Lysistrata Jones = Epic Fail

By Jonathan Jones
Wednesday, November 22, 2011

I wish I got my act together last spring and ventured to the Judson Church to see this confection. Had I, I probably would have loved this gem of an Off-Broadway musical. Unfortunately, I found out about the show too late, and though it was extended, I could not get a ticket. So, when I heard that it would make the jump to Broadway, I knew this was my chance.


Alas, it seems I missed my chance. This show should not be on Broadway. Who is the audience for this? High school kids...undergraduates...I worked with theatre students outside of New York, so I'm sure that they would find this worthwhile when visiting - but will New York audiences sustain this through the winter? Me thinks not.


Where did they go wrong? The largest problem with the show is that it is the sister of the disastrous revival of Godspell playing at Circle in the Square. Ken from Godspell is replaced by practically perfect creamy skinned blond Barbie (Lysistrata Jones played by Patti Murin), leading her band of heathen (again, just the same as Godspell - one in every color) away from their lusty desires, toward enlightenment, peppered with idiotic pop-culture anachronisms that do get tepid laughs ("Herman Cain asked the pizza girl, 'What topping?'," some idiocy about the iPhone dropping calls, and, "Siri, can you find a brothel in the neighborhood?" among others) Patti, Kerry Butler called. She's seen your pale imitation and is not amused.


Aside from the unfortunate approach to multicultural casting that is now officially plaguing Broadway, this material is not strong enough for this venue (nor these ticket prices). When I saw Bring It On  last winter, I was at first dismayed by the work, feeling that this is what was to become of musical theatre, thanks to Disney's High School Musical franchise. Thankfully, Tom Kitt, Jeff Whitty, and Lin Manuel Miranda are boy-geniuses and they really made something out of that work. The same cannot be said for the creative team here. While these men made satirical magic with Xanadu, there is plenty of fun in Lysistrata, but it lacks the pizazz of the former production (and the knock-out cast). Whereas masterworks like In the Heights, Avenue Q, and Rent were readily adaptable for the Great White Way, Lysistrata just doesn't have the gravitas to make this work.


Other pitfalls? The choreography is all straight out of an *NSYNC concert circa 2000. The male lead, Josh Segarra, wants desperately to be the incomparable Jon Rua, but fails. The brilliant Jason Tam is hugely underused, though his dancing stops the show. The 11 o'clock number,  "When She Smiles," has a melody that is a complete rip off of "When the Sun Goes Down" from In the Heights. One of them haunts the audience. The other, well, guess...

Lysistrata Jones is playing at the Walter Kerr Theatre. Tickets can be purchased here.

Private Lives: Certain Women Should Be Struck Regularly Like Gongs

By Jonathan Jones
Thursday, November 17, 2011

Kim Cattrall is divine. Does that surprise you? She slinks and saunters and wraps her tongue around Coward's poetry like you wished she would. Twenty-four years after she became a household name--at least in my family, where love of Mannequin knew no bounds--she is walking sex. 


The production was fun and had some clever moments. The script is difficult, for while Cowards works are indeed luscious, the constant references to hitting women is quite jarring. At times I wanted to jump up in my seat and scream, "Revise the damn thing! No one from the Coward estate would question your choice!" Indeed, the strength of the casting of Cattrall is not just her sex appeal, but also that she is a monster, and for everything that Paul Gross' charming yet smarmy Elyot throws at her, she DEVOURS him again and again. 


In spite of my unending love for Ms. Cattrall, the real star of this show it the set in act two and three. The drab overabundance of yucky brown shutters that make of the facade of the hotel in act one flies away to reveal a beauteous undersea adventure. I'll post a picture, but you really must buy the ticket just to see the set. 

Private Lives is playing at the Music Box Theatre on 45th Street. Tickets can be purchased here.

The World May Remember Bonnie and Clyde, but Not Perhaps This Show

By Jonathan Jones
Tuesday, November 15, 2011

After seeing director Jeff Calhoun's last efforts, Disney's Newsies, I had high hopes for what I would see tonight. Unfortunately, those hopes were soon dashed as this misguided production never materialized as I had hoped it might.


Where did they go wrong? The fundamental problem with this production is the lack of choreography, and as the director is a choreographer, there really is no reason why this should have happened. The music is arguably derivative, reminiscent of Dolly Parton's entire catalog, The Color Purple, and Big River. Unfortunately, the three share in common soaring ballads, and had this show just been wall-to-wall ballads, at least the lack of choreography would have made sense. But what is the point of having up-tempo knee slappers one after another and the actors just standing in place? If one were to make the case that it would break the reality of the drama to have them break out in dance, then I would say - Why in God's name are they singing? I just didn't get it. And in Newsies, Jeff Calhoun's stage pictures were incredible. Here, not so much. The set was interesting, but nothing on it seemed worth a second glance.


Bare in mind, I have never seen any of Mr. Wedekind's shows as I've never heard anything good about them, but I was willing to see past that when I entered the theatre tonight. After this experience, I'm indifferent about his abilities. The music was not the problem. Sure "You Love Who You Love" is sonically interchangeable with Henry Krieger's brilliant "Who Will Love Me As I Am," but lacks the message of the latter. That the main theme runs through the show (and is the main melody of the chorus to "This World Will Remember Us" and "When I Drive") is so close to "It Don't Mean a Thing if It Ain't Got that Swing" that it's hard to believe they're getting away with it...


Alas, Laura Osnes was luminous in South Pacific and I adored Jeremy Jordan in Newsies, so there was no lack of talent (though Melissa Van Der Shyff is the real showstopper in this work) but tonight was yet another example of when a bad production happens to good people.

"This World Will Remember Us"

Bonnie and Clyde is playing at the Schonfeld Theatre, opening in the first week of December. Tickets are available here. 

The Greatness in Mary Testa: Queen of the Mist

By Jonathan Jones
Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Mary Testa is divine. So divine, in fact, that I spent much of this show imagining a film version featuring The Divine Miss M. I've never seen work by Mr. Lachiusa (sacrilege, I know), but I've been told that he is often innovative, and I have limited taste for "innovation." In Queen of the Mist, innovation was simply not on the menu--and thank heaven for that! This is a new story indeed told in a very traditional musical comedy style. A quintet supports Mary Testa's Anne Edson Taylor, who famously was the first person to descend Niagara Falls in a barrel and survive way back in 1901. Their numbers are all show, straight out of turn-of-the-century vaudeville--and what fun they are! These numbers provide great counterpoint to Ms. Testa's angst ridden tomes--all-in-all creating a fabulous evening at the theatre.

Queen of the Mist is scheduled to run at The Gym at Judson Church on Washington Square South through November 20. Tickets can be purchased here.

Queen of the Mist was commissioned by Transport Group Theatre Company and is the first production of Transport Group's ten-year cycle, "The 20th Century Project," exploring themes from each decade in the 20th century. Queen of the Mist takes place during the first decade, 1900-1910. 

Timeless: No Day But Today

By Jonathan Jones
Wednesday, November 2, 2011

If I measured my life in love, the chills all over my body this afternoon were evidence that love in my life is in the theatre. Rent is, as always, an unparalleled live thrill.


Last spring, a critic asked if reviving Rent was worthwhile; would the work hold up in a new time? The answer is YES YES YES. Students in my musical theatre history class were equally skeptical, but I told them then that a timeless work can never go out of style. Michael Greif's ability to dress Mark Wedland's signature stage boxes is fine tuned. The stage pictures are thrilling, harking back to the Rent publicity stills that papered subway stations and telephone booths fifteen years ago (and remember the wall of images in the Times Square subway station?) and it was glorious to see the show in this fragmented way: watching them watch the action. The costume decision to have all the jackets closely mirror the original jackets from the previous production was unfortunate as so much of the show is an artistic re-conception, all other costumes included.


For a show with a history of blowing out the voices of untrained young performers, I understand the production's choice of hiring tried and true Equity performers, but sometimes (as with Matt Shingledecker's interpretation of Roger) the Broadway belt is inappropriate. Conversely, Arianda Fernandez's limited vocal control displayed in "Take Me Out" made me worry that she had hurt herself, as she tried to regain her voice through "Another Day" (not a good time to have vocal trouble--such a beauteous melody). Thankfully she was in fine form again by the time of "Without You." Today's Star Watcher award goes to Annaleigh Ashford. I wish I had seen her as Galinda in Wicked. Her rendition of "Over the Moon" is AMAZING, comic, fun, fresh, and inventive. As I often say, she too should have her own show.

Rent plays at The New World Stages Off-Broadway Theatre complex on 50th Street. Tickets can be purchased here.

Godspell: When a Bad Show Happens to Good People

By Jonathan Jones

November 1, 2011

We’ve been down this road before: amazingly talented actors and musicians in a poor, unfortunate show (Urban Cowboy, A Tale of Two Cities among others). Not only is the show unfortunate (early Stephen Schwartz may have a handful of memorable numbers, but overall, dreck), but this production embraces a level of unfortunate-ness that soured my evening from the moment the cast took the stage.

The central conceit of the misguided revival is to add as many anachronisms as possible to make the show seem fresh and topical—and more (horror of all horrors), to appeal to a younger audience. The problem is that good musical theatre is timeless—that’s what makes it good (Gypsy, Follies, Hairspray, etc). Godspell, as an adaptation of the Bible should easily lend itself to a timeless quality, but like the animated Shrek films and KathyGriffin’s comedy shows which have heavily influenced this production, the work here will not age well. Kathy circumvents this by constantly recreating her bits—and maybe that is the plan for this production as well—forever in state of re-writes to keep the jokes and allusions fresh and topical—but the problem (should they not) that I suspect this work will share with the Shrek films is that after a few months, the jokes refer to events and people that are better left forgotten. You might imagine that this is what happens when a well-meaning high school theatre director adds some new ‘hip’ jokes to an older musical to keep it fresh for the kids—but this is Broadway and someone should knock-knock-knock on the stage door of the Circle in the Square and remind them of this fact.

Aren’t we done with the Black Judas bit? Me thinks it’s just a bit overdone at this point (Black man betrays Jew, news at eleven). Further, as the production team have gone out of their way to have a diverse cast (oh yes, one or two of every color), they quickly forget how unfortunately condescending it is to have the blond haired, blue eyed Ken-doll-Jesus leading the heathen infidels….

Production problems aside, Telly Leung is a star. If I were writing for Broadway (you never know), I would write him a show. Pluck him from the ensemble and put him center stage! His charisma is infectious and his voice will blow you away (his opening to act II makes the ticket worthwhile).

A wise man once said that if reviewers just tear down shows, all they’re gonna get is Andrew Lloyd Webber. Little did he know the real horror that could be upon us: not just the onslaught of movie transfers, but bad-movie-inspired-revivals. I’m all for a new approach to old material, but this was not the best incarnation.

Godspell is playing at Circle in the Square. Tickets are available at telecharge