On Meeting McNally

Those readers who also follow my Tweets on Twitter will already know that I saw the new production of Ragtime at the Kennedy Center last Saturday night and that, to my delight and surprise, the Tony Award-winning playwright Terrence McNally was in the audience, seated almost directly in front of me.

It turns out that the whole creative team of Ragtime was there to see the show last weekend. In addition to McNally, who wrote the book of Ragtime (based on E.L. Doctorow's novel), composer Stephen Flaherty and lyricist Lynn Ahrens were also present.

After the final curtain call, I had an opportunity to chat briefly with Mr. McNally. (I even obtained his autograph in my program. I may be a critic, but I'm also a fan.) While I was interviewing him for The Metro Herald, Mr. Flaherty also joined us; he signed autographs for other fans. I was also able to take a few photographs -- not in the best lighting conditions, but at least there is a record of the meeting. (You can see some of the results nearby.) Unfortunately, I wasn't able to reach the trifecta of also meeting Ms. Ahrens.

My review of the show is not yet complete (but you can see what I wrote about the original national tour and about the Broadway production as well). This does provide, however, an excuse to post a review of another Terrence McNally play (and movie) -- not a musical, but it does have some dancing in it -- Love! Valour! Compassion!

A sidenote: I saw the original Broadway production of Love! Valour! Compassion! in 1995. In the audience that night was veteran stage and screen actor Hume Cronyn. Though tempted to introduce myself, I was restrained (and polite) enough to let him have his privacy. At the time, I would not have even had the rationale of being a drama critic to justify being intrusive.

In any case, here is my review of Terrence McNally's Love! Valour! Compassion!, which appeared in The Metro Herald in June 1997:

A Study in Contrasts:
Love! Valour! Compassion! on Stage and Screen
Rick Sincere
Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

How fortuitous for Washington-area drama lovers that the film adaptation of Terrence McNally's Tony-award-winning play, Love! Valour! Compassion!, has opened just when the area's premiere of the stage production is playing at the Studio Theatre. This gives us a rare opportunity to compare and contrast drama in its live form with its cinematic counterpart.

In a recent review of Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of Hamlet (America, May 17, 1997, p. 22), film critic Richard A. Blake noted that Shakespeare's play is one of "introspection," in which "a gifted actor on a bare stage speaking lines of unparalleled power and beauty opens the character's alternating spasms of confusion and resolve." Movies, Blake asserts, "don't do that type of soul-searching very well. Film is a medium of action, of epic scope and visual symbol. Words have their place, of course, but the dialogue must fit the images; and dialogue, even lengthy verbal exchanges, provides interludes to explain motivation for action."

So, too, with Terrence McNally's film adaptation of his own hit play. With one exception (TV star Jason Alexander, cast for his marquee value when Nathan Lane refused to participate in the project), the cast is the same as that on Broadway. Love! Valour! Compassion! (hereinafter LVC!) is not a play of action. While not as introspective as, say, Hamlet, and not as motionless as Waiting for Godot, it is essentially plotless. Things happen, to be sure, but only as a means to define and delineate the characters and their relationships.

The characters, in this case, are eight gay men who come together on the three major holiday weekends of the summer at the country home of Gregory Mitchell, a celebrated choreographer (Christopher Wilson at the Studio Theatre; Stephen Bogardus in the film). The concept sounds cliched -- after all, didn't Mart Crowley introduce this conceit in his pioneering 1968 play, The Boys in the Band? Well, yes and no. McNally is a writer with far more universal appeal than Crowley ever had. Contemporaries they might have been, but McNally has built upon Crowley's foundation to create a combination of pathos, tragicomedy, and humanity wholly free of the venomous bile that characterized The Boys in the Band.

The movie fails because McNally has -- for commercial reasons? -- truncated the expository elements of his characterizations that make the play so appealing. In the play, we are given information that clearly establishes the web of relationships among these men: John Jekyll (Kirk Jackson/Studio; John Glover/film, repeating his Tony-winning performance as both John and his twin brother, James) is Gregory's rehearsal pianist as well as a failed Broadway composer; Perry Sellars (John Emmert/Studio; Stephen Spinella/film) is Gregory's attorney; Buzz Hauser (Floyd King/Studio; Jason Alexander/film) is the costume maker for Gregory's dance company. Moreover, Buzz was once (14 years earlier) Perry's roommate who met John the same day that Perry met his longtime companion, Arthur Pape (Michael Russotto/Studio; John Benjamin Hickey/film). None of this -- except a passing reference to Perry's pro bono legal work -- is explained in the film.

These details are not disposable. Without knowledge of these interlocking relationships, the film audience remains puzzled about why these men have come together for their holiday weekends. Why do they know each other? What do they have in common? Why do they tolerate the mean-spirited John? Audiences at the Studio Theatre can answer these questions.

Gore Vidal once wrote that "A talent for drama is not a talent for writing, but is an ability to articulate human relationships." This is true of Terrence McNally, the playwright. It is not true of Terrence McNally, the screenwriter. (This was also evident in McNally's film adaptation of his play Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune, which was incomprehensible when performed on screen with Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer in the title roles.)

The centrality of character in this play becomes clear, too, when one contrasts the performances of Jason Alexander and his colleagues, who came to the film directly from Broadway. Their months of rehearsal, exploration, and performance as the characters they portray provided them with a substantial depth that Alexander lacks. Alexander, despite his admirable theatre experience, comes off as superficial. (Eight years on Seinfeld may have retrained him to go for the quick laugh, the 23-minute punch that weekly sitcoms demand.)

To a certain extent, this may be explained by what British critic John Berger meant when he said that "Theatre brings actors before a public and every night during the season they re-enact the same drama. Deep in the nature of theatre is a sense of ritual. The cinema, by contrast, transports its audience individually, singly, out of the theatre towards the unknown." Just as the relationships among the characters are much more strongly bonded in the stage play, the relationship between the characters and their audience is much stronger in the theatre than in the cinema. Theatregoers are required to participate much more in the stage production -- the barren stage induces them to use their imaginations. In contrast, the movie sets everything before the audience. For example, while Gregory's blind lover, Bobby Brahms (Sean Pratt/Studio; Justin Kirk/film) pantomimes his tactile exploration of the trees and flowers in the garden on stage, those trees and flowers are there, larger than life, on screen. When Bobby drops a milk bottle on stage, no prop is used but an off-stage sound effect alerts us to what happened; on film, the bottle and milk explode into myriad pieces. The lush realism of LVC! (the movie) detracts (and distracts) from the drama itself.

Here, then, is the irony: Movies require action to attract and retain their audience, which otherwise remains passive. Plays, being less action-oriented, require the audience to be active. The New Republic's longtime theatre critic, Robert Brustein, put his finger on this phenomenon when he noted: "Theatergoing is a communal act, moviegoing a solitary one." Few things are more dissatisfying than attending a live performance in an empty auditorium; being the sole member of a cinema audience is hardly ever disappointing.

In the end, LVC! on film fails for the same reasons it triumphs on stage. McNally's screen adaptation attempts, unsuccessfully, to impose a plot where none existed; to do this in two instead of three hours; and to sacrifice full understanding of each individual character before the (perceived) facile needs of a moviegoing public, assumed to be less sophisticated than the mavens of the Great White Way.

No one should endure this condescension. That is why we in the Washington area are so lucky -- we can take advantage of the Studio Theatre's excellent production of Love! Valour! Compassion! even as others across the country must settle for the inferior film version. This critic's advice: see the play now, while you can, and rent the video when it's released.

Love! Valour! Compassion! is not currently playing in Washington (2009) but Ragtime's run at the Kennedy Center has been extended through May 17.

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'I'm the Mother'

Tony Award-winning actor and playwright Harvey Fierstein paid tribute to the late Estelle Getty in a guest column in the New York Post yesterday. Getty died earlier this week at the age of 84; Friday would have been her 85th birthday.

Before going on to worldwide fame as the acerbic Sophia on the hit TV sitcom The Golden Girls in the 1980s, Getty was a hardworking New York actress. In fact, when she was cast in The Golden Girls, she was playing the mother of Fierstein's character, Arnold Beckoff, in Torch Song Trilogy on Broadway. Ironically, according to IBDB, this was Getty's only Broadway credit.

Why "ironic"? Let Fierstein explain:

At the height of popularity of "The Golden Girls," there was no more beloved character on television than Sophia Petrillo. Estelle Getty, who brought Sophia indelibly to life, was awestruck: "What the hell is going on? I have the highest TVQ of any woman on television?"

It was true. For several years, Estelle Getty, formerly Estelle Gettleman of Bayside, Queens, was the most bankable star on any network. She was bigger than Carol Burnett, more saleable than Mary Tyler Moore and surer to deliver viewers than Cher. Still, the day after she won the Emmy, she told me she'd trade it and her Golden Globe for a Tony.

Despite all of the glamour, glory and gold of television fame, Estelle Getty was a theater creature.

Fierstein gives Getty much of the credit for making Torch Song Trilogy such a big success (1,222 performances, Tony Award for best play, a popular film adaptation [sans Getty]). Besides creating the role on stage, Getty had persuaded Fierstein to write the character into the play in the first place.

From the first reading through seven years of productions here and on the road, the marriage of actress to role was remarkable. There was simply nothing like seeing this henna-wigged tornado in a turquoise suit arrive onstage to announce, "I'm the mother."

So great was her performance that almost every audience member identified with my character. You read that right: Estelle's Mrs. Beckoff was so identifiable that everyone claimed her as his or her mother. And if she was their mother, then they were a drag queen.

The thing about Estelle was that you could not catch her acting. She was being. If her character was supposed to be angry, Estelle got angry. If her character was brokenhearted, the actress was brokenhearted. It all felt real....

Without the mother, "Torch Song Trilogy" would never have achieved its universal popularity and might not have reached further than La Mama. But with the mother, the play was, and remains, a force not to be denied.

Unfortunately, this dynamic performance was not captured on film. In the movie, Mrs. Beckoff was played by Anne Bancroft. Fierstein notes wryly:

Estelle was dealt another blow four years later when she wasn't cast in the film version of "Torch Song." Although we never discussed it directly, I knew how much that hurt her. (Recently, I've come to know exactly how she felt - know what I mean?)

There's another irony in this story, a personal one for me.

Although Estelle Getty played Mrs. Beckoff for some 1,200 performances (perhaps more, if you include the off-Broadway run and subsequent national tours), when I saw Torch Song Trilogy in New York in February 1983, it was during the two-week period that Barbara Barrie played the role in Getty's absence.

What are the odds of that?

Liveblogging the Tony Awards

Tonight's the night. After a season of ups and downs, the rivals are meeting tonight in a single arena to decide who will be the ultimate winner. Competition is fierce, of course; it is every year.

I'm prepared, too. I just returned from Kroger with an eight-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon and a package of chicken wings. I'll be settling into my easy chair to watch television, uninterrupted, for the next three hours.

The broadcast channels know what a big night this is, too, with all of them deferring to CBS. The CW has reruns of Everybody Hates Chris and Aliens in America. The local PBS affiliate is having a pledge drive. Fox has reruns of The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Family Guy, and American Dad. NBC has a Saturday Night Live prime-time clip show, and ABC is running some basketball game.

That's because America is focused on the Tony Awards. Broadway's big night is here, hosted by The View's Whoopi Goldberg.

Isn't that worthy of live blogging?

8:03 p.m.: A production number from Disney's The Lion King (coming soon to Washington for the first time, at the Kennedy Center) opens the show. This season marked the show's tenth year on Broadway.

8:04 p.m.: Whoopi takes the stage in a crab costume from Disney's The Little Mermaid. The opening credits begin.

8:06 p.m.: Whoopi says, "Welcome to the 62nd Annual Tony Awards." She announces that there will be excerpts from shows that are not nominated (e.g., Young Frankenstein). She introduces the first presenter, Laurence Fishburne, and takes an unnecessary dig at Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas (eliciting some boos from the audience). (She implies that Thomas is not "black.")

8:08 p.m.: Fishburne presents the award for best featured actress in a play. The winner is Rondi Reed for August: Osage County.

8:11 p.m.: John Waters takes the stage. "Yes, I'm back. Can you believe it?" He's introducing a musical number from Cry-Baby, which is based on his film of the same name. He wonders if "there are actually prisoners watching the Tony show tonight. Talk about a new minority!"

8:15 p.m.: Musical number from the first nominated musical, Cry-Baby, ends.

8:20 p.m.: A spotlight on Jersey Boys, winner of best musical in 2006.

8:21 p.m.: Backstage with Whoopi, pointing out that viewers can go to CBS.com to see the "Thank You Cam."

8:22 p.m.: Laura Linney presents the award for best featured actor in a play. The winner is Jim Norton for The Seafarer. It is his first Tony. He shouts: "I love New York!"

8:25 p.m.: Adam Duritz of Counting Crows announces the number from Passing Strange, set in an Amsterdam coffee house.

8:36 p.m.: Two-time Tony winner John Lithgow presents the Tony for best direction of a musical. The winner is Bartlett Sher for the first Broadway revival of South Pacific.

8:39 p.m.: Jack Klugman, who was in the original cast of Gypsy, for which he was nominated for a Tony, introduces a number from the latest revival of that show. Patti Lupone sings "Everything's Coming Up Roses," perhaps the most frightening song every sung by a mother to her daughter. (After seeing this, I really want to see Lupone's "Rose's Turn.")

8:45 p.m.: A number from 1988's Phantom of the Opera, with Whoopi as Christine.

8:51 p.m.: We return from a commercial break to the announcement of the special Tonys given earlier this evening to Robert Russell Bennett (posthumously) and the Chicago Shakespeare Company, as well as to best choreographer, best book of a musical, best orchestrations, best revival of a play (Boeing-Boeing).

8:52 p.m.: Big Brother's Julie Chen looks back at "the year in plays."

8:54 p.m.: Tony winner Duncan Sheik mentions how Stew won the best book of a musical award for Passing Strange, and presents the award for best score. The award goes to Lin-Manuel Miranda for In the Heights, the early favorite musical with 13 nominations. Miranda's acceptance speech is delivered as a rap. He says, "Mr. Sondheim, look, I made a hat/ where there never was a hat/and a Latin hat at that."

8:57 p.m.: Harry Connick, Jr., introduces a medley from South Pacific, which begins with the Seabee chorus singing "There Is Nothing Like a Dame." Then Paulo Szot sings "Some Enchanted Evening," followed by Kelli O'Hara and the female chorus with "A Wonderful Guy."

9:07 p.m.: A "Broadway Spotlight" on Legally Blonde; Whoopi flies in like (and as) Mary Poppins.

9:08 p.m.: Tony winner Kristin Chenoweth presents the award for featured actress in a musical. The winner is Laura Benanti for her role as Louise in Gypsy. She expresses surprise at seeing Arthur Laurents standing. "Stephen Sondheim," she says, "I just worship you. There are no other words." She describes her mother as "the anti-Mama Rose."

9:11 p.m.: Barry Bostwick, who was in the original Broadway cast of Grease, introduces a number from the revival of that show. The cast sings the title song, "Grease," which comes from the movie soundtrack, not the OCR. (Frankie Valli sang it -- words and music by Barry Gibb -- over the film's credits.) The medley also includes the finale, "We Go Together." So the cast gets to sing both the first and last numbers of the current revival.

9:21 p.m.: A Broadway Spotlight with the cast of the longest-running revival musical, Chicago.

9:22 p.m.: Brooke Shields takes the stage to present the Tony Award for best performance by featured actor in a musical. The winner is veteran Boyd Gaines, for Gypsy; this is his fourth Tony award after five nominations. "I am honored to be in this great American classic," he says, thanking the creators, Stephen Sondheim, the late Jule Styne, and his director, Arthur Laurents.

9:25 p.m.: Oscar winner Marisa Tomei, now on Broadway in Top Girls, offers a taste of the new musicals "that have eight nominations among them," starting with The Little Mermaid. Faith Prince sings a number from A Catered Affair. Megan Mullaly sings to Shuler Hensley in a number from The New Mel Brooks Musical Young Frankenstein. (This segment seems an attempt by the award show's producers to spotlight tourist-friendly musicals that failed to get nominated in the "best" category.)

9:30 p.m.: I notice that the Internet Broadway Data Base (ibdb.com) is unusually slow in loading tonight.

9:35 p.m.: A Broadway Spotlight on George Wendt and the cast of Hair Spray. Then we get a look behind the scenes at the American Theatre Wing, featuring young actors from current musicals.

9:36 p.m.: Whoopi returns. She introduces a scene from the first nominee for best play, August: Osage County, by Tracy Letts, followed by a scene from Tom Stoppard's Rock 'n' Roll, and one from Conor MacPherson's The Seafarer. Finally, she introduces a scene from Patrick Barlow's The 39 Steps.

9:42 p.m.: Gabriel Byrne presents the award for best director of a play. The winner is Anna D. Shapiro for August: Osage County. She has a tattoo on her upper right arm, not something you expect to see on a Tony-winning director. She pays tribute to the Steppenwolf Theatre Company of Chicago and her parents. She also thanks her six nieces and nephews, "who don't care about any of this; they really don't. They just wanted tickets to Little Mermaid. And I got them."

9:46 p.m.: A scene from Spamalot with Whoopi as the Lady of the Lake; commercial break follows.

9:52 p.m.: A Broadway Spotlight on Mamma Mia!, which comes to Washington's National Theatre later this month.

9:53 p.m.: Mary-Louise Parker takes the stage to present the award for best performance by a leading actor in a play. Despite her flat reading off the teleprompter, the winner is Mark Rylance for Boeing-Boeing. (In announcing nominee Patrick Stewart, she properly says "the Scottish Play" rather than Macbeth; to do otherwise inside a theatre, even inside Radio City Music Hall, would be to invite disaster.) Rylance wins for his Broadway debut and gives a dry, droll acceptance speech.

9:56 p.m.: Emmy winner Alec Baldwin presents the award for best performance by a leading actress in a play. The winner is Deanna Dunagan for August: Osage County.

9:58 p.m.: IBDB is slower than it has ever been.

10:00 p.m.: Whoopi introduces Lin-Manuel Miranda, who begins a number from In the Heights, joined by the rest of the cast. (Good timing; you don't want viewers to switch channels at the top of the hour.) John Kander has said he greatly admires Miranda's music for In the Heights; I'm not sure I could sit through two hours of rap-like recitative.

10:05 p.m.: CBS runs a commercial for Mamma Mia!, the film version of the long-running London- and Broadway musical. That movie opens mere days after the show arrives at the National Theatre in D.C.

10:09 p.m.: The design awards, presented earlier this evening, are rapidly announced to the TV audience. Do they really think that anyone watching the Tonys doesn't really care about these important awards?

10:10 p.m.: A non-nude Daniel Radcliffe and Equus co-star Richard Griffiths (also non-nude) present the award for best new play. The winner is, "as if by magic," August: Osage County. Playwright Tracy Letts accepts the award along with a large crowd of producers, cast, and backers. Letts says "I don't know all these people. I assume they are associated with the play." He adds: "This beats the hell out of auditioning for JAG." He thanks the producers for doing a remarkable thing: "They decided to produce an American play on Broadway with theatre actors!"

10:14 p.m.: Looking like he just stepped out of a production of Fiddler on the Roof as Tevye, Tony winner Mandy Patinkin accepts a special Tony award for lifetime achievement for Stephen Sondheim. Because the recipient could not be present, Patinkin reads a message from Sondheim, who thanks his collaborators. Sondheim says, "I would also share this award with Hal Prince, but he has one already."

10:16 p.m.: Patinkin goes on to mention the original production of Sunday in the Park with George, and introduces scenes from the new Roundabout Theatre Company revival. Jenna Russell and Daniel Evans sing "Move On." (I last saw Evans in his Olivier-winning turn as Charley in the Donmar Warehouse production of Merrily We Roll Along.) Am I alone in this observation, or does Evans look like Andrew Sullivan before Andrew grew a beard?

10:21 p.m.: A scene from last year's winner for best musical, Spring Awakening, with Whoopi and the cast; commercial break.

10:26 p.m.: A Broadway Spotlight on Avenue Q.

10:27 p.m.: Glenn Close presents the award for best revival of a musical. The nominees are Grease, Gypsy, South Pacific, and Sunday in the Park with George. The award goes to South Pacific. Producer Andre Bishop accepts the award. He thanks the daughters of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, and Ted Chapin of the R&H Organization.

10:30 p.m.: Lily Tomlin takes the stage to the strains of "Put on a Happy Face." She introduces a scene from best-musical nominee Xanadu. She said she saw it the other night and "I L-M-A-O." She is obviously having problems reading the teleprompter. Tony nominee Kerry Butler, Tony Roberts, Cheyenne Jackson, and the cast sing "Don't Walk Away." Who would have thought that Xanadu, a campy 1980 movie with Gene Kelly and Olivia Newton-John could one day become a Tony-nominated, hit Broadway musical?

10:40 p.m.: A classic Tony moment: Madonna complains about a short microphone and says, "I'm being punished for not coming to rehearsal today."

10:41 p.m.: Whoopi presents the original company of Rent, beginning with Anthony Rapp, who in turn introduces the current cast in a production number, "La Vie Boheme." He then brings in the original cast to join him. Of course, they mention how Jonathan Larson died of an aortic aneurysm on the day of the first public preview of the show. Of course, they sing "Seasons of Love."

10:46 p.m.: It's Liza! Her lisp is more audible than ever as she presents the award for best performance by a leading actor in a musical. The Tony Award goes to Brazilian baritone Paulo Szot for South Pacific.

10:49 p.m.: Tony winner (for Curtains) David Hyde-Pierce thanks Rob Ashford for "giving me the greatest dance on Broadway ... unfinished business from last year." He presents the award for leading actress in a musical. The winner is Patti Lupone for Gypsy. This is her second Tony; her first came in 1980 for Evita. She sends out her love to her husband, Matt, and their son, Joshua. She thanks everyone who has helped her in the past 35 years. She calls Arthur Laurents "an inspiration to all of us in the theatre." She even thanks the ghosts of the St. James Theater (and there must be many, considering what's played there before). She yells at the orchestra, which is trying to play her off, "Shut up! It's been 29 years!" She talks over "There's No Business Like Show Business" before finally saying good night.

10:53 p.m.: Whoopi joins the cast of the 2006 revival of A Chorus Line in "One." Mario Lopez is at the front of the line. I knew he was in the cast; I hadn't realized he was playing Zach. (That's the closest thing to a non-dancing role in the show; Michael Douglas played it in that dreadful Richard Attenborough movie version.)

10:54 p.m.: IBDB is still slow. Very slow.

10:57 p.m.: Whoopi returns to the microphone to present the award for best new musical. "Seconds from now," she says, "this stage will be filled with producers." The big winner of the night is In the Heights. Producer Jill Furman accepts the award with a throng of producers and cast members.

11:00 p.m.: Whoopi calls this "the greatest night of an actor's life." She encourages the audience to "come to New York to see a Broadway show." The closing credits begin. CBS runs a commercial for "the summer's guilty pleasure," Swingtown.

Community Theatre - Part One

It's hard for me to believe, but it was thirty years ago tonight that I auditioned for The Music Man, a summer production of St. Bernard's Studio Theater in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. It was the first time I tried out for a community rather than a school group. I only knew one person involved in the company, Jack Lynch, who was a freshman at Marquette High School when I was a senior; it was a chance meeting with him a couple of weeks after graduation that sparked my interest.

That audition led to a three-year, four-production commitment to a great group of people, under the leadership of director/choreographer Rozeann Campbell. (The next year, 1978, I was in both The Fantasticks and The Boy Friend, and in 1979 -- my last summer in Milwaukee -- I was in Fiddler on the Roof.)

St. Bernard's Studio Theater was a true community theater: Productions were mounted in a parish school gymnasium (with no air conditioning in July and August!). The casting process was open to all ages, from small children to grandparents. There were no barriers to participation; there was always a role on stage or a job backstage for anyone who wanted to join in. A mission statement printed in the program said:

The purpose of the Studio Theater is to provide an educational and cultural summer activity for the children, young people, and adults of St. Bernard's, Wauwatosa, and the surrounding communities. There are approximately 100-125 people in the cast and crews.

It didn't seem relevant at the time, but 1977 marked the twentieth anniversary of the original Broadway production of The Music Man, which means this year it is 50 years since Robert Preston debuted as Harold Hill, Barbara Cook created Marian Paroo, and Meredith Willson gave us perhaps the most popular tune ever played by high-school marching bands, "Seventy-Six Trombones." While The Music Man is a well-crafted, entertaining musical play (one of the few with book, music, and lyrics by the same person), isn't it incredible to note that it beat out West Side Story for the Tony Award for best musical that season?

My involvement in the play was deep enough that I borrowed from the Milwaukee Public Library a copy of Meredith Willson's second autobiographical book, "But He Doesn't Know the Territory", which vividly tells the story of the making of The Music Man. (Revealing, for instance, that Danny Kaye, Jackie Gleason, and others were first considered for the lead role, before it went to B-movie actor Robert Preston, who went on to win the first of his two Tony Awards -- out of three nominations -- for best actor in a musical.)

That summer of The Music Man -- like the two summers that followed -- was the sort that lends itself to lavish, largely inexpressible flights of nostalgia. Believe me when I say the memories are pleasant and irreplaceable.

Fortunately, I have a short (about 3 minute) record of that production of The Music Man. It was originally a silent, Super-8 millimeter film that I transferred to Hi-8 video and VHS a few years ago, and to DVD and WMV more recently. (The multiple iterations explain the degraded quality of the recording.) Take a look:

Finally, let me state for the record: I did not drop Lisa Bender that night, late in the run, during the "Footbridge Ballet." She fell; it was an accident.

Update: I have posted still photographs from that 1977 production of The Music Man in the second part of this ongoing series of articles about community theatre.

'"Doubt" Is Divine'

About two weeks ago, I had the pleasure of conducting a telephone interview with actress Caroline Stefanie Clay. Now on tour with Doubt, she was staying in the same Holiday Inn Express hotel in Hartford, Connecticut, where I spoke to Tonye Patano while she was on tour with Legends! Like Legends!, which had a short run in Washington last fall, Doubt is coming to the National Theatre for two weeks beginning March 13.

Ms. Clay was a natural subject for an interview: I asked one question, and half an hour later I said, "I think it's time to let you go." She was gracious, funny, and passionate. I very much enjoyed chatting with her.

As a result of our conversation, I wrote an article for The Metro Herald, which should appear next week (in the February 23 issue). Here is what I submitted to the newspaper:

Interview with Caroline Stefanie Clay:
Appearing in Doubt, D.C. Native Has Homecoming
Rick Sincere
Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

Actress Caroline Stefanie Clay is a Washington native and graduate of the Duke Ellington School for the Arts who is now touring in a production of John Patrick Shanley’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Doubt, which will arrive at the National Theatre on March 13 for a limited, two-week run.

The original Broadway production of Doubt garnered many laurels, among them eight Tony nominations (winning four awards, including Best Play of 2005) and five Drama Desk Awards (including Outstanding New Play).

Clay plays the pivotal role of Mrs. Muller, who appears on stage for just a few minutes but who has such a dramatic impact that Clay’s predecessor in the role, Adriane Lenox, received a Tony Award for it. (Clay understudied for Lenox throughout the Broadway run of Doubt.)

In an exclusive interview with The Metro Herald, Caroline Stefanie Clay shared reflections on her life growing up in Northwest D.C., her career as an actress, and her role in Doubt.

Clay grew up near the corner of Nebraska Avenue and Military Road. Her father was a high-ranking official in the Department of Housing and Urban Development during the Carter administration, and he later served a similar role, locally, under Mayor Marion Barry.

“I grew up in melting pot of a lot of embassy kids,” says Clay, noting that among the neighbors on her street were “Greeks, Ethiopians, Somalis, Chileans, Russians, Chinese.” She went to Lafayette Elementary School, which she describes as “an international community.”

“It wasn't until I went to Alice Deal Junior High,” she notes, “that I got into the African-American community.”

Even so, she says, “we grew up being very aware that ‘if you're black, you've got to work three times as hard’” – an admonition that has guided her professional ethic ever since.

Her mother, whom she describes as “a brainy oddball” was an English teacher who came from Louisville. “My brother and I still laugh at this: she would get The Canterbury Tales and read them to us in Middle English. She was determined not to raise her children by television.” Instead of TV, Clay remembers, during her formative years “we would go to museums.” Moreover, Clay’s mother would “lock the screen door to keep us outside and said, ‘Go find your friends; if you can't find them, make them.’”

During her teenage years, Clay says, “I was very, very lucky. I was a product of the Mayor's Youth Employment Program. To me, that program was one of the most progressive and forward-thinking programs. One year I worked at Smithsonian Visitors Center, I also worked at Hirshhorn museum in the slide registry, learning about 20th century modern art, learning about Picasso and Pollack. I was with D.C. Youth Orchestra one summer, and also with D.C. Street Theatre. Those were the kinds of things you could do, as long as you applied yourself.”

Ellington School co-founder Mike Malone, who passed away last December, was a mentor to Clay. “He was instrumental in giving me confidence to know that I could do what I could do. He told us the life skills you can gain from here -- if you're paying attention -- if you soak up what we have to offer, there really isn't anything you can't do.” At Ellington, “there was always a reinforcement of African-American achievement. That's what thrust me out into the world.” Clay adds, with a chuckle, that after high school, “Perhaps people thought I was arrogant -- definitely crazy.”

After high school, Clay went on to study in Philadelphia and dove into the New York theatre scene. “When I graduated college, I did not go to grad school. I got my union card and was ready to work.” Sadly, Washington was not welcoming to the newly-trained actress. ” I came home after college, auditioned, and didn't get response. I have to say it wasn't until I went to New York that I was able to work in D.C. Unfortunately, there are some places that won't give you a second look unless you've been working in New York.”

She did, however, get a second look eventually. Now a classically trained actress, she appeared at the Shakespeare Theatre with Kelly McGillis in The Duchess of Malfi. She has nothing but praise for the Shakespeare Theatre’s artistic director: “Michael Kahn is brilliant -- he is a true master teacher,” she says.

Clay admires the Washington theatre scene in general, too. “There is such a rich, talented, theatrical community in D.C., they don't need a lot of people from outside.”

“I am always happy to come back,” she says, especially since it gives her an opportunity to “figure out how to get theatre students from Duke Ellington” back together for a mini-reunion.

"The last time I was in DC,” Clay said, she was a finalist in a theatre festival, doing Lady Day from Emerson's Bar and Grille. “I said I am so very proud to be in D.C.”

Getting back to her current production, Clay says, “I play a character back in 1964, who is working very hard to protect her son, dealing with a priest who may have dealt with son in improper manner. My response to that allegation is what you can never, never imagine.”

Doubt, she says, is actually “two plays -- the play that's on stage, and the one that’s off stage, where people talk about it afterwards.”

“I love being in Doubt,” says Clay. “I think Doubt is divine in all things.”

Doubt opens at the National Theatre on Tuesday, March 13, and closes with two performances on Sunday, March 25. Ticket prices range from $38.75 to $78.75 and are available through Telecharge.com or via phone at (800) 447-7400. Tickets area also available at National Theatre Box Office. For more information, visit www.doubtthetour.com.

(Photo of Cherry Jones and Caroline Stefanie Clay from Doubt courtesy of the National Theatre. Photo credit: Craig Schwartz)

Prelude to the Tony Awards

When the nominations for the Tony Awards were announced today, I recognized the names of composer Matthew Sklar and lyricist Chad Beguelin, who received a nod for their work on The Wedding Singer, a musical based on the 1998 Adam Sandler movie of the same name.

I remembered the names as the creators of a 2000 musical that had its premiere at Signature Theatre in Arlington, but never made it to Broadway (despite their hopes and my prediction): The Rhythm Club, set in 1938 Germany.

Speaking to Playbill, composer Sklar gave his reaction to the news of being nominated for best score of a musical:

"I was just at home sitting on my couch watching NY1. When they read the score nomination, I let out a little scream. Well, actually a big scream. I wanted to be nice to my neighbors. Then my friends and family started calling. It meant so much for our show that we get recognized. We got five nominations in five big categories. It feels amazing. I'm sort of at a loss for words. It's been a dream of mine for a long time. We'll get to do a number on the Tony telecast."

I haven't yet seen The Wedding Singer (neither play nor movie), but here is my review of Sklar and Beguelin's earlier musical play, The Rhythm Club, as it appeared in The Metro Herald on October 13, 2000:

The Rhythm Club: Waiting for the Explosion
Rick Sincere
Metro Herald Entertainment Editor

The Rhythm Club is a firecracker ready to explode – yet some of its powder is just a bit damp. A work in progress that still needs some tweaking, it already provides an evening of great music, fine choreography, and evocative design. With some minor improvements, it will be a powerful piece of musical drama and a potential classic.

On its way to Broadway, The Rhythm Club has the potential to be for Signature Theatre what The Great White Hope was for the Arena Stage. That is, it could permanently set this small regional company into the firmament of theatrical trendsetters.

The Rhythm Club continues what seems to be Signature’s recent affinity for – or is it fascination with – musicals set in the 1920s and ‘30s. Last year’s Floyd Collins was about events in 1924 Kentucky; and Side Show recreated Depression-era vaudeville. Later this season, Donna Migliaccio will play Mama Rose in Gypsy, also from the same period. And here The Rhythm Club, although not about America, gives us Nazi Germany: Hamburg, 1938.

If nothing else, this affinity gives Signature’s costume designers a wonderful opportunity: Gregg Barnes’ costumes in The Rhythm Club are marvelous. Each piece of clothing not only represents a unique period in history, it supports and enhances the character who wears it.

The Rhythm Club treads on ground already covered, as a musical, by Cabaret, and in terms of storyline by the movie, Swing Kids. The main characters are adolescents who rebel against Nazi authority by listening to, performing, and dancing to forbidden music – the swing music of Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Glenn Miller, and others, as well as the pure jazz of Louis Armstrong and the hybrid sounds of Duke Ellington and Count Basie.

Why was this music forbidden? The Nazis saw it as “Negro music performed by Jews – a double whammy in that racially-based legal system. But the impetus for such control goes back much farther. In The Republic, Plato (speaking as Socrates) said that “the introduction of a new kind of music must be shunned as imperiling the whole state; since styles of music are never disturbed without affecting the most important political institutions,” adding: “It is here in music that our guardians should erect their guardhouse.” To this, Socrates’ colleague Adeimantus replied: “At any rate it is here that lawlessness easily creeps in unawares.” If nothing else, Hitler understood what the ancient Greeks did: by control of music and art, the state can also control the minds and souls of the people.

Enter two friends, Jake and Adam (Jeremy Kushnier and Tim Martin Gleason). Adam is a composer who absorbs the works of the American swingmasters. Jake is a conductor who admires their zest and celebrity. Together, they have put together a small ensemble and even have persuaded a classically trained singer, Petra (Lauren Kennedy), to front for their band. With the assistance of manager Greta (Megan Lawrence), they persuade Gustav Hebert (Buz Mauro), the owner of the underground Rhythm Club, to let them play for his customers.

Jake and Adam meet with success. In the argot of swing, they ride and send like Satchmo. Their talents merit the attentions of the menacingly effete Herr Kroger (Jonathan Hogan), a Nazi official with connections to the music business in America. He offers them their ticket to stardom and out of the path of danger that Nazi Germany presents (particularly to Adam and his family, who are Jews) – or does he?

To go further in this synopsis would give away too much. At this point, let us be frank about The Rhythm Club’s shortcomings, then go on to its superlatives.

First, the backstory of The Rhythm Club has a number of holes in it. How, for instance, do the musicians in Jake and Adam’s band learn their stuff, aside from listening to smuggled acetates? They seem to rise sui generis, like some kind of Hamburg Howard Roark. While important bits of information about each character are revealed over time in the play, there are still questions that need answering. Perhaps a prologue could help, or some flashbacks.

Second, anyone can see the play’s ending from a mile away. I won’t reveal it now, but suffice it to say that a reasonable closing line could be something akin to “Round up the usual suspects.”

Third, the sound design (by Tony Angelini) in Signature’s space is seriously flawed. Particularly with some of the hotter numbers, it was difficult to hear the singers over the orchestra. This is one rare instance in which body microphones would have been helpful. (Signature used them for The Fix, so the intimate staging alone does not explain their absence here.)

That said, one cannot praise highly enough The Rhythm Club’s music and dancing. Just as Stephen Sondheim filled his Follies with pastiches of the music from the Broadway revues of the 1920s and ‘30s, composer Matthew Sklar and lyricist Chad Beguelin emulate – not imitate, but emulate – the various musical styles of the great swing bands. Much credit for this must go to orchestrator Don Sebesky (fresh from winning a Tony Award© for the revival of Kiss Me, Kate) and music director Robert Billig. Particularly given the small size of the orchestra – only seven pieces – it is astounding that they wereable to recreate so accurately the sound of the era. Some numbers evoked Artie Shaw so accurately, one expected to see Lana Turner waiting in the wings. (Or is it Ava Gardner?)

Sklar and Beguelin and their collaborators successfully evoke the sometimes unique, sometimes overlapping musical styles of the 1930s. (“Up in Heaven They Play Swing,” which becomes something of a theme for the show, sounds remarkably like Jimmy Lunsford.) The other, “Broadway” tunes are not so remarkable, but they bear echoes of Sondheim (“Inside the Music”) and Kander & Ebb (“They Taught Me Well,” sung by mothers Florence Lacey and Barbara Walsh, is virtually a duet version of “What Would You Do?” from Cabaret).

Integrated with the music is what really makes The Rhythm Club shine: the choreography by Jodi Moccia. Although the show comes a few years late to capitalize on the swing dancing craze of the mid-1990s (and the remarkable TV ads for The Gap), Moccia pulls out every trick in her leotard to make the joint jump.

Altogether, director Eric Schaeffer has pulled together a visually brilliant, musically inventive production.

A prediction: The Rhythm Club will be a modest success on Broadway, but a huge hit when it arrives in London’s West End.