From the Archives - A Rare Treat for Theatergoers: 'Lady in the Dark' (1998)

This review appeared in The Metro Herald in May 1998, twenty years ago this month.

A Rare Treat for Theatergoers: Lady in the Dark

Rick Sincere

Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

Idiosyncrasy saves us from boredom and blandness. In a world of popular culture driven by focus groups, polls, and plagiarism, it's no wonder that television and the theatre seem infected by a sameness virus. Luckily, individual human choices are able to transcend this groupthink. And the American Century Theater (TACT) in Arlington shows us how the idiosyncratic choices of a few individuals can slash through the morass of predictability and yawns we have grown to expect from so many cultural institutions.

Last season's Orson Welles' Moby Dick Rehearsed, for instance, was a triumph of physicality and illusion. The show had to be extended several times -- yet it was a play that hardly anyone had ever heard about before the TACT production.

Artistic director Jack Marshall has done it again with Lady in the Dark. Except, in this case, TACT is presenting a play that almost all literate theatergoers have heard about, but hardly anyone under the age of 80 has seen.

Lady in the Dark, with a libretto by Moss Hart, music by Kurt Weill, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin, frequently appears on lists of the "greatest American musicals." Yet it is not part of the basic musical theatre repertoire. Some plays become classics because of repetition -- what community theatre company has not already performed Guys and Dolls or The Fantasticks three or four times? Some become classics because of a special cult status. Anyone Can Whistle achieved this when it closed after nine performances, but its producers were canny enough to record an original cast album.


Lady in the Dark is of a different breed. It closed after less then a year when leading lady Gertrude Lawrence left the show. It had no original cast album (the concept had not yet emerged in 1941). According to research by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music, fewer than 20 productions of Lady in the Dark have been mounted since 1942. This production by the American Century Theater is the first since 1965. Its reputation grew through the Hot Stove League of musical theater aficionados. It's discussed with the same distant admiration as baseball fans banter about a one-season pitching phenomenon of the 1930s. Textbooks explore it at length. Anthologies include it. But no one has seen it.

Except for three songs in the second act -- "Tchaichowsky," "The Saga of Jenny," and "My Ship" -- hardly a soul has heard any of the score. Yet Lady in the Dark is legendary. Why?

In January 1941, Lady in the Dark set records for expenditure. The production cost a then-unimaginable $150,000. (At the time, top ticket prices for Broadway plays were $4.40.) It had four interlocking turntables, extravagant sets and costumes, and a cast of 50 that included Danny Kaye, Victor Mature, MacDonald Carey, and Natalie Schafer (later Mrs. Thurston Howell on Gilligan's Island). Weill scored the show for a full symphony orchestra.

Theater lore has it that later producers found the show entirely too daunting. Jack Marshall, however, is dauntless.

It is said that theatre requires nothing more than actors, a performing space, and lighting. Everything else is gravy -- bells and whistles, smoke and mirrors. TACT proves that it is possible to mount a complicated, literate musical play without the special effects that so frightened other producers. In the small black-box theatre at Gunston Arts Center, set designer Hal Crawford and lighting designer David Walden have created a workable space that does all that is necessary to convey what Hart and his colleagues intended.

For those unfamiliar with the story, Lady in the Dark is basically a non-musical play with extended musical sequences. The musical sequences -- little one-act operas -- exist only in the dreams of troubled magazine editor Liza Elliott (Maureen Kerrigan). The non-musical scenes are played out in the drab offices of Elliott and her psychoanalyst, Dr. Brooks (Bernard Engel). Significantly, these scenes are played at the most distant edges of the stage, as far from the audience as possible. This allows the musical scenes to take up the fullest extent of the performing space, literally blossoming before our eyes with the colorful costumes of designer Edu. Bernardino.

Liza, a driven career woman, has suddenly begun to have panic attacks and fits of depression. For these, she seeks the help of Dr. Brooks. In what may be the play's most unsatisfactory facet, she resolves her problems in barely a week. Within that week, however, we are able to observe the inner workings of Liza's mind -- the "lady" in the "dark."

Given the structure of the play, with dream sequences being as disjointed as dreams are, the commercial temptation for Weill and Gershwin would have been to write a collection of potential hit songs -- something in the revue tradition of the Ziegfeld Follies or Garrick Gaieties. Instead, they wrote integrated, operatic playlets in which discrete songs are difficult to discern at all. Ironically, the play itself does not nearly approach the full integration that Rodgers and Hammerstein achieved with Oklahoma! two years later, setting the standard for American musical theatre for the next quarter century.

The play does, however, give opportunities for both dramatic and musical virtuoso performances. Standout Jason Gilbert is manic as photographer Russell Paxton. Buzz Mauro is pleasingly sleazy as advertising director, Charley Johnson, a perfect foil for "boss lady" Liza. Timothy Hayes Lynch is appropriately, WASPishly staid as Liza's longtime live-in lover, Kendall Nesbitt. In a small but important role as high-school student Ben Butler, Kerry DeMatteis is sweetly but unintentionally inconsiderate (and well-cast for age -- DeMatteis seems not to have aged a day since his Washington area debut in a Georgetown University production of Gemini almost 14 years ago). Somewhat off the mark, however, is Tom Manger as Randy Curtis, who simply fails to come across convincingly as a Hollywood matinee idol.

Aside from Liza, the female roles in Lady in the Dark are underwritten, but Mary McGowan is a finely-tuned Maggie Grant, Liza's right hand, and Brenda Wesner gets a few comic turns as Allison DuBois.

There is a reason, unfortunately, to feel sorry for all these talented cast members. They will now put Lady in the Dark on their resumes -- but no one will believe them. No one, that is, except for those who hear about the American Century Theater's bold decision to mount a play that scares off richer and more powerful producers.

Lady in the Dark has been extended through May 30 at the Gunston Arts Center, Theatre II, 2700 S. Lang Street, Arlington, Virginia. Performances are Wednesday through Saturday at 8:00 p.m., with 2:30 matinees on May 16, 17, and 23. Tickets are $20 and $17 (students/seniors). For information and reservations, call 703-553-8782.

From the Archives - 'Annie Get Your Gun': Not Just a Shot in the Dark

This article appeared in The Metro Herald (Alexandria, Virginia) on January 22, 1999:

Annie Get Your Gun: Not Just a Shot in the Dark

Rick Sincere

Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

By all rights, this year should be a great one for revivals of Broadway musicals, at least if major anniversary productions are mounted. December 30 marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Broadway premiere of Kiss Me, Kate; April 7 will see fifty years since the debut of South Pacific; December 8 will be the fiftieth anniversary of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Hello, Dolly!, after a tryout at Washington's National Theatre, had its Broadway premiere on the night of January 16, 1964, making it 35 years old this month. A Broadway revival of The Sound of Music, which will be 40 years old on November 16, is already into a long run. Others celebrating forty years in 1999 include Gypsy, Once Upon a Mattress (also recently revived), and the Pulitzer-winning Fiorello. And another 35-year-old (September 22) is the great Fiddler on the Roof.

What all these great musicals have in common -- with the possible exception of the seldom-produced Fiorello -- is that members of the audience walk into the theatre already humming the tunes. (This is not to be confused with a similar phenomenon that occurs when people see a new Andrew Lloyd Webber musical for the first time.) So it is with the revival of Annie Get Your Gun now on stage at the Kennedy Center Opera House. This 1946 musical, written by the irrepressible Irving Berlin for the incomparable Ethel Merman, is jam-packed with standard melodies that should be familiar to anyone who has owned a radio during the past half-century.

Although the songs are arranged in a different order from the original production -- it now begins with that anthem to performers, "There's No Business Like Show Business" -- each one lands pleasantly and familiarly on the ears: "Anything You Can Do," "Doin' What Comes Natur'lly," "The Girl that I Marry," "Lost in His Arms," "They Say It's Wonderful," "You Can't Get a Man with a Gun," and "An Old Fashioned Wedding," introduced by Merman in the 1966 Lincoln Center revival, a contrapuntal duet no doubt intended to match the success of the similar "You're Just in Love," from the 1950 Berlin-Merman collaboration Call Me Madam.

The team behind this revival of Annie Get Your Gun certainly matches that of the original production, which included Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II (as producers), Dorothy and Herbert Fields (book writers), Jo Mielziner (scenic and lighting design), and Joshua Logan (director). That production was only the second book musical in Broadway history to exceed 1,000 performances (preceded by Oklahoma!).

This revival is directed by Graciela Daniele, fresh from her award-winning choreography for Ragtime; the book has been revised by Peter Stone, who has won four Tony awards; the scenic design is by Tony Walton, with three Tonys, an Emmy, and an Oscar on his shelves; and backed by Tony-winning producers Barry and Fran Weissler.

Bernadette Peters is clearly the star of the show as sharpshooter Annie Oakley. Her name appears above the title, and she can belt a Berlin ballad nearly as well as La Merman herself. The two Broadway divas are similar in many ways: Despite forays into film and television, Peters is known primarily as a stage actress, making her name in Sondheim shows (Sunday in the Park with George, Into the Woods). Merman seldom ventured into the movies -- she repeated her starring Broadway roles only in the 1936 Anything Goes and the 1953 Call Me Madam. Her greatest triumphs -- Annie Oakley and Mama Rose in Gypsy -- were played by Betty Hutton and Rosalind Russell in the film versions. Go figure.

Unlike Merman, Peters rose through the Broadway ranks in an era in which Hollywood does not automatically produce movies based on hit musicals. In fact, not a single one of Peters' Broadway hits has been translated into film, and only one of her films -- Annie (1982) -- is based on a Broadway musical. So, to non-theatregoers, Peters is known primarily by straight dramatic performances, and they might be surprised to learn that she has such a terrific singing voice.

In general, Peters delivers what her talent and the material in Annie Get Your Gun promise. Her interpretations of the songs are spot-on, although there is a disappointment in "Lost in His Arms." In this instance, Peters seems to build up to a huge climax, but settles down on the approach to the top. Is this her fault, or was it the decision of arranger John McDaniel? Whatever the case, the whole song feels unresolved and unfulfilling.

One serious problem with Peters performance is her cloying, backwoods accent. It is cute at the beginning, but quickly begins to grate. And why don't the three children playing Annie's younger siblings have a similar accent? Peters needs to tone this down. We're not asking for Manhattan here, but we don't need the Beverly Hillbillies, either.

TV star Tom Wopat gives a strong performance as Annie's love interest and rival, Frank Butler. Wopat's Butler is confident without being (too) arrogant.

Daniele's choreography, created in collaboration with Jeff Calhoun, has echoes of her work in Ragtime. Daniele's dancers move geometrically, complexly, exuberantly. It would be interesting to view her work from above, like the June Taylor Dancers on the old Jackie Gleason show.

Some commentators have criticized the revised book for Annie Get Your Gun for being too "politically correct." These critics are looking just at the surface. While it was probably advisable to rid the script of insensitive treatments of Native Americans (one song, "I'm an Indian, Too," has been dropped from the score), the fact is that Peter Stone's new book subversively makes fun of the P.C. crowd. The most "P.C." jokes are, in fact, self-referentially mocking.

All in all, Annie Get Your Gun is great fun and suitable for the whole family. I hope that many Washington area children get their first taste of musical theatre through this show. It wouldn't be the first time: The celebrated playwright Terrence McNally (currently represented at The American Century Theatre with a revival of his first play -- see last week's Metro Herald for a review) decided as a child that for him, there was "no business like show business" when he saw a road company of -- what else? -- Annie Get Your Gun!

Annie Get Your Gun continues at the Kennedy Center through January 24. Performances are Tuesday through Saturday evenings at 8:00, Saturday matinees at 2:00, and Sundays at 1:30 and 7:00 p.m. Ticket prices range from $20 to $75 and may be purchased at the Kennedy Center box office or by calling Instant-Charge at 202-467-4600.

From the Archives: Reevaluating 'Fiddler on the Roof' from an economic perspective

Publisher's note: This article was originally published on Examiner.com on April 18, 2010. The Examiner.com publishing platform was discontinued July 1, 2016, and its web site went dark on or about July 10, 2016.  I am republishing this piece in an effort to preserve it and all my other contributions to Examiner.com since April 6, 2010. It is reposted here without most of the internal links that were in the original.

Reevaluating 'Fiddler on the Roof' from an economic perspective
April 18, 2010 9:41 PM MST

It’s time to reassess one of the central claims of the classic American musical play, Fiddler on the Roof. The current engagement at Washington’s National Theatre offers a chance to look at the play with fresh eyes, adding a different sort of vitality to a work that is so familiar that we may have begun taking it and its characters for granted.

Tony®-winning Broadway actor and playwright Harvey Fierstein is the star of the latest national tour of Fiddler, playing the role of Tevye, the Dairyman, a character created a century ago by Yiddish short-story writer Sholom Aleichem and beloved by millions of readers and playgoers around the world.

'If I Were a Rich Man'

Tevye sings one of Fiddler’s biggest hit songs, “If I Were a Rich Man,” in which he first complains of his own poverty and then daydreams about what it would be like to be a wealthy man.

Tevye’s life, however, belies his plaintive pleas of poverty. Digging deeper into the text reveals that, far from being a poor man, Tevye is a man with assets and means – someone we might call a working-class entrepreneur. Indeed, nearly all of Tevye’s neighbors in Anatevka are working- or middle-class and not at all poor in any objective sense.

Although Tevye’s wife, Golde, tells one of their five daughters “you’re a girl from a poor family” and although Tevye says to God, “it’s no shame to be poor, but it’s no great honor either,” the circumstances of their family are not those of poverty, especially not the sort of poverty one would expect in a pre-industrial, traditional society.

Four Pieces of Evidence

First, Tevye is a self-employed farmer. He owns at least one horse and other livestock –probably several cows. Not only that, he has sufficient cattle to meet his customers’ needs and he can every so often sell a surplus cow. (Tevye assumes that the butcher wants to buy his “new milk cow,” which implies he has old milk cows and that he has enough cash to periodically buy a new one.)

Second, Tevye is sufficiently secure economically that he is able to hire a tutor for his daughters (“food for lessons,” he says to the itinerant Perchik) at a time when girls were expected to stay uneducated. His third-eldest daughter, Chava, has enough pocket money to buy books for pleasure reading.

Third, when the Russian authorities force Tevye and his neighbors to leave Anatevka, he is given three days to sell his property. What does Tevye own? A house, a barn, and a plot of land big enough to feed his livestock. His ownership is clear enough that he has the courage – and the right – to order the constable off his land while he still owns it.

Fourth, Tevye has disposable income above the subsistence level. He husbands his assets so effectively that he can buy luxuries (candlesticks, goose pillows, and a feather bed) as gifts for his daughter on her wedding day and pay for the food and drink and musicians that make a wedding celebration, too.

To return to “If I Were a Rich Man,” Tevye is not so much asking to be a “rich man” as he is expressing his desire to be a “man of leisure” – a person who does not have to work for a living and who can enjoy a mansion, servants, and free time for prayer and contemplation.

There is no question that Tevye is not “rich” in the sense of a Rockefeller or a Rothschild. Neither is he poor. His family has enough food to eat – indeed, they have enough food that they can routinely share it with strangers and friends who visit for the Sabbath.

Tevye works hard, to be sure, and like any dairy farmer must rise before dawn to feed and milk the cows, plus toil through the rest of the day to make cheese and butter and deliver his goods to his customers. This is not a life of impoverishment. It is a life that produces something of value to trade for other things of value. It is essentially middle-class.

Neighbors and Friends

The other characters we meet in Fiddler on the Roof are in similar economic circumstances. Except for Nachum, the beggar, nearly everyone in the play has means and assets.

Mordcha and his wife own a tavern, where they serve anyone from the village, Jew and Gentile alike. Lazar Wolf is a self-employed butcher who could afford to buy strings of pearls for his wife. Motel Kamzoil (Tevye’s eventual son-in-law) owns his own tailor shop and has saved enough money to buy a modern sewing machine. Yussel is a hatmaker. Even the widow, Yente, is an independent woman who provides a service much in demand in a traditional society like Anatevka’s – she is a matchmaker (much like that independent woman of the Broadway season that preceded the premiere of Fiddler on the Roof, Dolly Levi).

We are told, over and over again, that Tevye’s family and the people of Anatevka are poor, but what we see contradicts what we are told.

Tradition Meets Modernity

All that said, it’s not possible to gainsay Fiddler on the Roof’s other theme: what happens when modernity intrudes upon tradition, and the topsy-turvy world that results (or, at least, that is perceived by those who have to engage the intrusion).

Fiddler on the Roof is set in 1905, the time of the first Russian revolution and, consequently, an era of turmoil and upheaval. For centuries Anatevka has been isolated from the outside world and thus, its inhabitants think, the village need not concern itself with the politics of far away. Those politics arrive with a growl and a bite that are unwelcome, and the people of Anatevka are subjected to a pogrom that eventually results in their exile.

Yet the hidden future-story offers a bittersweet life beyond the final curtain.

Bittersweet Future

Through government-induced violence, Tevye and his family lose their home in Anatevka, which, though fictional, in real life would have stood in eastern Poland or western Ukraine.

By being forced to leave their ancestral home in 1905 and emigrating overseas, the people of Anatevka – including Tevye and his family – were spared the scorched-earth battles of World War I. They were spared the horrors of Stalin’s induced starvation of the 1930s. (As a landowner, Tevye would almost certainly have been executed as a capitalist exploiter along with the other kulaks.) They were spared the torture and genocide of the Nazis.

They were, in fact, the lucky ones.

From the Archives: Review of TAP's 1999 'Damn Yankees'

Searching through the archives, I found this article from 17 years ago, the same day that my review of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace was published.

The following review of a community theatre production in Arlington, Virginia, appeared in The Metro Herald (Alexandria, Va.) on May 21, 1999:

TAP’S DAMN YANKEES HAS A LOT OF HEART

Rick Sincere

Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

One of the great things about community theatre is that, when the cast is having fun on stage, the audience knows it. The sense of delight – and, yes, community – imparted by amateurs having a good time is infectious. While the Washington area is blessed with numerous top-notch professional and semi-professional theatres, there is something refreshing about seeing a group of actors, singers, and dancers putting on a show for the sheer joy of it, without worrying about the next audition, next paycheck, or the next job waiting tables.

Thus it is with the Arlington Players’ current production of Damn Yankees at the Thomas Jefferson Community Theatre. It may be true that not every step is in place, not every not is hit just so, and not every line is delivered with equal panache – but the energy and enthusiasm of the cast and enthusiasm of the cast and crew shines through and overcomes any “amateurism” in the pejorative sense. This sensibility even comes through in the sound of the community theatre (and also the high school theatre) orchestra, which has a certain raw, rough-edged sound that, while never being exactly “off,” still lacks the pristine precision of a professional ensemble. This lack of polish is not a flaw; instead, it is endearing.

It is particularly gratifying that director-choreographer Christopher Dykton has chosen to use the original script of Damn Yankees from the 1950s, rather than the compressed, rewritten book from the 1995 revival (which played the Kennedy Center in late 1996 with Jerry Lewis as Applegate; see The Metro Herald for December 28, 1996). That latter work eliminated some characters and changed others (“Sister,” for instance, is a hometown friend of Meg Boyd in the original, but she becomes Meg’s sister – what else? – in the rewrite.) Although the original script has some lame jokes and some anachronisms, it retains a better exposition than its successor. We learn, for instance, that Meg and Joe Boyd are two members of a colony of transplants from Hannibal, Missouri, in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Who knew? (Two of the puzzling anachronisms: The play is set in 1955, yet Lola is introduced to Joe by Applegate as “Miss West Indies of 1957.” And in the opening number, “Six Months Out of Every Year,” Meg sings that she and Joe met in November of 1938 and married soon thereafter; later in the show, Joe says he got married at age 20. This means that Joe would be about 37 years old in 1955, yet he is played as someone in his mid- to late 50s. A simple change of that lyric to “1928” would solve the problem.)

Perhaps it is this hearkening to a simpler time that allows the cast to relax and enjoy themselves as they recreate the material on stage. All the performers put their all into their roles. You can almost see them licking their lips in satisfaction after a number ends successfully.

Of the principals, perhaps Chuck Dluhy is the most perfectly cast as Mr. Applegate, the devil who comes to Washington. Dluhy’s slinky performance reminds us of Bob Fosse as the snake in The Little Prince, and how appropriate can that be? After all, the original Damn Yankees was choreographed by Fosse, and there are echoes of his style in Dykton’s dances. Unfortunately, despite the enthusiasm of the chorus, the choreography here is much better conceived than it is executed.

Dluhy is well-matched with Kathryn Fuller as Lola, the vamp who used to be “the ugliest woman in Providence, Rhode Island.” Fuller’s height contrasted with Dluhy’s diminutive stature turns them into a Mutt-n-Jeff team that works remarkably well. And the red and black costumes designed for the pair by Susan Chong are delightfully devilish.

If there is any problem in casting, it is, unfortunately, in Darrin J. Friedman’s Joe Hardy. He seems weaker than he should be, and this manifests itself the moment Friedman appears on stage, taking up the song “Goodbye, Old Girl,” where his older alter ego, Joe Boyd (Jim Golterman) leaves off, Friedman turns out to have a lighter voice than Golterman, when the opposite should be true. Boyd should have a voice that sounds worn, while Hardy should be booming. That’s not the case here.

Much of the rest of the show relies on good, strong ensemble work, and Dykton squeezes that out of his cast to good effect. It is difficult to pick out the stand-outs, but special message should be made of Kerry DeMatteis as Rocky, Christopher Smith as Vernon, Matt Steffens as Strane, Steve Gluckman as Mickey, and Wyatt Fenner in multiple supporting roles.

Damn Yankees has a number of wonderful, tuneful songs, including “You’ve Gotta Have Heart,” “Whatever Lola Wants,” “A Man Doesn’t Know What He Has,” and the comic baseball song, “The Game.” It also has what is perhaps the most clearly superfluous song in all of musical theatre, “Who’s Got the Pain,” a mambo number that was obviously designed to give Gwen Verdon (the original Lola) a chance to show off her special talents. It serves no other purpose.

If you want to have a good time and escape into the arms of a strong community of players, then go see Damn Yankees.

* * * * *

Damn Yankees continues through May 29 at the Thomas Jefferson Community Theatre, 125 South Old Glebe Road in Arlington (near the intersection of Route 50 and Glebe Road). Performances are Friday-Sunday, 8:00 PM, with a matinee this Sunday, May 23, 2:30 PM. Tickets are $12 for adults and $10 for seniors and juniors (18 or younger).

For reservations, call the Arlington Players, 703/549-1063, or visit the TAP Website at http://www.come.to/the_arlington_players.

For the record, the current web site of The Arlington Players is http://www.thearlingtonplayers.org/. Damn Yankees was written by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross (music), Richard Adler and Jerry Ross (lyrics), Douglass Wallop and George Abbott (book; based on Wallop's novel The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant). The original production was directed by George Abbott.

Director Barry Levinson Talks About Making 'The Natural'

Movie director and screenwriter Barry Levinson is in the entertainment news pages these days because he is making his debut as a musical theater writer. He is now adapting his 1982 film, Diner, into a musical play at Tony Award-winning Signature Theatre in Arlington.

Levinson's collaborators on this world-premiere musical version of Diner include Signature artistic director Eric Schaeffer and composer-lyricist Sheryl Crow, who is also writing her first score for a book musical.

In a feature by the Washington Post's Nelson Pressley, Levinson acknowledges that he's not a big fan of musicals but he's dived into the genre to create this new version of Diner for the stage.

Levinson’s been reading theatrical memoirs and marveling about great numbers written under the gun on the road, even though in his early days he met weekly deadlines as a TV writer for Marty Feldman and Carol Burnett. This was just after he studied broadcast journalism at American University and interned at a Washington TV station, working on the morning puppet show and eventually directing the evening news – just like the protagonist in “Sixty-Six.”

But he’s never been particularly crazy about musicals. He enjoyed “Book of Mormon” and laughed at “The Producers,” by his old mentor Mel Brooks – Levinson helped write “Silent Movie” and “High Anxiety” – but he rightly categorizes them as comedies first, with music. What he really admires is the sturdy melodic stuff, like “South Pacific.”

He can talk “Guys and Dolls” and “Carousel,” [director Kathleen] Marshall says, and Crow says he easily refers to everything from early rockabilly icon Eddie Cochran to “High Society.” But at the diner, he seems wary of the dark mark of the frivolous Broadway show.

“I’m not precious about the material,” he says. “But it does have to be a dramatic comedy. There are dilemmas. Shrevie and Beth don’t share common interests, and they’re desperately trying to connect. You can’t just pull that out and make it a fluffy piece.”

Last month in Charlottesville, Levinson came to the Virginia Film Festival, where he discussed the making of his 1984 baseball film, The Natural, with New York Times journalist Mike Tackett.  Over the same weekend, the director also presented his newest film, The Humbling, which features Al Pacino as a late-career actor in a panic.  The Humbling is based on a novel by Philip Roth.

Based on a novel by Bernard Malamud, Levinson's film version of The Natural starred Robert Redford as Roy Hobbs and a supporting cast that included Robert Duvall, Glenn Close, Barbara Hershey, Robert Prosky, Kim Basinger, Wilford Brimley, Richard Farnsworth, and Darren McGavin (uncredited).

Here is video of that conversation, recorded at the Paramount Theater on Charlottesville's downtown mall on Sunday, November 9:

Other celebrities who spoke at the Virginia Film Festival this year included actor Richard Roundtree (Shaft) and novelist Adriana Trigiani (Big Stone Gap), as well as political scions Barry Goldwater, Jr., and Skip Humphrey.

From the Archives: A Review of the Revival of 'Chicago' (1997)

Monday's post about Big Stone Gap, which mentioned cast member Jasmine Guy, reminded me about how, in the last years of the last century, I reviewed a musical she starred in: a national tour of  Kander and Ebb's Chicago.

Guy played Velma Kelly in the revival of the Bob Fosse musical, on tour at the National Theatre in Washington in the spring of 1997. Notably, this revival is still playing on Broadway -- a continuous run dating to November 14, 1996, adding up to 7,494 performances as of November 30, 2014.

From the archives, here is my review. It appeared in The Metro Herald in May 1997 and contains some contemporaneous references that may be inscrutable to anyone born since 1994.

My Kind of Town . . . Chicago Is

Rick Sincere

Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

Stand aside, Comet Hale-Bopp -- there's a new star rising above the Washington horizon, and she's at the National Theatre! The new star is Belle Calaway, the understudy who took over the key role of Roxie Hart in the new touring company of Chicago, and blew away the crowd on opening night.

Jasmine Guy

Calaway and her co-star, Jasmine Guy, brought the audience to its feet with thundering applause. While Guy slithered sensually across the stage, Calaway exuded energy enthusiastically. A last minute replacement for Charlotte d'Amboise, who is nursing an injury and expected to return to the cast in about three weeks, Calaway evokes the spirit -- and star-power -- of Gwen Verdon, who created the musical role of Roxie Hart in 1975. In fact, Calaway's vocal and dance style nearly replicates Verdon's, a remarkable feat in itself. The question remains: If Calaway -- the understudy -- is this terrific, how good is d'Amboise herself? We'll see in a few weeks.

Chicago features one of the best scores by John Kander and Fred Ebb, who also wrote Cabaret (1966) and the dreadful (but Tony-winning) Kiss of the Spider Woman (1992). Conceived by the legendary director-choreographer Bob Fosse, Chicago is a tuneful and sophisticated musical play. Like Cabaret, it contains hummable and memorable melodies and sharp, crackling lyrics.

Twenty-two years ago, Chicago was shut out of the Tony Awards by A Chorus Line, which at the time was groundbreaking but after its long Broadway run, numerous national tours, and a flop of a movie now seems hackneyed. Despite a respectable run of 868 performances that featured not only Gwen Verdon but the great Chita Rivera (and, succeeding that duo later, Liza Minnelli and Ann Reinking), Chicago had been largely forgotten until an "Encores" concert in New York last year. Its cynical look at the press and judicial system simply did not fit in to American culture at that time. Today -- in the era of two Menendez brothers trials, two O.J. Simpson verdicts, and Court-TV's rising popularity -- it seems more timely and relevant than ever.

This became crystal clear when Billy Flynn, the city of Chicago's hotshot lawyer, first appeared on stage. The National Theatre audience gasped when actor Obba Babatundé strode through the orchestra to sing his first number, "All I Care About [Is Love]" -- for Babatundé bears an uncanny resemblance to Johnnie Cochran, a hotshot lawyer in his own right.

It's difficult to find something not to praise in this production. Ann Reinking's choreography recreates the style of Bob Fosse in a way that deserves hearty appreciation, for the art of the dance has been suffering in recent musicals. (For example, Paper Moon, reviewed favorably in these pages a few weeks ago, had serviceable but unremarkable choreography. This, unfortunately, represents a sad trend in American musical theatre, which was once driven by such creative choreographers as Agnes de Mille, Michael Kidd, Jerome Robbins, Michael Bennett -- and Bob Fosse.) Fosse's style -- a unique blend of modern dance, ballet, athleticism, and sexual energy -- is often attempted but seldom accurately rendered. It lends itself to injury -- not only D'Amboise, but Reinking herself has been sidelined in recent weeks -- and is perhaps the greatest challenge to a dancer. When it is done right -- as it is done here -- the Fosse style is eye-popping and jaw-dropping. "How do they do that?" comes to mind quite often.

Walter Bobbie, the director, has reconceived the show that builds upon Fosse's original concept and takes it to its logical conclusion. A simple set, which includes the orchestra on stage (a conceit that originated with Cabaret), forces most of the action onto a narrow apron, which makes that action so much more intimate to the audience. Costumes are limited to black, white, and shades of grey. The stage itself is largely black, with a few frames in gold and the glinting gold of the brass instruments complementing the blackness. Props are limited to a few chairs and feathered fans (don't ask, just go see for yourself). Lighting is emphasized, with golden and white pools creating focus and definition.

In its original incarnation, Chicago was billed as "A Musical Vaudeville." Today it bills itself as "The Drop-Dead Broadway Musical." Both are true. Structurally, the play is a series of vaudeville-type numbers, introduced by various characters in the style of a vaudeville emcee. These numbers, however, advance the plot and define the characters as effectively as any written by Rodgers and Hammerstein or Stephen Sondheim.

In a nutshell, the plot is this: Chorus-girl Roxie Hart shoots and kills her boyfriend, expecting her Casper Milquetoast husband to take the rap. Instead, she goes to jail and hires Billy Flynn as her attorney, who promises to manipulate the media and the jury to obtain a "not guilty" verdict. Then, as a celebrity murderess, she can go on tour as a -- you guessed it -- vaudeville star. Interacting with Roxie is Velma Kelly (Jasmine Guy), another murderess who has hired Billy and expects the same result. The predatory press itself plays a major role, showing us that not much has changed between 1927 and 1997.

So many performers stand out it is hard to single them out. Carol Woods is at her throaty best as Matron "Mama" Morton, the jail keeper. M.E. Spencer is cloyingly pollyannish as reporter Mary Sunshine. And Ron Orbach is practically invisible -- believe me, that's good -- as Roxie's sad-sack husband, Amos, who does a star turn himself in the amusing number, "Mister Cellophane."

Chicago is not a family musical. It contains adult themes and rough language. It is also a historical landmark of American musical theatre. No one who loves musical theatre can afford to miss Chicago.

Trivia tidbit: the real-life Chicago murder case on which the musical is based (also the basis for the 1942 Ginger Rogers movie Roxie Hart) was covered by a "girl reporter" named Ione Quinby, who later in life was an agony-aunt columnist for The Milwaukee Journal, writing as Ione Quinby Griggs or, simply, "Mrs. Griggs." Whether her choice of a 50-year career as a staple of the back page of the Journal's "Green Sheet" was inspired by the character of "Mary Sunshine" is not known to me.

Remembering Adolph Green at 100

A report from NPR's Jeff Lunden today on "All Things Considered" recalls that today marks the 100th birthday of Broadway lyricist and Hollywood screenwriter Adolph Green, whose works include On the Town, Wonderful Town, Bells Are Ringing, Singing in the Rain, The Bandwagon, and about half of the 1954 version of Peter Pan.  That last show will be presented on NBC-TV this coming Thursday as Peter Pan Live!

The 1954 Peter Pan had one set of songs by composer Mark Charlap and lyricist Carolyn Leigh, which included "I've Got to Crow," "I'm Flying," and "I Won't Grow Up," among others.  (The use of first-person nominative in those song titles must indicate something about the character of Peter Pan's embedded egoism.)

Along with his lyric-writing partner, Betty Comden, and composer Jule Styne, Green contributed a number of songs to Peter Pan, including "Wendy," "Ugg-a-Wugg," "Distant Melody," and the haunting "Neverland," sung in the clip below by Mary Martin in a kinescope of the 1955 live NBC-TV production.  (Kathleen Nolan appears as Wendy Darling in this production, which was directed and choreographed by Jerome Robbins.)

In the rare clip below, from a 1957 broadcast on the Dumont network of Art Ford's Greenwich Village Party, Comden and Green sing their duet from On the Town, "I Get Carried Away." Art Ford reminds his viewers that Comden and Green had worked with Judy Holliday in a nightclub act in the 1940s called The Revuers, which led to their collaboration with Leonard Bernstein on On the Town, and that Holliday was then starring in their latest collaboration (with Jule Styne), Bells Are Ringing.

After Green sets up the number, it begins at the 3:30 mark on the video.

Another snippet of Comden and Green and performers can be seen in this compilation of songs from the 1985 Follies in Concert.  They sing "Rain on the Roof" beginning at 2:00 (and, sadly, ending at 2:10).  The video clip also includes the late Elaine Stritch singing "Broadway Baby" and Adolph Green's wife, Phyllis Newman, as part of the ensemble on "Who's That Woman?" as well as Carol Burnett proclaiming "I'm Still Here" -- along with leading players Barbara Cook, George Hearn, Mandy Patinkin, and Lee Remick.

A look at Adolph Green's credits on IBDB shows how prolific an artist he was. In addition to the shows already mentioned, he contributed either book or lyrics (or, sometimes, both) to Billion Dollar Baby, with David Burns and Helen Gallagher (1945), Two on the Aisle, with Bert Lahr and Dolores Gray (1951), Say, Darling (1958), A Party with Betty Comden & Adolph Green (1958 and 1977), Do Re Mi, with Phil Silvers and Nancy Walker (1960), Subways Are for Sleeping, with Carol Lawrence and Sydney Chaplin (1961), Fade Out-Fade In, with Carol Burnett and Jack Cassidy (1964), Hallelujah, Baby!, with Leslie Uggams (1967), Applause, with Lauren Bacall and Len Cariou (1970), Lorelei, with Carol Channing (1974), On the Twentieth Century, with Imogene Coca, John Cullum, Madeline Kahn, and Kevin Kline (1978), A Doll's Life, with what seems like the cast of Sweeney Todd -- George Hearn, Betsy Joslyn, and Edmund Lyndeck (1982), and The Will Rogers Follies, with Keith Carradine, Dee Hoty, and the voice of Gregory Peck (1991).

The list of Adolph Green's collaborators could itself be a book about the history of the musical theatre:  George Abbott, Lee Adams, Richard Bissell, Abe Burrows, Jerome Chodorov, Cy Coleman, William and Jean Eckart, Lehman Engel, Ron Field, Joseph A. Fields, Bob Fosse, Paul Gemignani, Garson Kanin, Michael Kidd, Arthur Laurents, David Merrick, Harold Prince, Burt Shevelove, Irene Sharaff, Oliver Smith, Peter Stone, Charles Strouse, Tommy Tune, Robin Wagner, and Freddie Wittop -- to name just a few.

Considering that Peter Pan Live! goes on the air this week, that there is a current revival of On the Town on Broadway, and the first full Broadway revival of On the Twentieth Century opens early next year, Adolph Green is having a pretty good season for a centenarian who has been dead for twelve years.

Signature Theatre to Resurrect Political Musical 'The Fix'

Welcome news arrived in the form of an emailed news release from Arlington's Signature Theatre this week.  To mark the end of its 25th anniversary season, Signature will be reviving The Fix, a musical play about political corruption that was produced there in 1998 in its first American outing.

For someone like me, whose interests in musical theatre and politics rarely overlap, this is a development worth celebrating.

As explained in the press release:

The revival, directed by Signature’s Artistic Director Eric Schaeffer, will round out an anniversary season chock-full of work by some of the Theatre’s brightest collaborators from the past 25 years.

“The Fix paints a picture of American politics that’s part fun-house, part haunted house,” said Schaeffer. “It’s twisted, and it pushes boundaries. It instantly became one of Signature’s favorite projects. And on top of that, it’s one of the shows most requested by our audiences. It’s only fitting that we close the season celebrating our first 25 years by bringing it back in an all-new production.”

With a rock-laced, eclectic score and scandalous lyrics, The Fix skewers the American bureaucratic machine. Reminiscent of Sondheim, with tinges of Kander and Ebb and a voice uniquely its own, it is a darkly brilliant, over-the-top, audaciously fun ride through the shenanigans of political elections.

When a popular presidential candidate dies in his mistress’s bed, his ambitious wife Violet thrusts their lackluster son Cal into the spotlight. With the help of her strategic brother-in-law, Violet transforms Cal into the perfect citizen. Together they create one of the most dysfunctional – and brutally entertaining – almost-first families ever.

(My original review of The Fix from April 1998 can be found here.)

Writing in the Washington Post Style section, Jessica Goldstein reports:

For its 25th anniversary season, Signature is bringing back “The Fix,” a production which, unless the political process somehow gets squeaky clean between press time and when you read this, is as relevant a show today as it ever was. “The Fix” will run in 2015, from May 12 to June 28.

“I say it’s ‘The Manchurian Candidate’ meets ‘Caligula,’ ” said Signature Artistic Director Eric Schaeffer, who directed the 1998 production and will helm 2015’s as well. For the young’uns, that basically means it’s like “Scandal” meets, well, “Scandal.”

The script will be getting some tweaks to allow for changes in “the communication things, sending this picture and that,” Schaeffer said. Even our fictional politicians don’t know that no one wants to catch them with their pants down on Twitter. “John [Dempsey, who wrote the book and lyrics] is looking to make it even more dangerous.”

Signature's current musical production is the classic Gypsy, with a book by Arthur Laurents, music by Jule Styne, and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.  The show, directed by Joe Calarco, has been extended through January 26 and first reviews should appear early next week.

From the Archives: 'West Side Racist?'

In a recent commentary on controversies surrounding sports team names, Winston Jones wrote in the Douglas County (Ga.) Sentinel:

Our society has gotten too picky and thin-skinned so that too many people are offended by too many things. And too many people are running circles around themselves to try to be politically correct on everything. Don't take life so seriously.

That's the point I tried to make in an opinion piece I wrote 14 years ago in reaction to complaints about a New England high school's production of West Side Story. The article appeared on November 21, 1999, in the Daily News of Bowling Green, Kentucky, under the headline, "West Side racist? - Objections to classic play is a sad commentary on our times." The only other place it is available on the Web is here.

This text, however, is more accessible.

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Word comes from Amherst, Massachusetts, that some students and parents object to a planned production of the classic 1957 musical play, West Side Story, at the local high school. They are insisting that it be canceled.

The local newspaper, the Daily Hampshire Gazette noted in its Nov. 11 edition that a petition presented to the school board with over 150 signatures states: "The play continues to generate negative stereotypes of Puerto Ricans in society and perpetuates the racism that we as students have been working so hard to eliminate in our school and community." Other complaints cited the play's use of violence as a way to solve problems.

This is yet another case of ill-informed cultural critics failing to see the forest for the trees. Anyone who has seen West Side Story - or performed in it - cannot help but be touched by its message against prejudice and violence. The message is not subtle. It is not hidden. It is not difficult to grasp.

Like a previous protests against such literary works as Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, the complainers seem not to understand that in order to present a theme that condemns racial prejudice and stereotyping, it is necessary also to present unsavory characters and dialogue that express the ideas and conditions to author wishes to condemn. Because these types of protests are successful, students are denied an opportunity for fruitful exploration of some of the complex and sad problems faced by our society.


West Side Story is itself based upon an earlier classic, William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. In its original concept, it was called East Side Story and its focus was to be on a conflicted Catholic-Jewish relationship. As creators Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins and Arthur Laurents (and later Stephen Sondheim) moved forward on the project, they became aware of the tensions in Los Angeles between Americans and Mexican immigrants and in New York's West Side between native English speakers and recent migrants from Puerto Rico. They decided to reset their play in this environment.

But does it "perpetuate stereotypes"? Does it inflame racial or ethnic tensions? Hardly. As Ethan Mordden notes in the chapter on West Side Story in his history of the Broadway musical in the 1950's, Coming Up Roses, "West Side Story is about real people: real life, real love and something is possible, for all the despair."

In Amherst, one alumna said the possibility of her high school presenting West Side Story is "humiliating." A parent, Elizabeth Capifali (a doctoral candidate in the multicultural education at the University of Massachusetts), called it "a very racist play" that is "replete with racial discrimination, creating negative images of Puerto Ricans and poor European immigrants."

Which European immigrants? The characters in the play are all "Americans" - but the ones who speak English and originally lived in New York come off looking much worse, morally speaking, than the Americans who speak Spanish and come from Puerto Rico. It is the "Anglos" who are unwelcoming, disrespectful and hostile toward their new neighbors. It is the "natives" who would rather fight the Puerto Ricans than work and play alongside them. The "natives" are blustery Archie-Bunkers-in-training, with a violent, gangster-like bent. The Puerto Rican characters - also Americans, as they don't hesitate to remind us, and their adversaries - simply want to make a better life for themselves. What kind of negative stereotype is that?

Bowling Green Daily News, November 21, 1999

Aside from the play's message, which can only be missed by someone wearing blinders and earplugs, it is a landmark of the American stage that deserves to be seen and performed by young people who wish to be culturally literate.

West Side Story was cutting-edge in 1957, yet seems somewhat old-fashioned today. (This was my reaction to a London revival earlier this year [1999] that recreated the original production, including the sets and costumes.) Still, students of the theatre recognize its innovations: in music and lyrics, in its focus on young people to the exclusion of adults, in its daring realism in a medium that relies on fantasy. Its progeny include Fiddler on the Roof, Cabaret, Sweeney Todd, and Ragtime. To deny members of the Amherst Regional High School community an opportunity to participate in, observe and learn from West Side Story is petty and barbarous.

We can only hope that the level-headed faculty, students, and school board members stand up to these philistines. The show must go on.

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For more discussion about West Side Story, check out these videos of a post-screening discussion about the movie from the 2008 Virginia Film Festival.

Part I:


Part II:

From the Archives: Review of a 1997 'Sunday in the Park with George'

Having previously thought that all of my theatre reviews from the late 1990s had been posted here for archival access, just this week I uncovered a piece that had been inaccessible because it had somewhat mysteriously been converted into an old WordPerfect format.

Yesterday I found an online resource that will convert text documents from one format to another and -- ta-dah! -- I have a review of the 1997 joint production by Washington's Arena Stage and Arlington's Signature Theatre of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's Sunday in the Park with George.

So, for the first time on line, here is my May 1997 review, which appeared in the Metro Herald under the headline, "Sunday Sings!"

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Washington audiences have an embarrassment of riches available this spring. Within a few days, Chicago, The King and I, and Sunday in the Park with George all opened. Together, these three plays offer examples of the best by the giants of American musical theatre: Bob Fosse, Rodgers & Hammerstein, and Stephen Sondheim.

In a historic collaboration, Arlington's Signature Theatre and Washington's Arena Stage have joined forces to present a play that neither could produce on its own: the Pulitzer-prize-winning Sunday in the Park with George, by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine. This production is directed by Signature's Eric D. Schaeffer, whose work at the tiny but innovative Signature Theatre has earned him a national reputation, and produced by Arena's outgoing artistic director, Douglas C. Wager.

Like most Sondheim musicals, Sunday is not for everyone. For Sondheim fans, however, it is bedazzling. The intimate setting of Arena's Kreeger Theater is far superior to the larger auditoriums in which earlier Sunday productions have been staged. Sondheim's sophisticated lyrics and intricate melodies and counterpoints are far more easily heard in such a venue.

Perhaps the most valuable aspect of the smaller auditorium is the ability of the audience to see more closely Patricia Zipprodt's costumes. Because of the foresight of Schaeffer, the costumes used in this production of Sunday are the same ones used originally on Broadway (and since used by the Arlington Players a few years back). Zipprodt has successfully simulated the pointillist style of painting invented by Sunday's protagonist, neo impressionist Georges Seurat, for his masterpiece (now hanging in the Art Institute of Chicago) Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte.

Seurat's work and style of work is the focus of the first act. George (played by Sal Viviano) is obsessed by light, color, balance, design. He has discovered that it is possible to create the illusion of mixed colors by setting discrete points or dots of color side by side, in juxtaposition to each other. He is fully absorbed by his work, ignoring and therefore losing his mistress, appropriately named Dot (Viviano's real-life spouse, Liz Larsen). We meet the characters whom we see in the final painting, but whether they are real people or the imaginings of George is hard to say.

The second act focuses on another artist, also named George, who may be the great grandson of the first act's George. At least his grandmother, Marie, insists that this is so. Act II's George also works in a new medium, but his primary challenge is raising the money to pursue his art. Tired of criticism that he has lost his way, that his work is no longer new or creative, he travels to France to visit the island of La Grand Jatte. There, he encounters his (perhaps?) great grandmother, Dot, who counsels him to "move on."

This synopsis cannot do the play justice. Sunday in the Park with George is not a typical musical. This is not a simple boy meets girl, boy loses girl scenario. Indeed, there is no conventional plot at all. Through the integration of music, lyrics, movement, lighting, and costumes, composer and playwright raise important issues about artistic integrity, personal relationships, and the importance of family.

Viviano plays the two Georges in contrast. Act I George is cold, obsessive. At first Viviano's stiffness in the first act is off putting, but soon it becomes apparent that this is what drives Dot away, into the arms of the more caring Louis, the baker who takes her to America. Highly rational and highly intellectual, focused laser-like on his creative endeavors, this George will be all too familiar to Washingtonians, who encounter this type every day. Act II George is more well rounded, though still devoted to his work. He seems more able to connect to his fellow human beings, particularly his grandmother, and has a deeper understanding of his own faults and shortcomings.

As Dot and Marie, Liz Larsen is astonishing. Her voice is as clear as a bell, her emotions sincere and convincing. We know she genuinely loves George, but cannot spend her life with him because he has another love his art. Her warmth contrasts suitably with George's chilliness, and the comparison helps us better understand the central character. Singing "Children and Art" in the second act, we begin to understand what really counts in life. And her rendition of "Move On" to and with George in Act II makes it hard to believe that Sondheim has written anything more, well, moving.

The rest of the cast is uniformly excellent. Drawn from the professional ranks of New York, regional, and Washington theatre, this cast includes a number of Arena and Signature veterans.

Anyone who works in the non profit world or, for that matter, anyone who is engaged in campaign fundraising will be captivated by the action, lyrics, and dialogue of the Act II number, "Putting It Together," which describes the schmoozing and bootlicking that are necessary to keep one's head above water in these situations.

Schaeffer has done well in bringing Sunday in the Park with George up to date. The modern art in Act II is now computer generated graphics and music, rather than the laser light show that was so cutting edge in 1984. One quibble, however, may be necessary as future productions are planned. The script requires that Marie be born in 1885. With the second act set in 1984, this was not hard to believe many people live to be 98 or 99 years old. Now that the second act has been brought forward to 1996, however, it stretches our credulity to have Marie, now 111 years old, as the grandmother of a 32 year old grandson. Will a revival in 2007 have a 122 year old Marie?

The Arena/Signature Sunday in the Park with George is breathtaking. I hope it will have an extended run that will allow multiple visits for those of us who are truly moved by Sondheim's best work.

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As I dig through paper and virtual files, more surprises may turn up.  Please stay tuned!