obvious foreshadowing and that reliable mood-changer, the telephone call, to move the thin drama along.

The more serious problem, however, is that Wellman fails to show us any signs of what kept these two together for so long.  The animated, attention-seeking Adam and the cold, distancing Jan seem so detached from one another that watching their marriage fall apart is an unemotional experience.  We can thrill to Marvel's horrifying unleashing of bottled-up emotions and be repulsed by the selfishness behind Butz's playful groping of his topless wife, but the reactions come more from watching two daring and committed performances than any feelings nurtured for Jan and Adam.

"It's a stupid word, 'love.' There should be fifty words for it; like Eskimos have for snow," says Jan during a sobering moment.  And while there is much to be admired in Weller's play, there is little impact without a fuller exploration of the love that exists, or at least once may have existed, between its characters.

Photos of Norbert Leo Butz and Elizabeth Marvel by Joan Marcus

Posted on: Monday, October 06, 2008 @ 02:07 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

"Yeah, it's a musical.  This is a festival of all musicals."

"Oh good, I love musicals."

"It's just not, you know, like Broadway.  They don't have all the big sets and costumes."

"Oh, but that's the best part."

I don't know what that second woman thought of the afternoon's NYMF production but I get the nagging feeling she might have raved over the new Broadway musical adaptation of Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities.

Although I hadn't read any of the first wave of reviews, by the time I was seated for my post-opening night press performance at the Hirschfeld it was pretty much common knowledge to the entire Broadway community that the new (and from the looks of her Playbill bio, the only) creation from bookwriter/composer/lyricist Jill Santoriello brought out gobs of that legendary New York theatre critic acid wit among the great majority of my colleagues.

So I'm not going to write very much about the show because, at this point, there's really no sense in subjecting readers to a "Me too!" account of the material's ineptitude.  Besides, I couldn't possibly come up with anything cleverer than David Cote's observation that the score sounds like it was composed on tracing paper.

But I will say this.  Thanks to a bit of recently stirred controversy involving Barack Obama, John McCain and Sarah Palin, it wasn't long after the curtain was raised that a certain, newly-popular phrase kept repeating in my head:  Lipstick on a Pig.

I seriously think we should start using the phrase Lipstick on a Pig to categorize a certain class of Broadway musicals; the ones where first rate productions are given to inferior material, prompting loud ovations of appreciation for the cast, the design, the staging… everything but the book, music and lyrics.

While Jill Santoriello's effort isn't aggressively bad - we're not talking In My Life or The Blonde In The Thunderbird, here - it's just sadly uninspired.  Whatever emotional pull there is in the evening has already been supplied by Dickens' classic story of a hard-drinking English playboy who makes a heroic sacrifice for the husband of the woman he loves at the outset of the French Revolution's Reign of Terror.  While the musical's book has a good, basic structure, the simple rhymes that make up her surface-scratching lyrics and the generically "glorious" melodies - the familiar kind of music that telegraphs to the audience that something of great theatricality is going on - adds nothing of interest to what was already there nearly 150 years ago.

But director/choreographer Warren Carlyle's production does efficiently supply the old Max Factor treatment.  Tony Walton's set may seem disappointingly skeletal at first, but its large moveable units help keep the actors in perpetual motion, allowing us to admire how Dickensian everyone looks in David Zinn's costumes and Tom Watson's wigs.

And while the material barely tests the acting skills of the talented cast, the score at least provides a vehicle for some pretty damn terrific singing.  Aaron Lazar can take that high belting business that's so popular these days and give it some real texture.  Brandi Burkhardt, Natalie Toro and Kevin Earley all get their moments to show their stuff and reliable Broadway favorites Gregg Edelman and Nick Wyman are always a delight.  Outshining them all - in a role where, quite frankly, any self-respecting musical theatre actor had better outshine them all - is James Barbour as the arch and clever bad boy, Sydney Carton.  Giving the score more emotional weight with his versatile low baritone than Santoriello did with her piano, he reaches tortured depths and airy heights with a rich, masculine musical theatre timbre guided by intelligent, detailed phrasing.

But even outshining Barbour was a moment in the opening of the second act when an actor held up the gleaming metal blade of a guillotine that reflected a blinding beam of light directly into the face of some unfortunate patron sitting in the middle of the orchestra section.  For what might have been 16 bars or so, I and many others in the audience turned our heads away from the stage to watch the guy trying to shield his eyes from the pinpoint light.  Years from now, I'm sure that will be my most vivid memory from attending A Tale of Two Cities.

Photo of James Barbour (top) and company by Carol Rosegg

Posted on: Thursday, October 02, 2008 @ 02:58 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

Let's start taking bets.  How many clueless parents are going to be taking their toddlers because they assume the Disney name means it's for kids?

Posted on: Wednesday, October 01, 2008 @ 01:24 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

-- Robert Benchley

The grosses are out for the week ending 9/28/2008 and we've got them all

right here in BroadwayWorld.com's grosses section.

Up for the week was: XANADU (20.6%), A TALE OF TWO CITIES (11.1%), MARY POPPINS (4.5%), A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (4.0%), THE LION KING (3.3%), GREASE (3.2%), THE LITTLE MERMAID (2.0%), TITLE OF SHOW (1.8%), CHICAGO (0.1%),

Down for the week was: THE 39 STEPS (-9.1%), THE SEAGULL (-8.4%), IN THE HEIGHTS (-7.7%), SPRING AWAKENING (-6.9%), SPAMALOT (-5.1%), AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (-5.0%), EQUUS (-4.3%), THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (-4.0%), HAIRSPRAY (-3.4%), AVENUE Q (-2.4%), MAMMA MIA! (-1.4%), BOEING-BOEING (-1.3%), JERSEY BOYS (-0.3%), GYPSY (-0.2%), ALL MY SONS (-0.1%), WICKED (-0.1%),

Posted on: Monday, September 29, 2008 @ 03:43 PM Posted by: Michael Dale

I don't mean to doubt the intelligence or inquisitiveness of the guy, but if I asked a pre-statehood Oklahoma cowboy how high the corn has grown, the first response I'd expect wouldn't be a comparison to the height of a proboscidea native to Africa and Asia.  Perhaps he found a picture book in some public library, or maybe that famous Thomas Edison film of the electrocution of Topsy, the Coney Island elephant, had made its way to a local picture house.

In any case, if your only exposure to a live, professional performance of Oklahoma! is Trevor Nunn's re-written, introspective and almost completely misguided mess that played Broadway several seasons back, you seriously owe it to yourself, and especially to Rodgers and Hammerstein, to get yourself out to The Paper Mill, where they know that Oklahoma! is a big boisterous musical drama (with a lot of great comedy) that smacks of the American pioneering spirit.

If the main plot of whether the headstrong farmer Laurey will go to the box social with the arrogant cowboy Curly or her loner hired hand Jud doesn't seem like the most scintillating story on its surface, Hammerstein's superb book - which contains several lengthy scenes bursting with tense drama and true hilarity - keeps us fully aware of the dark, violent culture nurtured beneath the homespun simplicity.  And if its moral lesson, "I don't say I'm no better than anybody else but I'll be damned if I ain't just as good," doesn't exactly have the refined eloquence of Thomas Jefferson, it is still, as John Adams might have put it, "a masterful expression of the American mind."

Director James Brennan's production spares us any newfangled takes on the 65-year-old musical.  I noticed some minor cuts in the book here and there (though slicing down the overture to a quick prelude is a major one and should not have been done) but he simply provides a good, straightforward, extremely enjoyable mounting of a piece that works fine just as it is.

Adam Monley and Brynn O'Malley not only sing beautifully as lovers Curly and Laurey but also do very well in Hammerstein's more dramatic moments; particularly in O'Malley's monologue where she describes what her character wishes for in life, hinting at sexual longing that she can't - or won't - express.  Andrew Varela gives the most normal performance of Jud Frey I've ever seen.  While the role is traditionally played as a dangerous menace or as a man who may have some kind of mental disability, Varela's Jud is just a regular guy who, living in a violent culture as it is, crosses over the line of acceptable behavior when he can't win the girl he loves.  His acting and singing of "Lonely Room," the musical's major dramatic soliloquy, is first rate and fully empathetic.

Though Ado Annie, the boy-crazy gal who "cain't say no" to any affection-starved lad, is one of musical theatre's most famous comic roles, Megan Sikora's cartoon interpretation seems more suited for a production of Li'l Abner.  Her high-pitched squeak of a voice gets plenty of laughs on its own, especially when she quickly switches to a low growl, but it also gets in the way of understanding the jokes that are already in the book and lyrics.  It's a good performance, but one that seems out of place compared with the others.  Brian Sears' dumb, but sincere Will Parker (snazzily danced, I should say) and Jonathan Brody's slick delivery of some of the book's funniest lines, as peddler Ali Hakim, are more on the mark.  Louise Flaningam as the hearty Aunt Eller tends to get a little muggy at times but does nicely when sincerity is called for.

Peggy Hickey's lively choreography, a traditional mix of ballet, two-steppen' and square dancin', reaches its peak during a terrific challenge dance section of "The Farmer and the Cowman."  She meets the dramatic challenges of Laurey's dream ballet very nicely, though I could have done without all the loud butt-slapping of the dance hall girls.  This is Oklahoma!, not Oh! Calcutta!

Photo by Gerry Goodstein:  Top: Brynn O'Malley and Adam Monley; Bottom: Ryan Jackson and Company

Posted on: Monday, September 29, 2008 @ 01:13 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

I think she summed it up very nicely.

The Mint's artistic director, Jonathan Bank, has a sharp eye for what the company calls "forgotten, but worthy" plays.  This one, making its American premiere under the graceful direction of Lou Jacob, is truly a lost gem.

Written for Canada's Crest Theatre, the action takes place at the well-appointed home of Toronto's McBane family, shortly after the turn of the 20^th Century.  Deeply religious family patriarch David (Gerry Bamman) runs the household with his brother Malcolm (Jack Wetherall) and Mildred (Robin Moseley), the sister of their deceased brother.  Years earlier a fourth brother had signed off his share of the family business for full ownership of one of their lesser holdings, which went bust under his leadership.  As the play begins, the three adult children born of his marriage to an Indian woman (Native Canadian?) are coming to stay in the McBane household after their mother's death.  At first they seem like shy, uncultured sorts, but eventually it's revealed they grew up with daily reminders from mom that they live poor because their father was swindled out of a healthy living by his brothers.

Douglas (Aaron Krohn), the eldest of the trio, demands they receive a substantial inheritance from the McBane estate to a shocked David, who has a very different recollection of the circumstances behind his brother's estrangement from the family.  Meanwhile, David's sweet daughter Elspie (Sandra-Struthers-Clere), who is being courted by Mildred's minister-to-be nephew, John (Chad Hoeppner), has taken a liking to her new-found cousin, the hard-drinking party boy, Angus (Saxon Palmer).  John has become equally fascinated by the intelligent and sexually aggressive McBane middle child Jean (Jeanine Serralles).

After family secrets are uncovered, prejudices revealed and legs are bared in a "shocking" celebration of dance (a lively break from the sceaming and manipulations) Priestley cleverly takes us to an unexpected and fully satisfying conclusion.

The solid ensemble cast includes standout performances by the vibrantly-voiced Bamman as the rich man who isn't necessarily the villain in the piece, and Serralles, as a woman both proud of and ashamed by her upbringing.  Chet Carlin charms in some lighter scenes as the family doctor.

As is the norm for Mint Productions, the design is first rate with Marcus Doshi supplying lights and Camille Assaf the period costumes.  Roger Hanna's fascinating set shows the skeleton of the home and the trim of its shiny marble floors in copper-colored piping, truly giving us the glass cage through which little can be kept secret.

Photos by Richard Termine:  Top: Saxon Palmer, Gerry Bamman and Aaron Krohn; Bottom:  Jeanine Serralles and Saxon Palmer

Posted on: Thursday, September 25, 2008 @ 08:27 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

How do you feel about well established writers who make a living through their art being granted cash awards that might otherwise go to talented unknowns who could use the money to spend less time at their day jobs and more time to writing?  Let us know in our new poll.

Posted on: Wednesday, September 24, 2008 @ 01:13 PM Posted by: Michael Dale

What works so beautifully about Irena's Vow is that it is told with the simple story-telling elegance of an uncomplicated woman who was led by circumstance to do something extraordinary during extremely complicated times.  The nine other actors play essentially one-note characters (and they play them very well, I might add) in this plot-driven ninety minute piece, which seems appropriate when you consider that the dramatization serves as a substitute for the way she describes the story for her young audience.

After the Catholic Irena is raped by a group of invading Russian soldiers at the outset of World War II ("That was my first date.  My first kiss."), she is sent to work in a German munitions factory.  There, her blonde hair and fluency in German attracts the attention of SS Major Eduard Rugemer (Thomas Ryan), who orders her sent to his barracks to be in charge of a dozen Jews working in his laundry room.  (We only see three: expectant parents played by Gene Silvers and Maja Wampuszyc and Tracee Chimo as a seamstress around Irena's age.)  By the time Rugemer decides to move to a large home and take Irena with him as his head housekeeper, she has already witnessed the systematic elimination of the Jews in progress and takes it upon herself to hide her 12 companions in the basement.  After all, inside the home of an SS major is the last place someone would expect Jews to be hiding.

There are close calls, of course, and even a bit of humor, but when Irena must go to extreme measures to save the lives of her friends, her actions cause the eventual victors to see her as a Nazi sympathizer and she is made to suffer the consequences.

Michael Parva directs with a soft and sensitive touch.  The drama is never didactic and though the play is light on character development the evening can be emotionally overwhelming; especially when Alex Koch's projections of period photographs add raw authenticity to the production.

But despite the fine accomplishments of her colleagues, the evening belongs to the mesmerizing Tovah Feldshuh, perhaps one of the New York stage's most underappreciated actors.  Without trying to pass herself off as 19 she gives a wonderful sense of youthful disillusionment and rejuvenation to her portrayal, making Irena a heroic figure who is still going through the normal phases of growing up.  As older Irena, she is a modest and soft-spoken woman who can turn to rage when hearing those who deny the Holocaust ever happened.  During such moments, or when reacting to the piece's most tragic episodes with painful realism, you can truly forget that she's acting.  But then, maybe she isn't.

Photo of Tovah Feldshuh by Carol Rosegg

Posted on: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 @ 11:47 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

The grosses are out for the week ending 9/21/2008 and we've got them all

right here in BroadwayWorld.com's grosses section.

Up for the week was: ALL MY SONS (97.7%), A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (81.1%), THE SEAGULL (79.8%), SPRING AWAKENING (9.2%), THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (8.1%), IN THE HEIGHTS (7.6%), THE 39 STEPS (5.8%), TITLE OF SHOW (5.4%), SPAMALOT (4.8%), GYPSY (4.0%), GREASE (2.3%), MARY POPPINS (1.8%), CHICAGO (1.5%), JERSEY BOYS (1.4%), MAMMA MIA! (1.3%), AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (1.1%), HAIRSPRAY (0.7%), THE LITTLE MERMAID (0.6%), WICKED (0.5%),

Down for the week was: A TALE OF TWO CITIES (-8.3%), AVENUE Q (-7.1%), EQUUS (-4.4%), XANADU (-2.0%), THE LION KING (-1.5%), LEGALLY BLONDE (-0.7%), BOEING-BOEING (-0.5%), SOUTH PACIFIC (-0.1%),

Posted on: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 @ 11:46 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

Just a hunch.

Posted on: Monday, September 22, 2008 @ 01:24 PM Posted by: Michael Dale

Maybe that's one of the reasons Gerard Alessandrini, whose contributions to the intimate satirical musical revue have surely by now earned him a well-respected place beside the likes of Julius Monk and Ben Bagley, has decided to close his frequently updated jabbing at theatre's elite on the twenty-seventh anniversary of its Jan. 15, 1982 premiere.

After all, when Forbidden Broadway first hit the stage of Palsson's on W. 72^nd Street people like Cy Coleman, Comden and Green, Tommy Tune, Jerry Herman and Harold Prince, just to name a few, all had great successes ahead of them.  Stunt casting was Linda Ronstadt having a decently legit soprano in The Pirates of Penzance, you had to get off the 1 train at Christopher Street for camp and the biggest jukebox musical to ever play Broadway was Do Re Mi.

Now, near the end of Forbidden Broadway Goes To Rehab, a disheartened Stephen Sondheim, who has also had spoof-worthy success during the Alessandriniera, sings of the current Broadway landscape, "Shot by shot / Putting up with rivals / Now what's hot / Has to be a kiddie show to pay / Or they do a Sir Lloyd Webber freak show / Everything is cardboard or cliché."

And though Dot, Sweeny and Red Riding Hood try and convince him to, "Just keep moving on," by the time the talented cast is taking bows it's abundantly clear why the show's creator/writer is not heeding their advice; there is very little greatness around to satirize.  His takes on Mary Poppins ("Feed The Burbs"), Young Frankenstein ("Putting Up With Shit"), Hairspray ("You Can't Stop The Camp"), Jersey Boys ("Big Shows Get By") and The Lion King ("Circle of Mice") echo a sentiment that has been dominating the show in recent years; that the cornerstone of culture and cleverness has been dumbed down to into a self-spoofing theme park.

But of course, that's definitely not to say that the new Forbidden Broadway isn't worth another visit or two before the last laugh is guffawed.  The cast is winning, those costumes by the late Alvin Colt (with additional ones by David Moyer) still get laughs before a lyric is uttered and the Alessandrini wit (he also co-directs with Phillip George) still provides one of the smartest and funniest evenings a musical theatre lover can ask for.  Forbidden Broadway Goes To Rehab only suffers when compared with past editions that had richer soil from which to grow.

Newer song parodies are hatched from In The Heights, which is pushed as a Latino show for white people, A Tale of Two Cities ("You thought the British op'rical was hell? / But try to sing this re-tread Scarlet Pimpernell.") and South Pacific (sung to recorded full orchestrations) while August: Osage County is reimaged as a boxing match between its two leading characters.  And while he mocks [title of show]'s use of profanity ("They say the "f-word" 44 times in [title of show] for no good reason…  It's actually considered smart and witty today.") he seems to defend Spring Awakening's use of the word in "Totally Bleeped."

As always, Gerard Alessandrini assembles an exceptional cast, under the music direction of on-stage pianist David Caldwell, that excels both vocally and in mimicry.  "Glitter and Be Glib," with Christina Bianco remarkably matching Kristin Chenoweth in soprano trills and perky squeaks, is bound to remembered as one of the series' classics.  Her appearances as Kerry Butler, Bernadette Peters and Kelli O'Hara, among others are done with chameleon-like accuracy.

As Patti LuPone, Gina Kreiezmar makes Mt. Everest's peak from the side of her upper lip even while belting out and her manic impersonation of Ms. Minnelli is reason enough to bring back the old standby, "Liza One-Note."

Michael West does a terrific job in copying James Barbour's vocal dramatics and Jared Bradshaw, in perhaps the evening's cleverest bit, is a stitch as Equus' Daniel Radcliffe going from shy adolescent to confident stripper in "Let Me Enter Naked."

Like the odd emptiness the city has when The Fantasticks isn't around, the absence of Forbidden Broadway without the promise of a new one on the way leaves us without a reliable old pal we know we can visit from time to time whenever we're in need of a good laugh.  Perhaps Gerard Alessandrini will see fit to bring us a new entry once the Broadway climate is worth spoofing again.  And wouldn't that be nice for several reasons.

Photos by Carol Rosegg:  Top:  Christina Bianco and Jared Bradshaw; Bottom:  Gina Kreiezmar

********************************************

Oh, good God, if Mandy Patinkin really wanted to be Caliban so badly he should have just signed to play the role instead of snarling, snorting and growling his way through Prospero in Brian Kulick's beautifully conceived but poorly acted production of Shakespeare's The Tempest at the Classic Stage Company.

To give him his due, the actor does pop in a few moments of humanity as the disposed Duke of Milan who uses sorcery to whip up a storm that shipwrecks the brother who betrayed him onto his island home.  And some legitimate humor, too.  That is, aside from his frequent forays into indecipherability where he's crunching his face into knot while rapidly sneering out lines and slicing the air surrounding him to bits with physical actions more suited for a martial arts competition.

At least he gives us some distraction from the passionless pairing of Elisabeth Waterston, who speaks in dull, muffled tones as Prospero's daughter Miranda, and Stark Sands, who gives a flat and emotionless portrayal of her new love, Ferdinand.

Shakespeare describes Prospero's "savage" slave Caliban as deformed and misshapen.  In this production that means has the physique of an Alvin Ailey dancer.  Using a sometimes too thick to be understood Jamaican accent for the role, Nyambi Nyambi is blissfully soft-spoken in his scenes with Tony Torn and Steven Rattazzi, who play the clown roles of Trinculo and Stefano as though they've been instructed that loud is funny and louder is just hysterical.

Angel Desai's rather docile, violin-playing Ariel has her moments of charm and the rest of the company all do fine work in smaller roles, particularly Nana Mensah and Bhavesh Patel as spirits whom Kulick utilizes well in controlling the actions of the island's new crop of human visitors.

Simplicity looks lovely in Jian Jung's set, a stageful of white sand (inexplicably swept away during intermission) beneath a tilting flat canvas representing the sky, lit with soft, dreamlike tones by Brian H. Scott.  Platforms emerging from the upstage wall and floor to ceiling poles provide an impish playing area for the three spirits.  Theirs are the only magical contributions to this potentially ethereal production.

Photo of Stark Sands, Mandy Patinkin and Elisabeth Waterston by Joan Marcus

Posted on: Sunday, September 21, 2008 @ 11:36 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

Posted on: Friday, September 19, 2008 @ 11:13 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

Bobby Pearce's costumes are fabulous, going from bright, bouncy taffeta to matching sexy minis and go-go boots.  And Michael Carnahan does a great job dressing up the Westside theatre as a high school gym sporting colorful party decorations.  Nostalgia trippers and moms and grandmas looking for some wholesome fun for theatre night with the 'tweens should find plenty to enjoy in The Marvelous Wonderettes.  And with a little tinkering perhaps the rest of us would, too.

Photo of Victoria Matlock, Farah Alvin, Bets Malone, and Beth Malone by Carol Rosegg

*********************************************************

Though playwright Michael Weller may have gotten his description of Beast as "a fever dream" from a Ray Bradbury story, his play about a horribly disfigured U.S. Iraqi war veteran trying to find his place back in America more closely resembles Mary Shelly's Frankenstein.

In a German military hospital, Private First Class Jimmy Cato (Logan Marshall-Green) sits in mourning beside the casket of his brave buddy, Sergeant Benjamin Voychevsky (Corey Stoll).  Jimmy lost an arm and has had skin grafted from his chest to fix disfigurement to his face.  Voych, as Jimmy calls him, suffered the same wounds and worse when he threw himself in the line of ambush fire, his own gun taking as many as he can with him, in order to protect his men.  The private is only momentarily surprised when his sergeant rises out of his box, apparently alive after all, and though Voych is somewhat confused about what has happened to him, he also knows it would take the army forever to sort out the paperwork needed to have a dead man declared alive again, so the two of them visit a shady captain, who sidelines in selling U.S. arms to Arabs, known for his ability to expedite such matters.

What follows is a sorta darkly comic, phantasmagoric, satirical buddy story - or a fever dream if you prefer - where Voych, whose mental scars match his physical ones stitch for stitch, reacquaints himself with the country he sacrificed nearly everything for, with the loyal and excitable Jimmy tagging along for the ride.

After an encounter with two blind prostitutes and a visit to his "widow's" home to consider letting her know the truth, Voych has an epiphany at Mt. Rushmore (humorously recreated by puppet designer Bob Flanagan) that takes him to a certain Texas ranch to visit a character referred to as "GW."  There, the two veterans introduce the commander in chief to a plan they have which will end the war by ensuring that every American will have a constant reminder of its inevitable result.  And as good soldiers, they're prepared to deal with his resistance.

Program notes tell us Weller began writing Beast last December and had a completed script by January.  There is definitely an exciting sense of urgency to his text, which director Jo Bonney's accentuates with a production that attacks the senses.  Sound designer/composer David Van Tieghem blasts pulsating music between scenes to accompany Tal Yarden's fast moving video montages of warfare and highways.  Make-up and effects designer Nathan Johnson ups the discomfort level in creating the soldiers' wounds and lighting designer David Lander isn't shy about letting us see them.

Stoll gives a beautifully empathetic performance as the quiet center of the production's firestorm; trying his best to hide a fury that bursts out when provoked.  Marshall-Green is also excellent as the young vet living in an arrested adolescence and who knows nothing more of life than to party hard and follow the orders of his superior.  Dan Butler makes a terrific impression as the cynically charming but truly threatening war profiteer, but lacks texture as GW, not playing much more than a cowardly comic impersonation.  Also memorable is Lisa Joyce as the prostitute who makes an emotional connection with Voych.

In the past eight years New York has seen an overload of plays, musical revues and performance pieces critical of President Bush; many of them filled with more anger than dramaturgy and wit.  Beast, while not completely satisfying, still packs a wallop when it reminds us that a leader's legacy is not only what he or she achieves, but the price others pay to achieve it.

Photo of Logan Marshall-Green and Dan Butler by Joan Marcus

Posted on: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 @ 11:21 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

-- Dorothy Parker

The grosses are out for the week ending 9/14/2008 and we've got them all

right here in BroadwayWorld.com's grosses section.

Up for the week was: EQUUS (74.0%), GREASE (13.6%), SPAMALOT (12.9%), A TALE OF TWO CITIES (12.4%), LEGALLY BLONDE (12.2%), THE LION KING (10.0%), GYPSY (9.8%), AVENUE Q (9.7%), CHICAGO (8.7%), THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (8.1%), SPRING AWAKENING (7.1%), MARY POPPINS (5.3%), HAIRSPRAY (5.0%), JERSEY BOYS (4.1%), THE LITTLE MERMAID (2.8%), THE 39 STEPS (2.2%), AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (1.2%), MAMMA MIA! (0.6%), SOUTH PACIFIC (0.1%),

Down for the week was: XANADU (-7.6%), TITLE OF SHOW (-1.8%), IN THE HEIGHTS (-1.6%), BOEING-BOEING (-0.7%), WICKED (-0.2%),

Posted on: Monday, September 15, 2008 @ 03:25 PM Posted by: Michael Dale

Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a little when I compare the way Enter Laughing introduces some of its songs with the method now popularized by Spring Awakening, but it certainly seems like an inner monologue to me when our hero accidentally places his hand on an attractive woman's breast and then, as the scene freezes, sings the refrain, "Whoever You Are, I Love You."  Or when time stands still after a lethal blow to the kid's ego sets off a fantasy of his own funeral, where he imagines how everyone in the world, who are obviously all against him, will suddenly repent for the cruel way they've treated him. 

Enter Laughing began as a semi-autobiographical comic novel by Carl Reiner about David Kolowitz, a 17-year-old Jewish Bronx boy growing up in the 1930s who obsesses over girls and has dreams of becoming a famous actor, despite parental insistence that he goes to pharmacy school, marry a nice girl and has a safe, normal life as a druggist.  Joseph Stein adapted the book into one of the hit Broadway plays of 1963 and then teamed up with composer/lyricist Stan Daniels to convert the piece into the 1976 musical, So Long, 174^th Street.  (This was back in the day when they actually thought up new names for musicals.)  Popular wisdom says that So Long, 174^th Street's mere two week run was mostly caused by the decision to go for a big star and cast significantly older than 17-year-old Robert Morse as David, playing the show as a flashback.  (I suppose a lyric like "I keep undressing girls with my eyes" loses some of its innocent charm once the actor singing it hits 40.)  But the eventually recorded (mostly) original Broadway cast album, featuring Morse, George S. Irving, Loni Ackerman and Kaye Ballard (added for the recording) helped the very funny score achieve cult status among collectors.  Concert productions by both Musicals Tonight! and the York proved the show to be a crowd pleaser, especially when Stein revised his book to turn David back into a teenager for the whole evening.  Now, with some minor tinkering on some of the songs (the sensuous delicatessen duet, "Bolero On Rye" is the only number completely removed) and a less catchy but commercially stronger title, Enter Laughing, the Musical, the York mounts its first full scale Off-Broadway revival.

While I didn't see the original production, the cast album performances and the Broadway reviews suggest it was a show with big, broad comic performances.  For the intimate York Theatre, director Stuart Ross has his cast playing on a more sincere level, creating a sweet empathy for the characters without losing any laughs.  This is particularly true for Josh Grisetti, whose starry-eyed awkwardness as David is warm and sympathetic throughout his misadventures both onstage and with girls.  Real life married couple Jill Eikenberry and Michael Tucker play his manipulative mom and mensch of a pop, with Eikenberry beautifully underplaying her two guilt-laden songs, "My Son, The Druggist" and "If You Want To Break Your Mother's Heart."  (And it takes talent to underplay a scene where you're handing your son a knife and encouraging him to stab you in the back.)  One of the score's funniest numbers, a bluesy torch song where a young girl sings of the grade school boys who wronged her in her pre-teen years, is snazzily belted by Emily Shoolin, playing the nice girl who wants to encourage David to follow his dream while wishing he would marry her and go to pharmacy school instead.

But since this is a musical about actors there must be at least a couple of eccentric theatrical types.  Janine LaManna is a hoot as the sex-starved actress David plays a love scene opposite.  Her performance of a song added since the Broadway run, a sit-on-the-piano cabaret turn where she describes the low standards she sets for finding her dream man ("He must have skin," is one of her requirements.) is just hysterical.

And then, of course, there's musical comedy's legendary character man, George S. Irving; a veteran of over 30 Broadway productions, beginning with the original Oklahoma!  Here he recreates the role of David's erudite, hard-drinking, washed-up acting teacher, which he played when So Long, 174^th Street premiered over 30 years ago.  At age 85 he's a bundle of sharp comedic energy; his superb and melodious timing still working its magic.  The evening's show stopping highlight is when he uproariously sings "The Butler's Song," in a fantasy scene where David imagines he's become so famous that every Hollywood starlet wants to sleep with him and his butler must keep track of his busy sexual schedule.  The naughty lyrics delivered by Irving's elegant and powerful voice make the number one of the highlights of this or any other season.

James Morgan's simple settings, David Toser's period costumes, Chris Robinson's lighting (which provides occasional laughs itself) and Matt Castle's music arrangements all serve Ross' playful mounting very well.

While it's far too early to tell, Enter Laughing might well wind up being the funniest, most entertaining production of a musical we'll see this season.  If you miss it, consider yourself totally f***ed.

Photos by Carol Rosegg:  Top: Michael Tucker, Jill Eikenberry and Josh Grisetti;  Bottom:  Janine LaManna, Josh Grisetti and George S. Irving

Posted on: Monday, September 15, 2008 @ 03:31 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

In presenting director Daniel Haley's pocket-sized mounting of Goldilocks on the tiny cabaret stage of The Duplex, the Opening Doors Theatre Company - who specializes in spirited revivals of underappreciated musicals, many of which have developed cult followings - closes its second season with exactly that; a fun night out.  Jean McCormick and Billy Sharpe sharply trade verbal jabs and sing with gusto (no microphones) as the stage performer who's ready to quit show business and marry the wealthy and respectable man of her dreams and the arrogant silent flick director who has her contracted to do one final film.  (He gives her the screen name "Goldilocks" because she doesn't want her name to be associated with the project.)  Comic complications arise because the director has been regularly hoarding funds for "miscellaneous expenses" from his backer in order to one day finance his dream project, an ancient Egyptian epic.  But when he gets word that financial support ends with the completion of his current 2-reeler, he dreams up ways to make the film longer and extend the time needed to shoot, thus delaying the star's marriage plans.

This production features four songs cut before the Broadway opening; a quick chorus number and three solos that beefed up the supporting roles originally essayed by Pat Stanley ("Tagalong Kid"), Margaret Hamilton ("My Last Spring") and Nathaniel Frey ("Little Girls Should Be Seen").  Though none of them are lost gems, they all receive fine deliveries from Jennifer Teska, Rachael Lee and Lee Chavellier.  Teska puts in an adorable turn as the cutesy girl-next-door crushing on the director and Andrew McLeavey is very funny as the overly noble fiancé of the reluctant star.  Ryan Hallett, Clare Chihambakwe and Rachel Louise Thomas make up the rest of the charming ensemble, led by music director/accompanist Jessica Stewart.

Goldilocks' brief run continues with 7pm performances tonight and tomorrow (September 13 &14) and then Opening Doors starts planning out its next season of rarely-seen Broadway revivals.  With enjoyable productions of great titles like Bring Back Birdie, Whoop-Up and The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public already under their belts, musical theatre lovers are bound to be delighted with their choices.

Photo of Billy Sharpe and Jean McCormick by Suzanne Adams

Posted on: Saturday, September 13, 2008 @ 04:03 PM Posted by: Michael Dale

Love On The Rocks is what Maye calls this set because, as she explains, whenever people ask for requests they always seem to want sad songs.  "People are happiest when they're sitting at a bar drinking and crying."

And while the remainder of her set lingers on the less successful side of love, this is no pity party.  There's a still dignity to her emoting of Murray Grand and Elisse Boyd's heart-crushing "Guess Who I Saw Today?" and a lovely, wispy elegance she gives to Bill Barnes' "Something Cool."  She builds "In The Wee Small Hours of the Morning" (David Mann & Bob Hilliard) to a majestic finish, but can be sweet, pretty and simple with a graceful sentiment like Rodgers and Hart's "Nobody's Heart."

Michael Stewart's lyric to the title song from I Love My Wife (set to Cy Coleman's music) gets an interesting twist as she sings it as "the other woman" who understands that although she enjoys a certain man's company, she'll never have his heart.  She matter-of-factly concludes, "He loves his wife."

After one of her 76 appearances on The Tonight Show, Johnny Carson looked directly into the camera and advised any young singers watching to buy her albums if they wanted to learn "how it's done."  I have no camera to look into but I'd advise any fledgling cabaret singers to consider the cost of attending one of Marilyn Maye's performances as an educational investment.  For the rest of us, it's just ninety minutes of Heaven.

Posted on: Friday, September 12, 2008 @ 11:45 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

And while the production at their new Theatre at Saint Clement's home certainly has all the sharp professionalism I come to expect from the Peccadillo Company - a brash period feel, excellent design and terrific ensemble acting - it's the playwright who lets the evening down.  The only solo effort by the famous co-author (with Ben Hecht) of The Front Page and Twentieth Century has a promising plot full of scandal, romance and crazy antics, but despite a game try by the actors there are few decent laughs to squeeze out of this one.

Set in an unnamed southern state whose governor is now running for the senate, the play revolves around Nickey (Carter Roy), a young hotshot campaign manager frantically attempting to cover up the news that his drunken boss has died in a whorehouse the night before the election; hoping to save the beloved man's reputation, stop a nosey newspaper publisher (a gruff and distinguished Raymond Thorne) from printing accusations of foul play behind the funding of a maternity hospital and keep his party in office.

Roy's fast-thinking Nickey is solidly appealing, as is Ellen Zolezzi as the hard-nosed but soft-hearted secretary he loves.  Laura Daniel drips drawly femininity as the belle who would steal him away and the 16-member company, playing 25 roles, is loaded with amusing character turns highlighted by Robert O'Gorman and Mark Manley as a pair of back room manipulators, Dale Carman as the mild-mannered Health Commissioner in line to fill the vacant governor's seat and Margery Beddow (Gwen Verdon's understudy in Redhead) as a sweet and silly madam.

Wackerman's swift and snappy production looks splendid with Joseph Spirito's dignified capital building set and Gail Cooper-Hecht's attractive and stylish 1940's costumes.

The evening is never dull, but the three acts are never especially funny either, due to MacArthur's uninspired dialogue.  A possible problem, and this is common with political humor, could be that many references intended to be funny sixty-six years ago are unrecognizable as jokes today.  Although I'm not certain that line about Jack Pearl would have gotten a laugh in any decade.

Photo of Ellen Zolezzi, Carter Roy and Laura Daniel by Laura Daniel 

Posted on: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 @ 02:25 AM Posted by: Michael Dale

Posted on: Tuesday, September 09, 2008 @ 10:56 AM Posted by: Michael Dale