cabaret review CHITA RIVERA, NJPAC, May 19

Chita Rivera can't stand still.  Though she may claim "I Won't Dance, Don't Ask Me," the fact that the two time Tony winner is constantly moving around the stage throughout her cabaret show makes it hard to believe she will be turning 80 early next year.  She has been touring her show "Chita Rivera, My Broadway" around the country and we caught her stop at NJPAC's Chase Room in Newark this past Saturday.

While her voice may be just a little rough around the edges and she might not be able to hold the notes as long as she used to, she still has so much power in her voice that when combined with her acting skills she still manages to completely deliver every song she sings.  She also has such charm and personality that carries throughout the theatre and in telling her stories about her life she adds so much humor to them that she comes across as such a down to earth person, well a down to earth person who just happens to have won two Tony's and starred in about fifteen Broadway shows.

She says she's from "the golden age" and while she says she's scared of what comes after that, she loves that she is from that era, a period when every theatre had a show in it and there were only new shows on Broadway.  She says that today there are so many revivals but that a few years ago she had a wonderful experience when she was walking through the Times Square area and passed posters for the revival of Bye, Bye Birdie and Chicago and then had a bus pass her that had a huge sign for the revival of West Side Story on it.  Chita talks about how much of an honor it is to having appeared in the original casts of all of those shows and how happy she was to see all of them on Broadway at the same time.  She said that after seeing those three posters and billboards "I thought, wait, am I supposed to be somewhere at 8:00 tonight?"

After her opening number that combined the afore mentioned "I Won't Dance" with the Irving Berlin classic "Let Me Sing," it was chilling to hear her sing a pairing of "A Boy Like That" and "America" from West Side Story.  If you shut your eyes you'd swear you were listening to the cast album that was made over fifty years ago.  And of course, during "America" she kicked up her heels across the small stage in the Chase cabaret room.

"Sweet Happy Life" has a nice message about making sure you live each day to the fullest with plenty of laughter and love.  It also has a rousing beat that found Chita moving across the stage to connect with the audiences on all three sides of the stage. 

In the many stories Chita told throughout the show she mentioned about being so lucky and fortunate to have lived such a great life as well as having had so many good friends in her life.  Two of those friends were the songwriting duo of John Kander and Fred Ebb.  "I Don't Remember You" is one of the earliest songs that Kander and Ebb wrote from the show The Happy Time.  Chita appeared in numerous Kander and Ebb shows, almost all of which have been recorded, so it is nice to hear her sing a Kander and Ebb song from a show she didn't appear in.  The message of the song is about aging and the inability to not always remember certain things and it included an amazing guitar accompaniment from Michael Croiter, who is also the music director for the show.   She commented that with all of the recent talk about the behind the scenes issues of the Spiderman musical that people forget that she was there first as the "Spiderwoman" in the Kander and Ebb show Kiss of the Spider Woman.  She won her second Tony for her role in that production. She sang a pairing of two songs from that show "Where You Are" and the title song and, like her take on those two songs from West Side Story, didn't sound any different than her performance on the cast recording.

Back in the 1960's, Chita starred in the National Tour of Sweet Charity as well as appeared in the 1969 film version.  Her take on "Where Am I Going?" from that show was a bit out of the ordinary .  Usually the number is sung in a more subdued quiet way, but Chita delivered it with an emotional rawness that I'd never heard before.  She talked about her leading men and how lucky she's been, including how much fun she had dancing a tango with Antonio Banderas in the revival of Nine.  In Seventh Heaven her co-star was Ricardo Montalban and she sang the humorous song "Camille, Collette, Fifi" in which she originally played the part of Fifi.  She expertly played all three parts when she sang the song, providing different characterizations to the three different parts.   Talking about her male co-stars was a perfect segue to her talking about the couple of guys she has loved over her years.  Her take on "Not Exactly Paris" was a lush and romantic story about remembering the one love of your life.

She talked about when she was first asked to star in The Rink and that she was so happy to learn that her co-star was going to be Liza Minnelli.  She said she'd always wanted to play sisters with Liza and was silent when she was told that she wasn't going to play Liza's sister but her mother.  "Chief Cook and Bottle Washer" is a fun character driven song and, once again, Chita sounded exactly the same as she did almost thirty years ago when that show first premiered and when she won her first Tony for her performance in that show.

"Carousel" from Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris is a song that when delivered right can be an absolute showstopper.  Chita starred in a production of the show with Theodore Bikel.  "Carousel" is a song about how we are all on a crazy carousel that is turning round and round that starts off slow and the accompaniment begins going faster and faster just like a carousel spinning out of control.   Chita managed to turn the song into a theatrical event that ended with a rousing ovation from the audience. 

"Nowadays" and "All that Jazz" are two songs closely associated with Chita and her performance in the original Broadway production of Chicago.  Both begin with vamps that are closely identified with each song and Chita mentioned that whenever she hears the one for "Nowadays" she always sees Gwen Verdon standing next to her as that song is a duo for the two female leads in the show.  Verdon died in 2000, so Chita's performance of the song, now as a solo, was touching in the way she delivers it as somewhat of a tribute to her friend and co-star.  In talking about the vamp that introduces "All That Jazz," Chita talked about how happy she was with the film version of the show.  She said that she told Catherine Zeta Jones, who played the part of Velma that Chita did originally on Broadway and who won the Oscar for her perfomance "you can keep the Oscar, but I get to keep the vamp."  Chita then delivered a rousing performance of the song that found her once again dancing all over the stage.

Chita ended her show with an encore of "Circle of Friends" by Carol Hall.  With all of Chita's talk about the many friends she's had over the years it was a perfect way to end the show.

Chita Rivera is a true living legend.  And she isn't stopping anytime soon as she'll be back on Broadway this Fall in a revival of The Mystery of Edwin Drood.  If Chita comes to your town don't miss the chance to see her.

Most of the songs Chita performed in her cabaret show can be heard on her latest cd "And Now I Swing"

Chita's official Website

Chita sings "Where You Are" from Kiss of the Spider Woman -

Chita and Gwen Verdon perform "Nowadays" from Chicago on The Mike Douglas Show - also includes an interview with both of them

theatre review ARE YOU THERE, MCPHEE?, McCarter Theatre, May 18

The McCarter theatre is ending its season with the world premiere of a new play by John Guare, Are You There McPhee?  Best known for writing The House of Blue Leaves and Six Degrees of Separation, Guare has delivered an overstuffed play of crazy proportions that while never boring unfortunately is too long, unfocused and gets lost along the way. 

McPhee is crazy and wacky with too many strange subplots to mention.   With a strange sense of "what will happen next?" the play centers on a playwright, Edmund Gowery, telling the story of what happened to him in 1975 when he took the money he made from his one hit play and invested it in a rental house in Nantucket, though he had actually never visited that island before.  The house was formerly owned by the daughter of a famous children's book author, and children or more so the theme of "lost children," factor importantly into the play. 

Paul Gross and John Behlmann

When the tenants who are renting the Nantucket apartment are accused of running a mail order child pornography ring, Gowery must go to Nantucket to prove he had no knowledge of what was happening in his house. There he finds that everyone he encounters played a part in a production of his one hit play that he was invited to attend but declined to do so.  Many of these individuals hold it against him that he didn't see their production which they claim many say was better than the original .  While every one of these Nantucket residents are somewhat crazy characters the wackiest are McPhee, a love struck man with a giant lobster in a cooler who sends Gowery to a house with the lobster to wait for McPhee's girlfriend, and Peter and Wendy (that lost children theme again) who Gowery finds in the house he is sent to and who are watching two children there who's parents are away.  The parents of those two kids include the children's book author's daughter that Gowery bought the house from and who are off in California hoping to sell the rights of the children's books to Walt Disney.  Gowery soon finds himself watching the two kids when Peter and Wendy disappear.  With the many plot points and characters in constant motion, Gowery and the audience is continually trying to figure out what is happening around him, what will happen next and how this will all come together. 

Add to the mix that this is the summer of Jaws, which plays endlessly at the movie theatre in town and Gowery finds everyone he encounters is reading the book the movie was based on.  Also, Gowery has been asked to write the screenplay for a remake of Hitchcock's Suspicion, a film whose plot centers on whether or not a husband is out to kill his wife which is a theme also mirrored in McPhee. The remake is to be directed by Roman Polanski and star Jane Fonda and Robert Redford.  Everything that he encounters in Nantucket makes him question if he can use it in either a way to have the Fonda and Redford characters meet each other or if he can incorporate it into a future play. 

Gross and the craziness around him,
puppets included.

Like I said above, a lot is jammed into the plot of this play and it mostly resembles a nightmare of crazy and I've only mentioned about 1/2 of the various plot elements.  Oh, did I mention there are also several puppets in the production as well?

Now Guare did visit Nantucket in 1975 and marry a girl he met there and he has declined seeing productions of his play including one a few years back at Princeton.  He has also written the screenplay for Atlantic City which earned him an Oscar nomination.  So one wonders how much if any of McPhee is autobiographical. 

Paul Gross who hardly ever leaves the stage is delivering a fascinating and solid performance as Gowery.  He is smartly dressed, looks great and provides a grounded center for the lunacy that happens around him. John Behlmann as McPhee plays an almost mirror image of Gowery with his shaggy dog look including his scraggly beard and cut off jeans. He is a man crazy in love and prepared to let nothing get in his way. The rest of the cast achieves the appropriate level of zaniness to make the play never seem outright silly or pretentious, which is a rare feet with everything that happens in this play.

McPhee is a roller coaster of a play and director Sam Buntrock delivers expertly in his direction of ensuring the cast is always achieving the sense of heightened zaniness the play requires.  I also appreciated the sense of surrealism in the play especially in the sets by David Farley that are extremely inspired, especially the Magritte themed room in the Nantucket home Gowery bought. 

While there are a few moments of inspired madness especially in the scenes between McPhee and Gowery, at over 2 1/2 hours the play runs a little long and doesn't exactly find a way for the many themes of the show and multiple plots to come together into a message or meaning.  I'm not sure if this is simply a play by an established playwright that needs considerable trimming and a better focus and McCarter was blinded by the fact that it was a new world premiere of a play by John Guare or if I simply missed the point Guare was trying to make.   I did like the crazy plot and characters and I'm hoping that with some editing as well as a more refined ending that better wraps everything up that McPhee will find its way in a future production of the play.

Are You There, McPhee? runs through Juned 3rd.

Official McCarter Theatre Site

A brief preview of this production -

theatre review THE 39 STEPS, George Street Playhouse, May 12

I am a huge fan of the films of Alfred Hitchcock.  And since Hitchcock himself was known for his sense of humor it is only natural that one of his earliest films has been whipped into a comic gem of a theatrical soufflé.   

Hitchcock's film The 39 Steps was based on the novel by John Buchan and was such a successful film that the 1935 film has been remade several times.  While some of those remakes have stayed closer to the Buchan novel then Hitchcock did, the play of The 39 Steps sticks close to the film and throws in references to other Hitchcock films as well.  Written by Patrick Barlow, the play first premiered in the UK in 2005, followed by a three year run in New York.  The UK production even won the Olivier Award for Best Comedy.  The production at the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, NJ runs through this coming Sunday, May 20th.

Stacie Morgan Lewis and Howard
McGillin getting ready to "check in" at
the Bates Motel.

The plot of the film, play and novel centers on a man falsely accused of a murder and what he does to prove his innocence as he flees across the English countryside.  This theme would be one that Hitchcock revisited many times over his illustrious career such as in North by Northwest and Saboteur.  It is also a theme that many other books, plays and movies have focused on.

John Hannay is a single man who after a night out at the music hall finds himself taking home a frightened woman after shots are fired at the theatre.  He later learns that she is a spy and the one who fired the shots as she is being followed by assassins who know that she has uncovered a plot where others are planning to smuggle British military secrets out of the country.  The man overseeing this plot runs an espionage organization called "the 39 steps." 

The woman spends the night at his flat, and the next morning, when Hannay finds her stabbed and dying, she gives him a few last details as to how he can help her stop the secrets from getting out of the country.   Hannay, on the run from the police who suspect him of the murder must stop the secrets from getting out as well as attempt to prove his innocence without getting killed by the assassins himself.


McGillin -it is amazing how a scarf with
a wire in it, a bicycle handle and some
lighting and music can come
together to portray a getaway
on a bicycle


Now while the details of the plot and all of the films based on the novel and original film are as serious as possible, the play is played for laughs and one of the ways it achieves this is to have all of the parts played by a cast of only four people.  And since the character of John Hannay is on stage for almost the entire time, it means that the three other actors must play all of the other 100 plus parts in the show.  The cast is so adept at playing multiple characters as well as so in sync with the split second costume changes that there were many times when I believed there where other actors off stage waiting to come on when all four of the actors were on stage.

Howard McGillin plays "Hannay" with the perfect touch of a proper English gentlemen (by way of Canada, no less) and he throws himself into the part.  I've seen McGillin in numerous Broadway musicals and I don't remember seeing him have so much fun in a part as in this one.  His performance did remind me somewhat of his role in the Broadway musical The Mystery of Edwin Drood where he also played an Englishman. 

Stacie Morgan Lewis only has three parts to play, those of the three women Hannay comes in contact with, but she so brilliantly plays each one, that you really can't imagine it is the same actress playing all three parts.  The accents alone, especially the one she uses for Annabella Schmidt, the German woman whom Hannay is accused of killing, are not only legitimate accents but also hilarious ones as well.

Every other part in the play is played by Mark Price and Michael Thomas Holmes and they are both amazing in their abilities to play so many different roles, some of them within seconds of each other.  The use of various wigs, mustaches and hats partnered with Price's and Holmes' rubber like features and skills at accents is a theatrical delight as well as pure insanity at many times.

Mark Price and Michael Thomas Holmes

Also, every chase scene and escape from the film, including ones on trains and in cars takes place on stage using a combination of theatrical magic and only a few set pieces.  It is amazing how a few trunks and some lighting can come together with your imagination to portray a chase on top of a train.  We saw the play on Broadway and enjoyed that and seeing another production of this play reminds me again how simple things can come together to provide theatrical magic.  It reminded me a lot of the current Broadway play Peter and the Starcatchers that also uses a small cast to play many parts and minimal sets to portray various locations.
The play includes references to other Hitchcock films and also uses music from his films as well.  The music works perfectly as a theatrical score for the action on the stage.  There is even a cameo by Hitchcock himself.

Mark Shanahan, who was an understudy in the Broadway production directs the George Street production.  He has also directed other productions of the play before and while he sticks close to what worked brilliantly on Broadway he appears to throw in a few of his own comical bits as well.  The play does get a little tired toward the end, but is still a fun treat for fans of theatrical imagination, spoofs and comedies. 

The play of The 39 Steps is a homage to the master of suspense himself, and any fan of Hitchcock, suspense, comedy and the theatre is bound to have a good time.

Official George Street Playhouse Website

theatre review, COCK, Off Broadway, May 8

This past year has seen a plethora of new plays that have been received very well by both critics and audiences.  Other Desert Cities, Venus in Fur, Peter and the Starcatcher, Clybourne Park and The Lyons are at the top of that well received new play heep with many of these plays having transferred from off Broadway to Broadway with the first four in the running for the Tony for Best Play this year. 

Now comes a somewhat controversial play, Cock, who's title alone elicits both nervous laughter as well as intrigue.  Interestingly enough of all of the new plays I saw this year, including many in that illustrious list above, Cock is the one that is still playing in my mind days after seeing it.  It is not only that good of a play but one of the most ingeniously directed plays I've seen in a long time. 

Jason Butler Harner and Cory Michael Smith

The premise of the play is simple and when stated in two sentences actually sounds a little like a plot in a soap opera as well as somewhat hokey - John decides it is time to take a break in his relationship with his boyfriend and when he does he unexpectedly falls for a woman even though he had never had those kind of feelings before.  He must then choose which one he wants to be with.  Like I said, a bit hokey and simple. 

However playwright Mike Bartlett has crafted a 90 minute play with such depth that it is unlike anything I've seen in a long time.  Simple it isn't.   

Jason Butler Harner, Amanda Quaid and Cory Michael Smith

John, played by Cory Michael Smith is the younger member of the gay couple at the center of the play.  Jason Butler Harner is "M" the older and more controlling half.  He exudes control but also a strong need to have John in his life.  We've seen Harner in several plays before and this is a truly breakout role for him.  Smith is also doing great work here in a part that requires many quiet moments.

While it is easy to see why these two should take a break in their relationship, Bartlett has written such smart dialogue for both of them, and the other two characters as well, that one can also see how connected the two are.  Bartlett doesn't need to add extraneous material in order for us to completely understand exactly what is going on between these two, while they should be together as well as why they shouldn't.  The play might sound intense but it also contains smartly written dialogue that adds a considerable amount of humor to the intense situations. 

Amanda Quaid is "W," the woman whom John meets and falls in love with.  She is perfect in the part with the right balance, like Harner, of control and need.  The interesting irony is the only difference between "M" and "W" is their sex, as they are both extremely controlling people who aren't really that nice to John as both of them want what they want.  When the three come together that is when the real fighting begins as both "M" and "W" make their moves to sway John to pick them as the victor in the ultimate "cock fight."  And, while John seems like a nice, young and attractive guy, so we can easily see why both "M" and "W" desire him, he also is a very indecisive person and obviously sexually confused.  So all three main characters have their pros and cons, just like real people, and are likable enough to see why John is drawn to them and vise versa, but at the same time they are all somewhat unlikable as well - again, all naturally realistic characters.

The fourth character in the play is "F," "M's" father.  Cotter Smith plays the part with the requisite amount of charm and love toward his son.  He is fighting for his son's relationship as well, something any gay kid would love to have his father do for him.  Interestingly enough Smith recently played the father of a gay character in the play Next Fall, but in that play he played the father a gay person would never want to have.

Bartlett has crafted a very intriguing character in John, one who can't quite figure out how he fits in the various "labels" that the modern world puts on people, as "gay" and "bi" and even "straight" don't seem to help him find his way.  It is an interesting point of view and opened my eyes to how society "rewards" or acknowledges people for certain things like "coming out" as well as how sometimes what might seem like the easy way might not be that easy at all - ie: living a straight lifestyle.  As a gay man I always thought that a "bi" man who lived a "straight" life was really gay but just couldn't admit it and I never imagined a character like "John" who starts out living a gay life but then finds himself drawn toward women really existed, but after seeing Cock I now find myself having a different understanding for people who say they are "bi" as well as for those who feel they don't quite fit in.   Like I said before, this play has really opened my eyes to many things.



Cory Michael Smith, Cotter Smith,
Jason Butler Harner and Amanda Quaid

Smith perfectly plays the confusing and sexual intrigue that the role of "John" requires and I'm looking forward to seeing what other roles the future holds for him.

Besides the smart dialogue, what elevates the play into something out of the ordinary has to do with the way the play is staged.  The entire action of the play takes place on a circular stage that is surrounded on all sides by five rows of seats inside a large walled wooden auditorium.   The setting is reminiscent of where one imagines an actual cock fight would take place.  Not only are we as the audience no more than twenty or so feet from the actors but we can see every audience member throughout the play as there is no theatrical lighting here with the audience lit as fully as the actors.  We are watching the "fight" unfold in front of us as well as everyone's reaction to it just like we would at a prize fight.  The picture above gives you an idea as to the stage setup, you just have to imagine an audience filling in the bleachers behind the actors. 

We are witnesses to every fight and plee that each character undertakes, and this is a play filled with many loud arguments and emotional outbursts.  Director James Macdonald, who also staged the London run of the play, has not only drawn perfect performances from his four actors, he has also created some scenes that will forever be etched in my memory.  Two of them that quickly come to mind- the scene where John and "W" have sex for the first time which is staged as a dance between two people moving around in a semi-circle as they come closer and closer to each other, reminiscent in some ways of two fighters dancing around their target, and the final scene where what John doesn't say tells us exactly what he is thinking.  And, back to that sex scene for a moment - there is such a rawness and nakedness to the character's in the play but since this is a minimalistic approach even in that sex scene the actors remain completely clothed even though the characters are obviously not.  I can't think of a sex scene in a play that is more real and more emotional only in the words that are spoken since nothing sexual is seen during it.   The same can be said about the rest of the play, it is emotional and raw without the trappings of sets and costumes that most plays feel they need to have.  

For the majority of the play between each scene is a simple bell tone as if to indicate the end of one round and the beginning of another just like you'd hear at a fight. The only thing missing was a spit bucket for each character and a towel to wipe off the sweat.  As much as I liked that correlation to an actual fight, the end of the round bell sound virtually disappears toward the last half of the play as the scenes got longer. I think the bell needed to keep ringing as the stakes got higher and the outcome kept switching, especially since during those last longer scenes there were natural breaks when characters move from one "room" in an apartment to another, so the bell sound could still have worked as a scene break.  But that is a small quibble when compared to the sheer brilliance of this place and how it is staged.   

The only problems with this production have to do with the somewhat pretentious use of "M" "W" and "F" as character's names - I'm assuming Bartlett means "man" "woman" and "father" but why not just give them names like he did for John?  Also, the somewhat uncomfortable nature of the bleachers is a major deterrent. Though, I don't know if maybe that was the intent as when you're eavesdropping on all of these private moments maybe you shouldn't be so comfortable in doing so. 

Still, Cock is one of the most original, intelligent and thought provoking plays I've seen in a very long time- highly recommended.


all photos credit: Joan Marcus

Official Show Site

theatre review, WEST SIDE STORY, National Tour, NJPAC, May 6

If you were to make a list of quintessential American musicals, West Side Story would have to be toward the top of that list.  With the perfect combination of drama, music and dance and containing some of the most well known theatre songs, West Side Story is a true classic with a message that still rings true sixty years after it first premiered. 

Written by Arthur Laurents with music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics from Stephen Sondheim and directed and choreographed by Jerome Robbins, West Side Story is a modern updating of Romeo and Juliet.  Set in 1950's New York City but instead of two feuding families we now have two gangs, one white and one Puerto Rican fighting for their home turf and the star crossed lovers caught in the middle. 

Evy Ortiz and Ross Lekites

There isn't one bad song in the score of this show.  With ballads like "Somewhere" and "Something's Coming," comical numbers like "I Feel Pretty" and "Officer Krumpke" combined with the heavy dance sequences "Cool" and "America" along with the lovely duets "A Boy Like That" and "Tonight," these songs are classics in the truest sense of the word.  Each song adds to the character development and plot and even the dream ballet of "Somewhere" is perfectly placed at the height of the tension and contributes some beauty into the ugliness we've just experienced.  Bernstein and Sondheim's music and lyrics so perfectly compliment each other with each at the top of their game.

The national tour of the show just ended a week long engagement at NJPAC in Newark before moving to Toronto for a month long run.  Based on the recent Broadway revival directed by Laurents, this production features a recreation of Robbins' original choreography by Joey McKneely and direction from David Saint.   When the recent Broadway revival premiered there was much talk of how many of the scenes and songs for the Puerto Rican characters were now in Spanish.   Now this touring production is a slightly different version then when the Broadway revival first premiered as some of the Spanish has been reverted back to English much as it was slightly scaled back during the almost two year long Broadway revival run.  I guess they thought there was too much Spanish for those viewers who weren't completely familiar with the show.  I think there is now a happy mix of the two languages that provide the correct ethnic felling but still keeping some of the most well known and most important lyrics in English. 

Michelle Aravena and Evy Ortiz

The cast for this tour is top notch. Ross Lekites as Tony has a clear and strong voice that serves his soaring ballads perfectly.  His "Maria" was stunning.  Evy Ortiz as Maria has the young innocent looks required but she correctly shows the yearning underneath.  She also has a lovely voice that is put to great use during "Somewhere."  The character of Anita is always the highlight of this show, and Michelle Aravena is smashing in the part.  She not only is a great dancer, with her "America" a major highlight of this production but her acting is so natural and raw and her voice easily wraps around the Spanish lyrics.  Her duet of "A Boy Like That" with xx was perfect. 

In the supporting parts, German Santiago as Bernardo and Drew Foster as Riff are both effective in delivering the raw energy required for the leaders of the two rival gangs.  They are both gifted dancers who, along with the entire ensemble, make the many dance numbers in the show extremely energetic.  In fact, McKneely must have spent many hours in drilling his dancers as they are so in sync and the opening number and the Dance at the Gym sequence are red hot.  Bernstein's music and Robbins' choreography so elegantly portray the emotion and complexity of  the characters and the dancers in this show couldn't be better.   Alexandra Frohlinger brought a nice uniqueness to Anybody's,  the girl who wants to be a member of the Jets.   It's just too bad her voice isn't stronger since she is given the opening part of "Somewhere" to sing.

James Youmans provided the scenic design as he did for the recent Broadway revival.  His designs seamlessly and effectively portray the many locations in 1957 Manhattan. I really liked how effective the forced perspective on the simple drops and flats was in portraying various places especially the underside of the freeway during the rumple scene.  Lighting by Howell Bickley was nicely done and costumes by David C. Woolard provided a brilliant color palate.  Sound design by Dan Moses Schreier was extremely effective especially considering the large space of the NJPAC Prudential Hall.  All four of these men recreated their designs from the recent Broadway revival.

It's been awhile since I saw a production of West Side Story and seeing a top notch production like this reminds me again how brilliant of a show this is.  Sure, maybe our young lovers fall in love a little too quickly and when one character dies their sibling doesn't seem to mourn them for too long.  But those slightly unrealistic moments don't detract much at all from the intelligent and thought provoking simple message of acceptance and tolerance at the core of Arthur Laurent's book.  I don't know what else I can say about the score except that it has to be one of the most entirely effective and significant scores in musical theatre history.  It is amazing that this show is sixty years old and still has a message that is timely.  If this tour comes to your town or if a production of West Side Story pops up close by you, don't miss a chance to see a performance. 

Official Show Site

A montage of scenes from this production:

Karen Olivo and the Broadway revival cast perform "America" on the Dave Letterman Show:

The Broadway revival cast perform "The Dance at the Gym" on the Tony Awards:

theatre review, NICE WORK IF YOU CAN GET IT, Broadway, April 23

When Crazy For You opened on Broadway twenty years ago it was hailed as "the new Gershwin musical comedy" even though George Gershwin had been dead for over 50 years.  So, it's surprising that the producers of the new Broadway musical Nice Work If You Can Get It aren't billing this show as "the newest Gershwin musical comedy" since, like Crazy For You, this new show is a re-working of an earlier Gershwin musical, but with a new book and with the addition of other Gershwin songs.

Based on the 1926 musical Oh, Kay!, Nice Work If You Can Get It features classic Gershwin tunes from that show as well as other Gershwin shows including "Someone To Watch Over Me," "Fascinating Rhythm," "But Not For Me," and "S' Wonderful."   It stars Matthew Broderick and Kelli O'Hara and officially opens on Broadway tonight.



Kelli O'Hara and Matthew Broderick

 Directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall and with grounded comedic performances by Broderick, Michael McGrath and Judy Kaye, Nice Work If You Can Get It is a throw back to classic musical comedies of the past.  Kelli O'Hara gives another one of her well thought out takes on an unordinary character, in this case a tom boy bootlegger. With some inspired choreography, a well honed book by Joe DiPietro and those wonderful Gershwin tunes, this show is definitely the most fun and funniest musical this season.  It is a modern screwball comedy that puts a smile on your face from pretty much the beginning that you will still have on your face when the show ends.

Terry Beaver, Estelle Parsons,
Kelli O'Hara and Matthew Broderick

Broderick is the wealthy playboy Jimmy Winter.  The show begins on the eve of his upcoming fourth marriage when he stumbles upon female bootlegger Billie (O'Hara) after a drunken night of partying.  It is 1927 and prohibition is still in full force so O'Hara is more concerned where to store her huge inventory of gin then falling in love. But sparks fly when Broderick plants a drunken kiss on O'Hara.  Of course we know from the beginning that by the end Broderick and O'Hara will be together, but DiPietro's book finds plenty of obstacles to get in the way of our stars having a "happily ever after" ending.  The fact that the father and aunt of his soon to be wife are a Senator/Judge and a prohibitionist, respectively, only adds to the drama. 

Matthew Broderick shows once again how effortless he is at comedy.  Not only is he given plenty of funny moments, but he sings many songs and dances as well.  It is nice to see Broderick in another musical, and one where he looks like he is having so much fun.  He also gets to wear some really nice costumes. O'Hara isn't given a lot of frilly dresses to wear, instead often wearing pants and jackets more associated with someone you'd see working around the docks of New York City, but she still looks great, and wraps her lovely soprano voice around many classic Gershwin songs.  She too looks like she is having a great time and her scenes and dances with Broderick are highlights of the show.  They have one solo dance number that brought the house down.

Judy Kaye and Michael MGrath

McGrath is O'Hara's bootlegging partner and he and Judy Kaye are the supporting comedic stars here who both fortunately get plenty of material and scenery to chew along the way.  I would be very happy to see both with Tony nominations in a few weeks as they are both so good with their comic abilities, solid in their character portrayals as well as both get some nice Gershwin songs to sing, including Kaye doing an over the top delivery of "Looking For a Boy" in the second act.

Also in the cast are Jennifer Laura Thompson as Broderick's fiancee and Estelle Parsons as his mom.  Thompson isn't given a lot to do but she is perfect as the fortune hungry woman who is only looking out for herself and while Parsons doesn't show up until the last 15 minutes of the show, she is given some rich material to deliver.

Like last year's Anything Goes, that she also directed and choreographed, Marshall has proven herself perfectly capable of directing a new musical comedy as well as being able to hone excellent performances from a fairly large ensemble cast.   Her choreography for Nice Work If You Can Get It is both fresh and funny. Her stars are all over the stage, dancing on the furniture, the staircase of the mansion, sometimes lifted high above like up on a ladder and Broderick is even lifted up by the female ensemble as well as rolled along the backs of the male ensemble.  All of these moments add funny touches to the already funny show.  Marshall's use of various set pieces from a bathtub or a bed to a chandelier to bring out the humor in the piece are also the signs of a director who knows how to accurately use what they've been given to make the whole more than the sum of the parts. 

A lovely set design by Derek McLane provides some huge Long Island Mansion surroundings including the front, inside and garden of the mansion as well as various bedrooms and a bathroom.  Costumes by Martin Pakledinaz are rich and elegant but also simple when necessary like the street close costumes for O'Hara and McGrath.

If you're looking for a fun night out with A list Broadway starts look no further than Nice Work If You Can Get It.

Official Show Site

Highlights from the show:

concert review, AUDRA MCDONALD, NJPAC, April 20

Audra McDonald is a consummate performer.  With an incredibly clear soprano voice, an intense emotional connection to every song she sings as well as a down to earth personal perspective it is no wonder she has won four Tony Awards for her various Broadway performances.  This last Friday night she took a night off from performing in the Broadway revival of Porgy and Bess and with only one slight misstep her concert with the New Jersey Symphony Chamber Orchestra was a stellar affair.

The concert provided a perfect combination of songs from contemporary composers from Stephen Sondheim, Kander and Ebb and Jason Robert Brown to songs from the Gershwins and Irving Berlin.  "When Did I Fall in Love?" from Bock/Harnick's musical Fiorello provided a perfect beginning to the concert with it's various emotional moments including several that truly allowed Audra's voice to soar to the rafters.  The cabaret standard from Jason Robert Brown, "Stars and Moon" is a song that allows a performer to not only sing a good song but tell a story that has moments of humour, deep thought and meaning as well.  Audra delivered the emotional and humorous moments perfectly actually getting the comical bits better than I've seen other performers get.  However, she might have scaled back just a bit on the slightly operatic vocal flourishes to the song that seemed to ultimately overshadow the simple meaning of the material.   This was the only song in the evening where Audra's delivery could have been turned down just a bit.

Audra mentioned that the next two songs "My Buddy" and "I Double Dare You" were the oldest songs in the concert, but the lyrics and music for both are so contemporary and Audra's delivery of both is so perfect that it is hard to believe these were both written so long ago.  Her personal comments about these two songs as well as the stories she told about her connection to every other song in the concert is what elevates her performing skills from someone who just comes out and sings a series of songs.  By personalizing each song it helps us not only to understand why she chose to sing each song but also feel like we know more about Audra McDonald the individual.

Audra talked about her daughter and how one day when they were listening to the Broadway channel on Sirius XM satellite radio that her daughter said that she should sing the song that was playing.  Audra mentioned how that song, "He Plays the Violin" from 1776, was from a show she wasn't originally that familiar with.  She talked about how the plot of that show centered around the fight for the Declaration of Independence and how her daughter and her two soon to be step-sons staged an "occupation living room" one night and came up with their own declaration requesting things like the right to stay up late.  She then gave us a crystal clear performance of the song with her voice filling the large space of the NJPAC auditorium.

Irving Berlin's "Moonshine Lullaby" from Annie Get Your Gun is a song that provides a lovely lyric with a lush musical accompaniment.  Audra's delivery was touching and heartfelt.  She followed this with Stephen Sondheim's "Moments in the Wood" from Into the Woods and managed to hit every emotional and comic note the song requires and truly made this into a major highlight of the concert.   Audra briefly spoke about her connection to the various Marriage Equality rallies and sang the song she often sings at these gatherings, the Gershwin's "He Loves and She Loves" from Funny Face.   This is a lovely song with a simple message that "love is love" and Audra's delivery of it was spot on.

"First You Dream" from Kander and Ebb's Steel Pier is a song from a flop show that has a lovely message that anything can happen as long as you dream.  The orchestration for this was simply stunning and provided a perfect accompaniment to Audra's stellar vocal.  Audra mentioned that her father died in a plane crash almost five years ago and that this song with it's connection to flying was very personal to her since her father loved to fly.  She also mentioned that her father often commented on why she didn't play the piano in her concerts so she sat down at the piano and delivered "Migratory V" from Adam Guettel's Mythms and Hymns.  Her performance of this song was especially meaningful after her comments about her father.

Next Audra sang a song that she said she never wanted to sing as everyone had sung it, but she realized that "I Could Have Danced All Night" from My Fair Lady was one that she needed to get over herself and sing.  Her delivery of this song was simply astounding, though while having the audience sing along during the chorus parts added a nice touch it would have been just as lovely to hear Audra sing the entire song alone.

Audra commented on how her daughter never let her sing any lullabies to her when she was a child, often saying that her mother's singing "made my ears cry" so Audra said that we would have to be the ones subjected to her singing of lullabies.  She sang a lovely pairing of "Whose Little Angry Man" from Raisin and "Baby Mine" from Dumbo.   Audra spoke about her Julliard training in Classical voice and then sang an extremely humorous song called "Craigslist Lieder" that uses actual text from Craigslist ads set to a modern classical composition.

Audra talked about the Kander and Ebb musical Scottsboro Boys and the significance of the actual events of that show where twelve young African American men were falsely accused of rape. She then sang the touching song "Go Back Home" from that show, hitting all of the right emotional notes and with a lovely orchestration accompanying her.

Audra mentioned how the young songwriter Adam Gwon won the Fred Ebb award two years ago which is an award that provides a cash prize to allow songwriters to keep writing instead of having to worry about where there rent money is coming from.  I've heard other songs that Gwon has written and am happy to hear that he won this award.  She then sang Gwon's "I'll Be Here" from his show Ordinary Days, is a contemporary story song about the effects of September 11th on one person.  It is a lovely simple story song with a huge emotional impact. 

Audra talked about how that day touched everyone, but most of all those of us in the New York City area.  She said the events of that day have always made her think about what's most important in life and how easy it is to take things for granted.  She said that one song that she loves that it is really about holding on to what's most important is the Jule Styne, Comden and Green song "Make Someone Happy" from Do, Re, Mi.  She then sang an incredibly touching and moving version of the song with a lovely orchestration.

Audra talked about Lena Horne and how she was asked to sing at Horne's funeral.  She then sang the rousing "Ain't It De Truth" by Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg from the musical Jamaica that was sung by Horne to close out the show.  This provided a high energy end to the concert.  

The one misstep that Audra made was to not do an encore despite the roaring ovation from the audience.   I understand that she did have two performances of Porgy the next day and even mentioned she had to be up early for softball pictures for her daughter around 8am - but by not providing an encore it seemed like she was in some way dissing the audience.  If she was trying to keep her concert to 90 minutes she could easily have cut one of the earlier songs and simply sang it as an encore instead and had the show be the same length it was, but giving the audience what they came for.  By not giving an encore it seemed like she was in some way short changing the audience.