Cipher

Summer Play Festival. Can't review it. Can count it.

Surface to Air

I'm hesitant to say bad things about Surface to Air: it's the first theatrical production to grace the renovated Symphony Space. However, if their future selections are as bad as David Epstein's charmless family drama, there's little to be lost in this warning. Surface and air is all you'll find in this shamelessly exploitative play about Vietnam (i.e., letting go of the past). The plot idles as often as the ghost of the play, Rob (Mark J. Sullivan), a sullen monologist who orates every so often from a dim spotlight cast over the stage left patio. The rest of the time, he just stands there, nodding off, although who could blame him, considering how blandly James Naughton directs the rest of the cast.

Princess (Lois Smith) is a germaphobe whose spirit died when Rob crashed and went missing, thirty years ago. So it makes perfect sense for her to smear herself in Rob's ashes: well, perfect sense considering all the hard work Epstein and Naughton go through to establish her fear of people and things. After all, she sprays not just the table, but the rag she wipes it with, and then the trashcan she throws it into. It's all so artfully done. Of course Hank, Princess's husband, has it out with his children, Terri and Eddie, over the meaning of honor: why else would you reunite them? Marisa Echeverria, who plays Eddie's new, Hispanic wife, is the only spot of color here, and the play she's in has nothing to do with Vietnam. There are a few good spots between Cady Huffman (as a bossy studio executive) and Bruce Altman (as a docile documentarian), but these scenes only re-enforce how unnecessary the intrusion of Vietnam is into this play. Politics may be dramatic, but just talking about politics, without any stakes or emotional investment at all? That's worthless.

[Also blogged by: Patrick]

Seussical

photo: Joan Marcus

There's a new Seussical in town that aims to please the peek-a-boo set, and it does: unlike the original Broadway flop of seven years ago, this production (from TheatreWorksUSA) makes a fair amount of demands on a kid's imagination. An open box is a bathtub, a blue blanket is the bathwater overflowing, and so on. Using a revised book that cuts a handful of musical numbers and trims away a subplot or two, this production clocks in at an intermissionless eighty minutes, which is just about right to hold the attention of New York's littlest theatregoers. Anyone older than that will notice that the musical doesn't have much distinctively Seussian flavor - it's especially disappointing that the songs rarely approximate the wonderfully catchy rhythms of the books. (It needs to be said, also, that this production uses pre-recorded music) Still, the cast (of twelve, ambitious by TheatreWorksUSA standards) is eager to please and succeeds at performing for children without condascending to them, and the production is energetic and imaginative enough to ensure that kids will have a good time. Parents do have at least one reason to be happy: all tickets are free of charge, distributed at the box office one hour prior to each performance.

GYPSY- Showshowdown Rave #3!

*****

City Center

GO! SEE! THIS! Encores has delivered us another mouth-foamer in this production starring Patti Lupone and directed by the book writer, Arthur Laurents. Laurents here has inserted so many fresh moments and bits that caught we the audience (aka congregation) off-guard and sent us into fits of crazy monkey laughter. Our dear St. Patti, belting to the rafters, nailed all of the rage, ambition, and humor that every good Mama Rose has sweating out of her pores. As for the rest of the cast- not one weak link. The children were perfect as were their adult counterparts. Literally from start to finish I could not wipe the goddamn smile off of my face. Thank you, Encores for giving us a full onstage orchestra, a dream cast, and a near flawless production. You wanna make out?

Also blogged by [Patrick] and [Aaron]

High School Musical

photo: Joan Marcus

Big sound system problems brought the curtain down and the house lights up about forty five minutes into the first act. I hear that they were able to get things together almost an hour later, but by then we were already over it and determined to get out of Philly on schedule. Is it fair or unfair to comment on what I did see of this touring stage adaptation of Disney Channel's extraoridnarily popular tv movie musical? I don't know, but I will say that it didn't reach me at all, even in the third row: it felt like an expensive version of one of those shows you file into at a theme park to get a break from the rides. Big, broad, bland.

The People vs. Mona

Photo/Randy Morrison

The People vs. Mona is about as plausible as an episode of Perry Mason, but (a) that's what it was styled after and (b) this one's an endearing, bluesy musical. If you're watching a musical, your belief is already pretty well suspended, so settle back in your seat and enjoy the lively tunes and livelier characters that Jim Wann and Patricia Miller are interrogating for tonight's entertainment. The plot's more elaborate than the set or costume changes, all of which happen in the middle of the action, so your focus is never distracted from the ensemble: there's the operatic Officer Bell (David Jon Wilson) and the sultry Tish Thomas (Marcie Henderson); over there's our cheerful Indian motel owner, Patel (Omri Schein), and in another corner, our take-no-sass judge, Ella Jordan (Natalie Douglas). The three leads, our defense, prosecutor, and defendant (Richard Binder, Karen Culp, and Mariand Torres) are also great singers, but they're actually a bit too normal in the context of this self-satirizing show. But that's no reason to dismiss this case: The People vs. Mona is a grand ole time.

[Read on]