Emerging from the Park Place station in New York City on the evening of December
30, we saw the panorama of destruction spread out in front of us. From my birds-eye
TV vantage point, I guess I’d imagined that the World Trade Center rubble measured
about the area of two Yankee Stadiums. Now I’m thinking it’s more like nine. Or
16. A fearfully large square plot where huge bulldozers are reduced in scale to
toy trucks in a playpen. It was past 11pm when we stopped at the memorials.
The temperature, unseasonably mild for most of the previous week, had dipped down
to 20 degrees, and a mean wind was blowing. But in the face of the colossal carnage
staring at us, it felt like sacrilege to complain about the cold, or even to acknowledge
it.
Midtown at Times Square, in the nerve center of New York’s theater district,
the handiwork of Al-Qaida is offstage and invisible. But there’s no doubt that
Broadway actors, technicians, and producers are keenly feeling the repercussions
of September 11.
Taking in eight shows between Christmas night and New Year’s Eve, we mostly
saw capacity or near-capacity crowds. That holiday week, however, was a spike
on Broadway’s ticket sales chart — a very sharp spike. All 27 Broadway shows
that had been open the previous week bettered their sales, boosting attendance
by an average of 17.6 percent. The numbers have headed south steeply in the
two weeks that followed, with the roster of shows open for business nosediving
by 20.7 percent and attendance at those shows dropping by an average of 11.2
percent. In response, Broadway is offering price relief to theatergoers, with
discounts ranging from $20 to $40 on prime orchestra seats being made available
for 13 current Broadway shows. Included among the shows are two that I raved
about during my 2000 holiday raid, The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife and
The Full Monty. This year’s crop of offerings — on and off Broadway
— was much more plentiful and no less tasty. Here’s what we saw and what I
thought.
Broadway
The Producers (
3/4 out of 4 stars) Honestly, I didn’t expect
this highly hyped romp to live up to its Tony Awards. My misgivings escalated
after we paid $100 apiece for prime house seats and found out at Will Call that
our Saturday matinee didn’t include Nathan Lane as Max Bialystock.
Nonetheless, this Mel Brooks musical floored me, surprisingly strong in every
respect. Nor does it require Nathan Lane to rise to glory. Brad Oscar spells
the ailing Lane when his wayward vocal chords bar him from performing. Normally
portraying the Nazi playwright guilty of the sure-to-fail Springtime for
Hitler, Oscar definitely has the pipes to sing the showstoppers, having
earned a Tony nomination in his own right. Moreover, he appears to be channeling
Lane’s every move and grimace.
Brooks’ trademark tastelessness runs riot, climaxing when we reach the goose-stepping
hijinks of “Springtime” with scantily clad chorines settling into a revolving
swastika formation. But Max’s sojourn in Little Old Lady Land — on a fundraising
excursion — is nearly as offensive, seasoned with a bizarre tap dance performed
with walkers.
Matthew Broderick starts off more than a little irritating as oppressed accountant
Leo Bloom. But he’s cuddly and effective once he gets the showbiz bug and commits
to partnering with Max. Cady Huffman, as Swedish bombshell secretary Ulla, keeps
everybody’s hormones perking.
Urinetown (1/2) Housed in the 600-seat Henry Miller, this
Broadway smash remains true to its off-Broadway beginnings. Brainy, grungy,
with wit and chutzpah to burn. Every kind of musical — from Annie to Rent — is targeted. And both extremes of the political spectrum
are in the crosshairs of Greg Kotis’ clever book, despoiling industrialists
and anti-scientific zealots. John Cullum, of Northwest Exposure fame,
plays evil urinal mogul Caldwell B. Cladwell, ruthlessly defending his empire
in a drought-ravaged metropolis where citizens must pay to pee.
Jennifer Laura Thompson co-stars as the idealistic heiress to the Urine Good
Company fortune. She falls for a fiery revolutionary who sings his anthem, “Run
Freedom, Run,” at Les Miz intensity to a country shuffle. All the pretentious
vapidity of the hip modern musical is mercilessly mocked with our lovebirds
enflamed by the profound message that everybody has a heart. Driving home the
point that today’s audiences are cynically patronized, Kotis offers us the pigtailed
Little Sally. Played to perfection by 33-year-old Spencer Kayden, this grimy
gamine is always asking the tough questions of our narrator, Officer
Lockstock. And articulating painful truths like, “A bad title could kill a show
pretty good.”
Wickedly avuncular, Jeff McCarthy serves up Lockstock’s answers with a candor
that is even more hilarious, sometimes brandishing his nightstick with the sleazy
showmanship of a used car salesman.
From beginning to end, with occasional misfires and stumbles along the way,
Kotis and composer/lyricist Mark Hollman know exactly what they’re about. What
they’ve achieved nearly qualifies as a latter-day Candide.
Hedda Gabler (1/4) Although Robin Baitz has done a creditable job
modernizing this Ibsen classic, Kate Burton’s spoiled-rich-girl interpretation
of the title role doesn’t quite satisfy. Under Nicholas Martin’s direction,
presentation often veered into Henry James, as channeled by Masterpiece Theater,
instead of homing into the tensions and melodrama that shape Hedda’s actions
and determine her fate.
Hedda’s desperation must seem the explosive outcome of a grim, implacable
sequence, not an inelegant caprice. Calm demeanors and a leisurely pace at the
dénouement don’t help in making our heroine’s last impulse seem credible. What
the production does do well is keep our judgment of Hedda nicely balanced.
Love her or hate her, she remains a fascinating, symptomatic phenomenon.
Contact () While I liked the innovative storytelling and production
of the title dance piece, the two preceding links in choreographer Susan Stroman’s
trilogy were somewhat disappointing. There was a continental worldliness about
“Girl on the Swing,” keyed to the famed Fragonard painting, and the story twists
gracefully. But our own North Carolina Dance Theatre achieves this level of
resourcefulness and airborne athleticism routinely. At more earthbound prices.
“Did You Move?” was overlong with a maudlin viewpoint hearkening back to the
dreaded pantomimes of The Red Skelton Show. With the title piece, lighting
designer Peter Kaczorowski and set designer Thomas Lynch finally get their say
in the fluid, fantastical storytelling. During this audacious liberation, Contact finally lives up to its eclat. But if you’re a stranger to modern dance storytelling,
I’d say the whole evening will be a revelation.
Off Broadway
Homebody/Kabu l(1/2) A richly informative, visionary work
from Tony Kushner in a flamboyantly disproportionate shape. Yes, the slash in
the title is warranted. The “homebody” is an eccentric English housewife, engagingly
rendered by Linda Emond, whose monologue — interweaving the history of Afghanistan,
her fascination and involvement with Afghan culture, and her disconnected family
life — occupies the entire first act.
And she never appears again! Rather, she disappears in Kabul days after the
bombardment of terrorist training camps in Khost, Afghanistan, authorized by
Clinton in 1998. We follow homebody’s husband and her daughter, who appear in
her wake, searching for her — or her savagely flayed remains. Father and daughter
have issues. He’s a craven creep who believes his wife is dead. So he cowers
in his hotel room succumbing to self-pity, booze, and heroin.
Priscilla, on the other hand, is preternaturally plucky, believing her mom
is alive and possibly embracing Islam. Tagging along on Priscilla’s quest, we
encounter a rich gallery of Taliban, peasants, a madwoman, and a poet. Dylan
Baker is the brittle despicable father, and the luminous Kelly Hutchinson is
Priscilla.
A brilliant feat of imagination for all its lapses, H/K nonchalantly
answers some of the most bewildering questions we’ve been asking ourselves since
9/11. Like what is happening in that mad country — and why do they hate us so intently?
Speaking in Tongues (1/2) In the first act of this finely crafted
Aussie script by Andrew Bovell, we encounter two American couples who are unknowingly
mate-swapping. The complications, deceptions, and consequences widen unpredictably
after intermission. Rarely do you see a piece so intricately designed delivering
so much emotional power. Sort of a throwback to the days when challenging fare
like Blow-Up and Last Year at Marienbad were more routine. Strong
cast includes Karen Allen, Kevin Anderson, and Margaret Colin.
True Love (1/4) If you wondered whether somebody might ever take
the loose, ingratiating form of Pump Boys and Dinettes and someday pack
it with a powerful story and message, your day has come in this edgy piece by
hotshot playwright Charles L. Mee. Away on West 37th Street, a place called
The Zipper has been cleverly remodeled into a theater where all the audience
sits on replications of back seats of automobiles. Or the real thing, including
headrests, reclaimed from junkyards.
The central story — what little there is of it — takes you back to the lurid
incest fancied by the Greeks. In the backseat of a souped-up Dodge Dart. A New
York original for the theatrically adventurous, laced with sensational monologues.
Co-stars Laurie Williams and Jeremiah Miller are seen in their anatomical entirety
after the coupling of mom and stepson. Ray Thinnes arrives late — and powerfully
— as the wronged husband.
And God Created Great Whales (1/2) I’d rate this pocket opera much
more highly if Rinde Eckert’s music were a little more varied and his lyrics
more consistently intelligible. Concept is very appealing, centering around
a dying composer and his struggle to finish an opera while his memory and health
disintegrate.
Since the dying man’s enterprise is nothing less than an operatic adaptation
of Moby Dick, there’s a clear parallel between the composer’s steely
determination and Ahab’s mad quest. Trouble is, Great Whales gets sidetracked
in Ishmael’s adventures, a female muse/opera soprano gets tossed into the stew,
and both Ahab and Moby barely show up.
I did like the score, despite the garbled lyrics, and my wife, whose mom succumbed
to Alzheimer’s, was deeply affected by the story. This may be a super
musical. But not until we get supertitles.
This article appears in Jan 25-31, 2002.
