Man-Made

photo: Jim Baldassare

This new one-act, written and directed by Susan Mosakowski and currently running at The Ohio Theatre, has the fathers of Evolutionary Science (Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace) interacting with Mary Shelley and her fictional Frankenstein monster, thanks to the conceit of Darwin's hallucinatory fevers. It's the kind of play that gently provokes questions, such as "how do we ultimately define human?" and "should we take a flying leap forward on the evolutionary chain just because we can?" By the time the first biogenetically manufactured woman arrives late in the play, Mosakowski has thoughtfully explored many aspects of the theme, sometimes with a bit of humor and always with intelligence, but the opening scenes are on the dry side and despite an able cast the play doesn't, ahem, come to life until Mary Shelley shows up. Once she does the play-of-ideas is more lively and textured, and remains engaging partly thanks to the playwright's probing tone. It's the opposite of being hit over the head sledgehammer-style with a "message".

South Pacific

photo: Joan Marcus

Lincoln Center's new revival of the Rodgers & Hammerstein classic is lush and beautiful: the production doesn't skimp on the number of musicians in the pit or actors in the ensemble, and the sets - from the forced perspective sand dunes to the giant rotating airplane - also look no-expense-spared. The show is rich in gorgeous classic show tunes - "Younger Than Springtime," "There Is Nothing Like A Dame," and "I'm In Love With A Wonderful Guy" are but three that have since achieved songbook standards status - and generally they are well-performed in this production. But I have to confess that while South Pacific may be my favorite Rodgers & Hammerstein score, I've never warmed to the Pulitzer Prize-winning book - everytime the military men pull out maps my eyes glaze over, and being asked to buy the dramatic convention of love-at-first-sight with not one but two couples in the story has always turned me into a tightwad. However, the show's heartstrings-pulling second act usually pulls me through (capped by the handkerchief-worthy double-hit of "You Have To Be Carefully Taught" and "This Nearly Was Mine", both splendidly performed here) as do charismatic performances. Two weeks into previews, some of the principal performers are not yet where they could (and probably will eventually) be: Kelli O'Hara hasn't yet found enough "hick" in her Nellie Forbush, for instance, and Paulo Szot - an opera singer making his natural and charming Broadway debut as Emile - needs to find more levels in his performance. Danny Burstein, on the other hand, is in ready-to-open spot-on shape as Luther.

South Pacific

****
Vivian Beaumont

This musical is at least a little bit ground-breaking in the sense that this is the first time that this almost 60 year old Pulitzer Prize-winner has been revived on Broadway; probably in part, due to the dated nature of the book whose themes on racism seem archaic and darling. Instead of calling in David Ives to fix it, Director Bartlett Sher, has smartly embraced the book as a relic and carefully presents it just probably had been originally. Having played Lt. Cable in my High School spring musical (Matthew Morrison decided to play him as sexy and masculine. Interesting choice.), I have every word of the score committed to memory and it was pretty heavenly listening to these songs sung so beautifully by our Broadway cast. I cannot get "I'm Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair" out of my head. Nor do I want to.

Hello Failure

Hello Failure is focused on the rich, excellent, substantive lives of seven submariner's wives who come together to discuss their feelings of isolation. However, Kristen Kosmas presents her material with overlapping text, fragments of thoughts, and gasps of self-confession that abruptly surface (and just as abruptly submerge), and the end result is often hard to grasp. The play is fixated more on the nuances of the conversation than what's actually behind the line ("sub"-text), and this self-inflicted meta-realism seems to be, like the characters, compensating for an absence of purpose. The actors are exceptional, especially given the untraditional deliveries and abrupt changes in scene (or mood), and special credit to Matthew Maher, who grounds Kosmas (and her play), despite seeming to be a figment of Rebecca's imagination. Kosmas uses many such devices, but this is the only one that forces the characters to confront their issues, the only one that isn't hiding failure behind cleverness.

[Read on]

The Sea Gull

photo: Joan Marcus

How are Dianne Weist and Alan Cumming in CSC's new production of The Sea Gull? They're both woefully misdirected and often adrift, but since that's also true of nearly everyone in the cast, the blame surely belongs elsewhere. The ensemble isn't the least bit cohesive - each actor seems to be in a different production, and only David Rasche (as the Doctor, Yevgeny Sergeyevich) seems to be in a production you'd want to see. Otherwise, there are counterproductive choices made throughout that prevent this production not only from having a cumulative emotional impact but also from making any kind of thematic sense: even the notes that confidently sound in any average production of this play are missed or not attempted. There's a doozy of a directorial choice near the end of the three-hour play that I won't reveal. I'll only say that it's misguided and part of the reason why this production's climactic Nina-Konstantin scene is the weakest I've ever witnessed, unless Drowning Crow counts.

King Arthur

photo: Carol Rosegg

One of the most joyful and entertaining shows in town right now is at City Opera, where director/dance genius Mark Morris has taken Purcell's 17th century music for King Arthur, thrown out all the dialogue, sent the singing chorus out of sight to the orchestra pit, and put his wonderful dance troupe on stage with the principal singers. Now more a cheeky modern dance program set to Purcell's lovely music than a comprehensible production of the piece, the dancers outnumber the singers. But the witty and repeatedly surprising show has a lot of fun integrating the modern dancers and the classical opera singers on the same stage, and it is hard to imagine anyone but the most diehard purists having a problem with this: the music, under Jane Glover's baton, is respectfully and gorgeously rendered and the dancing, to put it mildly, brings a visual excitement and a fresh attitude not usually associated with Baroque opera. (Said fresh attitude extends to a few brief, unabashedly bawdy moments including mimed guy-on-guy oral: this isn't your Grandad's production of King Arthur!) Morris doesn't run out of ideas - there are new ones at every turn, and you leave not only delighted by the music but tickled by the production's cheerful playfulness and its high spirits.

I've posted about this before when I saw La Boheme last year but it's worth repeating: thanks to their new Opera For All program, a number of Orchestra seats can be had at City Opera for $25. The week's discounted tickets go on sale each Monday morning of the season, and yes, they can be purchased online.