THESE ARE A FEW OF MY FAVORITE ... PLAYS (the Honor Roll) PART 4

THESE ARE A FEW OF MY FAVORITE ... PLAYS (the Honor Roll)

PART 4

Finishing up my top twenty-five plays with the remainder of the plays on my Honor Roll. Drum roll, please!

 THE LION IN WINTER by James Goldman

Although for some unknown reason I've never seen a professional production of this, I played John, the youngest son, in a production at Fort Sheridan, IL, decades ago. It wasn't pretty. More on that in a later post. Goldman's sparkling take on a festive Christmas gathering with Henry II, Eleanor of Aquitaine and their dysfunctional brood is perhaps sometimes too clever for its own good, perhaps sometimes pushes too hard for the comic line, but it's never boring and is often fascinating in the familial machinations that are second nature in this royal household. This 12th century tale of deception, power, intrigue and, yes, even enduring, if skewed, love oddly enough did not fare especially well in its 1966 Broadway debut, tallying only 92 performances. It was the 1968 film with Katharine Hepburn and Peter O'Toole that catapulted this play to great success. Since then, probably every college, regional theatre and community theatre in North America has produced the play. 

AMADEUS by Peter Shaffer

Boring computer-generated ticket. I still miss the old ticket rack tickets.

April, 1983. One of the great plays of the latter part of the 20th century, Shaffer's sprawling tale of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri was a triumph of phenomenal writing, seamless direction by Peter Hall, sumptuous design by John Bury and exquisite acting by a cast headed up by the late John Wood, who was one of the finest actors of his generation, as Salieri and Mark Hamill, in a surprisingly agile and top-notch performance, as Mozart, proving that his acting skills went far beyond those on display as Luke Skywalker. A remarkable afternoon in the theatre. Bob has long wanted to direct this. I have long wanted him to direct this. (Fun factoid: John Woods had a very prolific career in television, film and the theatre. One of his films, oddly enough, is the quirky and fun "Jumpin' Jack Flash," in which he plays the nasty, KGB agent who works undercover at the NYC British consulate and is very, very mean to our heroine, Terry, played by Whoppi Goldberg in classic "early Whoppi" style.) - at the Blackstone Theatre, Chicago

BREAKING THE CODE by Hugh Whitemore

Regrettably, I've yet to see a production of Mr. Whitemore's exceptional play about the heroic mathematician and pioneering computer scientist, Alan Turing. A bit of history: Turing was responsible for breaking the Nazi Enigma code, which helped hasten the end of World War II. After the war, he focused on computer research and the viability of computers for everyday use. He was also homosexual, which resulted in a criminal prosecution for "gross indecency." He was found guilty, accepted chemical castration in lieu of prison, and committed suicide just shy of his 42nd birthday. In 2013, the British government posthumously granted Turing a pardon, 50 years too late for Mr. Turing, but significant nonetheless. Whitemore's play is sometimes a bit dense, a bit too scientific, yet it's also a thoughtful, engaging portrait of a brilliant, kind and gentle man caught in the homophobic traps of the era. Derek Jacobi originated the role in London and New York. I can only imagine how brilliant he was. (Can't find a VHS/DVD of the 1996 television adaptation, also featuring Jacobi.) This is the second play of Whitemore's to make my top 25. His Pack of Lies ranks at #3. Like that play, Breaking the Code places its characters in untenable situations and forces us, the audience and/or reader, to go and think outside of our comfort zones. 

ANGELS IN AMERICA: A GAY FANTASIA ON NATIONAL THEMES by Tony Kushner

April, 2011. ‎"Angels" marathon: I liked Part 1 ("Millennium Approaches") better. Sometimes, however, the actors yelled a bit too much for my tastes. I will burn in hell for this, but Part 2 ("Perestroika") needs some cutting. (Dear Tony, I don't care one iota about vacuum tubes. Love, Jeff) Part 1 flew by; Part 2 sometimes got bogged down. And sometimes, but very rarely, it was cocky in its own self-importance. But these are mere quibbles. This is a masterpiece. Full stop. No discussion needed. A stunning physical production in a seemingly limited space gave the play a terrific environment. Michael Grief gets low bows and kudos for his superb direction. This truly was a not-to-be-missed experience and a day well-spent with ideas, often great dialogue, and terrific actors.  The Ethel Rosenberg scenes were appropriately creepy and among my favorites. And let's hear it for the ensemble acting that raised the bar to the stratosphere. Michael Urie proved he's not just the funny gay boy from "Ugly Betty" by demonstrating some solid acting chops.  Bill Heck as Joe Pitt and Jonathan Hadary as Roy Cohn were charismatic. Billy Porter, Adam Driver, Sofia Jean Gomez, Keira Keeley and Lynne McCollough rounded out this amazing cast. I am still in awe. - at the Signature Theatre (Peter Norton Space), New York

THE VISIT by Friedrich Dürrenmatt

I first discovered Dürrenmatt's sardonically comic and thoroughly chilling tale of revenge in 4th level high school German class when I read the play in the original German. Fascinating auf Deutsch, fascinating in an English translation. Like Auntie Mame, the Kander and Ebb musical version of the play ranks in my top 25 as well. Sadly, I've never seen the original play. In today's often hostile, greedy, and money-driven society, the time is ripe for a first class revival. (Last NYC revival was over 20 years ago.) While reading the play, I laughed. I gasped. I shook my head in disgust. Dürrenmatt presents a number of themes in the play, but first and foremost, he asks the question: what would you do for money? Does everyone have a price? According to Dürrenmatt, the answer is yes. Essential reading.

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST by Oscar Wilde

August, 1995. This elegant and very, very funny play, when performed well, is a delicious bon-bon of wit and manners. Bob and I were totally enchanted by Roundabout's production starring and directed by Brian Bedford in 2011. Sixteen years earlier, I had the pleasure of seeing the Birmingham Repertory Theatre's production of Oscar Wilde's classic at the Old Vic in London. Roger Allam (Jack) and Philip Franks (Algernon) were both about twenty years too old for their parts, but carried it off well. Barbara Leigh-Hunt's Lady Bracknell was, in a word, delicious. What makes this play so remarkable is that over one hundred years later, it still manages to delight audiences with its gentle, or perhaps not so gentle, send-up of society of late 19th century London. It is arguably Wilde's masterpiece; it is a classic of the theatre. - at the Old Vic, London

THE CRUCIBLE by Arthur Miller

March, 2006. Fact: once you've seen The Crucible performed by a superb cast of adults, you will never think of Arthur Miller's classic as just another high school play. As produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company at their Stratford home, this was as compelling an afternoon in the theatre as I have ever spent. Miller's themes of fear, religious extremism, persecution, greed and revenge are, unfortunately, so timely in our current atmosphere of right-wing extremism (can you say Tea Party?) and disturbing distrust by many Americans of anything that isn't white, male and Christian. If anything, the play is even more relevant today than in 1953 when it debuted as an allegory of McCarthyism. The entire cast was excellent, but I must especially praise Iain Glen's powerful John Proctor, Helen Schlesinger's courageous Elizabeth Proctor and Darlene Johnson's unyielding Rebecca Nurse. (Sidebar: an acquaintance of mine, Ian Gelder, played Rev. Parris.) We were simply blown away. Powerful, powerful stuff. - at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon

So, there you have it. My top twenty-five plays. A recap, you say? Delighted to oblige. Here it is:

1)  Next Fall

2)  Burning Blue

3)  Pack of Lies

4)  Love! Valour! Compassion!

5)  The Boys in the Band

6)  Take Me Out

7)  My Night with Reg/The Day I Stood Still/Mouth to Mouth

8)  Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

9)  The Laramie Project

10)The History Boys

Honor Roll (in alphabetical order)

o Amadeus

o Angels in America

o Auntie Mame

o Bent

o Breaking the Code

o The Crucible

o The Importance of Being Earnest

o The Lion in Winter

o The Little Foxes

o M. Butterfly

o The Paris Letter

o Peter and the Starcatcher

o The Sum of Us

o Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike

o The Visit

Until later! Have a super Labor Day weekend!

THESE ARE A FEW OF MY FAVORITE ... PLAYS (the Honor Roll) - PART 3

THESE ARE A FEW OF MY FAVORITE ... PLAYS (the Honor Roll)

PART 3

In earlier posts I've chatted about my top ten plays. In the next two posts, I'll talk about the fifteen shows that round out my current top 25, aka The Honor Roll. Like any list of "bests," this has changed over the years, some plays added while others subtracted. And, also like the top ten plays, I've not seen a professional production of all of them, but they do rank among my top 25, so they deserve a mention. Let's get started.

THE LITTLE FOXES by Lillian Hellman

Elizabeth Taylor's Broadway debut in this glorious play about ambition and greed has already been featured in an earlier post. 

THE PARIS LETTER by Jon Robin Baitz

June, 2005. Internalized homophobia, the fear of being gay, financial shenanigans, illicit affairs and the complexities of friendship, love and marriage are the major elements of Jon Robin Baitz's sprawling story which spans 40 years and moves fluidly from one decade to another and then back again…a theatrical time machine. Director Doug Hughes had the good sense to cast an amazing group of actors who worked as an ensemble to bring Baitz's challenging and thought-provoking play thrillingly to life. In less capable hands, this could easily have turned into a messy affair, but with John Glover (in yet another outstanding performance), Daniel Eric Gold, Jason Butler Harner, Michelle Pawk (one of the theatre's great underutilized talents, despite winning a Tony Award. People, get with the program!) and Ron Rifkin onstage, well, let me put it this way, it was an honor to be a member of their audience. Roundabout Theatre Company is one of the nation's finest resident companies. There's a reason for that. - at the Laura Pels Theatre, New York 

VANYA AND SONIA AND MASHA AND SPIKE by Christopher Durang

The newest addition to the top 25, Durang's 2013 Tony-winning Best Play was also featured in an earlier post. An outstanding example of how humor can so brilliantly illuminate our fears, hopes, disappointments and love of life.

THE SUM OF US by David Stevens

January, 2009. Story time. Back in the summer of 2008, Bob was all set to direct The Lion in Winter for a company, now defunct…and defunct for good reason, in Oak Park, IL, a Chicago suburb famous for an abundance of Frank Lloyd Wright architecture. When the company's artistic director finally got around to applying for the rights, however, he discovered that the amateur rights were frozen and would be frozen for an indefinite time. Oops. Plan B.

     Bob next chose David Stevens' lovely, touching and often funny play about a Australian dad and his gay son and the woman and gardener who come into their lives. I've long admired the honesty and charm  of The Sum of Us. Back when it was performed off-Broadway in 1990, back when AIDS infections and deaths were peaking, the unconditional parental acceptance and love shown by Harry toward his gay son Jeff were rarely, if ever, seen onstage or on the screen. In its modest way, this was an important and groundbreaking work. If at times the emotions seem a bit simplistic, they are never less than true. More than twenty years later, it still resonates with warmth and love.

     I digress. The play was cast, the initial read-through was held and the set was being built. Bob was excited. The artistic director was excited. And then without warning, the warm, supportive attitude at the theatre deteriorated quickly from good to bad to worse to, finally, toxic. No rhyme, no reason. For whatever reason, they wanted Bob and the play out and Bob was more than eager to comply. The partially built set was left onstage…a sad testament to a shattered dream…and Bob left. The show was cancelled and that was that. Or so we all thought. Plan C was just around the corner.

     In the fall of 2008, Bob turned sixty and, well, you just don't turn sixty without some sort of celebratory acknowledgment. I hate giving parties. Hate it. I'm no good at it. I can manage a dinner party just fine, but a party party? Nope. Not in this boy's repertoire.  So I gave Bob a choice: a party or a production of The Sum of Us. I know my Bobby, so I knew what the answer would be. Before you could say "David Merrick," I was a producer. Our friend Michael, brilliant as Harry, by the way, found a theatre for us for a ridiculously low rent while the theatre was dark for six weeks. We formed an ad hoc production company, obtained the rights, recast the show, got our designers back on board and just like Mickey and Judy, put on a show!

     Surprise! Shock! We received excellent reviews and played to full houses. The cast was magnificent and overall, it was a great experience. Remarkable for a premiere production for a new company, had our agreement with the theatre not included a portion of the gate, we would have made…a profit! I now have a deep and abiding respect for producers and company managers. The amount of work behind-the-scenes necessary to get an audience, press, etc. is daunting, to put it mildly. To date this is the only show from 1027 Productions, but who knows what the future will bring? - at Piccolo Theatre, Evanston

PETER AND THE STARCATCHER by Rick Elice

May, 2012. I'm mad about this incredible show. Someone told us the day before we saw Peter that seeing this show would just make us feel like better people. And you know what? She was absolutely right. Funny, poignant, smart, farcical, beautifully staged and wonderfully acted, this ranks among the finest shows I've seen in a long time. And the beginning of Act Two? Let me just say that alone is worth the price of admission. The show appeals to all ages. If the text is perhaps a bit too adult for children, the youngsters in the house loved the antics onstage. Seated by us was a group of special needs young adults and they were completely enthralled. Christian Borle won a well-deserved Tony Award for his hysterical and just-this-side-of-over-the-top performance as Black Stache. Celia Keenan-Bolger was a tart and sassy Molly. The handsome and talented Adam Chanler-Berat was a charming and sometimes clueless Boy, the perfect foil to Ms. Keenan-Bolger and Mr. Borle. And kudos to the rest of the talented ensemble. We'd see Greg Hildreth and Carson Elrod this year (2013) in other shows. Simply wonderful. - at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre, New York 

BENT by Martin Sherman

very young Richard Gere, David Dukes and David Marshall Grant. And check out James Remar! He was quite the hot little thing, wasn't he?

February, 1980. Martin Sherman's disturbing play about the persecution of gays by the Nazis starred a 30-year-old Richard Gere in his final (to date) appearance on Broadway. In 1980, Gere was starting to make a name for himself in film (Bent was before "American Gigolo" and "An Officer and a Gentleman"), but his star was high enough to warrant above-title billing and, let me be absolutely clear about this, he delivered the goods and then some. He gave a layered and nuanced performance as a man willing to do despicable things to stay alive before he comes to realize that sometimes taking a stand and being willing to die for that stand is worth far more than life. This was one of the first, if not the first, plays to explore the Nazi persecution of homosexuals and exposed yet another of the horrors unleashed by the evil known as the Nazi Party. The audience was riveted. The scene in Act Two where Gere's character, Max, and Horst, played in a remarkable performance by the late David Dukes, achieved mutual sexual orgasm by talking while standing completely still on opposite sides of the stage ranks as one of the most powerful single scenes I have ever seen in a play. Devastating. By the time the play ended, I was completely shattered. Along with Gere and Dukes,  the outstanding cast included David Marshall Grant, Ron Randell, George Hall, Gregory Salata and a young and briefly naked James Remar (Dexter's dad, Harry) making his Broadway debut. (Fun factoid: when the Apollo Theatre returned to the legit fold, the entrance was moved from W. 42nd Street to W. 43rd Street and the theatre was christened the New Apollo Theatre, possibly in an attempt to distance itself from its past as a grind house for B action movies. It's return to legitimate theatre was short-lived, however, and it closed its doors in 1983. Architectural features of the Apollo/New Apollo and the Lyric Theatres were incorporated into the design of the present Foxwoods Theatre which occupies the site of both former houses.) - at the New Apollo Theatre, New York

M. BUTTERFLY by David Henry Hwang 

          

October, 2004. David Henry Hwang's provocative 1988 Tony-winning play has it all: sex, politics, espionage, gender-bending and it's all wrapped up in a package that's thought-provoking, disturbing and even a little shocking. Arena Stage in Washington can usually be relied upon to deliver the proverbial theatrical goods and they certainly did with this classy production staged by Tazewell Thompson in their arena space which gave the show both an expansiveness and an intimacy necessary for this play. Compelling leading performances by Stephen Bogardus and J. Hiroyuki Liao, in an impressive professional debut, were supported by a first-rate company of actors. One of the really great things about M. Butterfly is that it doesn't wrap everything up in a nice, neat package. It's raw. It's dangerous. It's pretty damn wonderful. - at the Arena Stage (Fichandler Theatre), Washington, D.C.

AUNTIE MAME by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee

I've only seen the movie, which is pretty much a filmed version of the play, and which, thankfully, preserves Rosalind Russell's iconic performance as everyone's favorite aunt. I've long been a huge fan of author Patrick Dennis' books, the source for this play and the subsequent musical (a top 25 musical). Dennis' books and this classic adaptation by Lawrence and Lee are funny, often insightful and so life-affirming that you simply can't help but feel good after reading the books and/or watching the play or movie. Amazingly, Auntie Mame has never had a Broadway revival. I know, surprising, isn't it? And given its large production and cast requirements, it's quite possible there never will be since the cost would be almost prohibitive for a straight play in today's economic environment. A shame, too, since Auntie Mame would be a perfect antidote for today's often joyless social-political-economic times. (Fun factoid: Greer Garson and Beatrice Lillie also played Mame during its Broadway run.)

Check in next time for the rest of the honor roll. In the meantime, go see a play. Enjoy a musical. Go to the theatre!

WALKING IN A WEST END WONDERLAND

WALKING IN A WEST END WONDERLAND

PART 2

Today, let's return to the fabulous West End where I have spent many wonderful afternoons and evenings at the theatre. From the musical classic that ushered in the era of the modern musical to the worldwide sensation set amidst Parisian barricades to a play that celebrates in dialogue and music the life of one of the world's most evocative singers to a lesser effort by an accomplished playwright that achieved initial fame due to its somewhat unorthodox casting, there's something for everyone. 

January, 2001. Playwright and, in this case, director Richard Nelson is a Chicago native who achieved fame with his plays Some Americans Abroad, Two Shakespearean Actors, and The General from America, all initially produced by the RSC at their Stratford home. This memory play, with some "The Graduate" flavor, is not quite the slam dunk of success that the initial London reviews would lead you to believe. This is a story about a 15-year-old American student who finds himself alone in the Paris flat of one of his teachers, an attractive, single woman in her 30s. During the course of the play, they talk about art and music and literature and tumble into bed and the boy discovers sex and the next door neighbor comes in for some, actually, quite funny comic relief and it's all a bit messy and a bit creepy. The highly-regarded, and, based on her performance here, well-deserved regard, French actress Irène Jacobs, in her West End debut, played the teacher with a bracing authenticity and Madeline Potter was excellent as the neighbor. But the actor who put bums in seats was a twenty-year-old Macaulay Culkin making his stage debut as the young boy (and, framing the play on both ends, his older self). I kid you not. While I wouldn't call his performance riveting, he did a competent job and was able to hold his own on stage. I seem to remember a flash of naked Culkiness; Bob believes there was no nudity. Nudity or not, it was pleasant enough without being especially memorable. - at the Vaudeville Theatre, London

February, 1981. Australian Curly? Check. English Laurey? Check. Very English chorus? Check. How all-American can this all-American musical get? Okay, so the accents didn't exactly ring with middle America authenticity, this loving revival was wonderfully acted, beautifully sung (with one exception) and energetically danced with Agnes De Mille's groundbreaking choreography recreated by Gemze De Lappe. The one vocal exception was Rosamund Shelley's Laurey. Acting-wise she nailed the part, but it seemed, at least to my ears, that she was more mezzo than soprano and her songs didn't sound as effortless as they should have. John Diedrich was a handsome and sexy Curly (we'd see him years later as Billy Flynn in Chicago in Sydney). Featured as Ado Annie was Jillian Mack, a delightfully funny gamin who is now perhaps better known, despite a successful West End career, as Mrs. Tom Selleck. Also featured was a young Alfred Molina as Jud and a mighty fine Jud he was. Interestingly, the cast recording for this revival was recorded live during performances at the Palace Theatre. Highly theatrical. - at the Palace Theatre, London

May, 1980. Pam Gems' mesmerizing play with music about the life of Edith Piaf was, for me, one of those truly memorable evenings in the theatre. Jane Lapotaire's electrifying Piaf set the standard for all future portrayals of this complex person. (She would win the Tony for her performance when the play crossed the Pond.) Zoe Wanamaker was also memorable as Piaf's best friend, Toine. Songs were interspersed throughout the evening with a mini-concert near the end of the play. My friends and I were thrilled, along with the rest of the capacity audience. Everything was just right…the design, the direction, the music, the performances by a large and skillful cast. But in the end, it was Jane Lapotaire who flung this evening into the theatrical stratosphere. Brava, Mlle. Lapotaire, brava! - at the Piccadilly Theatre, London

March, 2006. The Donmar is one of London's most prestigious venues. An intimate space, it features top-name actors in challenging original works or stunning revivals. (The acclaimed Roundabout Theatre revival of Cabaret started here.) We didn't know anything about this play when we bought our tickets, but with Sir Ian McKellen heading the cast, what do you really need to know? As it turned out, this was a disturbing, quasi-political piece centered around a mysterious procedure called the Cut, which was presented in a way that offered multiple interpretations (I thought it was a super-lobotomy), administered against dissidents of a unnamed regime in an unnamed country and one of the leading administrators of the procedure (McKellen). Positively chilling, especially the second scene - a domestic scene between McKellen's character and his wife. Production values were spot-on perfect. Michael Grandage's direction was invisible. The acting was superlative from the entire company, but most especially from Sir Ian and Deborah Findlay as his wife. With the great divisiveness currently prevalent in the United States, this play is even more relevant than it was seven years ago. - at the Donmar Warehouse, London

October, 1987. True story. I bought the CD of the London original cast on a Thursday. One of Steve's days off was Friday. The next day he called me at work and exclaimed with great excitement, "You have to hear this!" and put the phone next to one of our stereo's speakers and played "I Dreamed a Dream," sung by the original Fantine, Patti LuPone. He then went on for the next several minutes about how wonderful the entire CD was. This may not seem like a big deal, but Steve, although he liked going to the theatre, wasn't nearly as devoted to it as I am, so this unexpected and unqualified rave was a bit out of the norm. (His other big favorite was Follies, showing his good taste.) So, when we planned our October trip to London (his first), Les Misérables and Follies were the two shows we saw. What we didn't plan on was the Great Storm of 1987 ravaging London and the surrounding area as our British Airways flight was enroute from Chicago. We were later told that our flight was one of the first to land after Heathrow Airport had been reopened. Mayfair was a mess, but the Savoy Hotel was open for business and, as everyone knows, the show must go on, so off we went to the Palace Theatre to see Fantine and her pals. Ms. LuPone had long gone, but this replacement cast was excellent, with Kathleen Rowe McAllen singing and acting the crap out of Fantine and solid performances by Craig Pinder (Valjean), Martin Smith (Marius) and Clive Carter (Javert). Steve, along with the entire audience except, apparently, me, sniffled and quietly sobbed through the more emotional moments. Unlike a lot of people, I don’t consider Les Misérables to be the greatest thing since sliced bread, but it has a great theatrical score and, at least in John Napier and David Hersey's original scenic and lighting design, a wow physical production. Worth noting… Broadway has seen both the original and revival productions come and go. The original London production is still running nearly 28 years after its opening night (as of this writing in August, 2013). Obviously the creators have done lots of things very, very right. - at the Palace Theatre, London

August, 1995. Alan Ayckbourn is, for lack of a better description, the UK answer to Neil Simon, though even more prolific than Mr. Simon with nearly 80 plays to his credit. Although several of his plays have been produced on Broadway, Ayckbourn has a distinctly British sensibility that makes his works far more accessible to UK audiences than to American audiences. (Likewise, Mr. Simon's works have an American flavor to them which is why he's more popular here than across the Pond.) The somewhat convoluted storyline concerns a dominatrix, two murdered wives, a crooked businessmen, his evil henchman and communicating doors in a London hotel suite that work as a time machine. People switch decades willy-nilly changing the course of the future as they do so and it all works itself out in the end. It was often quite funny and I enjoyed it, though not as much as the rest of the audience who howled to my titters. The reason for going was to see I-will-see-her-in-anything Julia McKenzie and she did not disappoint. Smartly acted, smartly designed and smartly directed, this was an agreeable enough way to spend the afternoon. - at the Gielgud Theatre, London

May, 1980. My friend Gordon and I picked the Thursday matinee performance because, for reasons that completely escape me now, we wanted to see Stephanie Lawrence, the alternate Eva, and logically thought, at least in our minds, the alternate would play the matinees. It never occurred to us to ask at the box office when we got our seats. We were, therefore, a bit disappointed to discover that the "regular" Eva, Marti Webb would play the role that afternoon. No need to be disappointed. Ms. Webb did a thoroughly fine job as did the rest of the cast. Evita is a show I have grown to like and admire. Before this performance, I saw Patti LuPone tear up the stage at the Broadway Theatre in the original NYC production a few months after it had opened. Ms. LuPone tends to be a rather intense performer, so the entire performance was played at a fevered, though very exciting, pitch. The characters were thrillingly portrayed, but the show itself got a bit lost. In London, Ms. Webb and her cohorts were a bit more subdued than their NYC counterparts which let me focus more on the production itself and allowed me to enjoy and truly appreciate Harold Prince's and Larry Fuller's remarkable direction and staging and fully appreciate the subtlety, focus and even complexity of Tim Rice's lyrics, the best of ALW's collaborators. The recent London-then-Broadway revival was very good in its own right, but for sheer theatricality and excitement, the original can't be beat. For the record, Ms. Webb continues to perform as I write this (August, 2013) and has had a very successful career in the UK. - at the Prince Edward Theatre, London.

May, 1994. This is the only show Andrew Lloyd Webber has written to date that can truly be called a star vehicle. Steve and I saw this a few weeks after Betty Buckley took over the role of Norma Desmond from its originator, Patti LuPone. She looked great and sounded terrific, but she was a bit too perky for a faded and forgotten movie queen and not imperious enough for a screen legend used to getting her way. (She would grow in her portrayal as evidenced by a superb performance Bob and I saw in New York after she had replaced Glenn Close.) This was a big show in all respects. It was sumptuously designed, lit and costumed. It had a big orchestra to play the big score. It had a big and talented cast. Yet for all that and despite the iconic pedigree of the Billy Wilder film, the musical adaptation seemed, well, flat and one-dimensional. Spectacle won out over depth of character and that's a shame. The story is terrific, but it's really quite an intimate one and with all the bells and whistles of this production, it sometimes simply faded into the background. John Barrowman, yes that John Barrowman, played Joe Gillis and he did a damn fine job of it, too. Face it, the man's talented. The gay lads sitting next to us were positively in a frenzy over the show and as the lights came up for the interval, one of them turned to me and breathlessly asked, "Oh, my God!! Can you believe this? What do you think?" To which I replied, "The house goes up; the house goes down." - at the Adelphi Theatre, London 

August, 1995. Despite my initial, uh, restrained opinion of Sunset Boulevard, I found the show strangely irresistible and returned for a repeat visit during my "Lick My Wounds" tour. The main impetus was the chance to see the much admired and loved Elaine Paige, who, at the time, arguably was the top musical theatre star in the UK. (I say arguably because, frankly, I think Julia McKenzie is more talented.) My friend, Rob, bless her heart, couldn't for the life of her figure out why I would spend good money to see, in her words, not mine, that "shrieking suburban midget." (Not PC, I realize, but those were the words used.) But then Rob doesn't get musicals, so it was rather pointless to try to explain it to her. This time around a very handsome Alexander Hanson (we would see him years later, still handsome, in the Broadway revival of A Little Night Music with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Angela Lansbury) played Joe Gillis in a nicely performed turn. The mechanics of the show continued to frequently dwarf the story, but it was still gorgeous to look at and listen to. As for Ms. Paige? Well, frankly, she was quite good, yet I wasn't all that impressed. She is very short and the costumes just looked far too big on her, almost like she was a little girl playing dress up. It was a bit disconcerting. She's noted for her big voice, yet I found it strangely subdued. The two main songs for Norma should have the audiences going crazy, but, though Paige got hearty applause for both and was note-perfect, she lacked an excitement. Maybe she was having an off performance. Maybe, because it was a matinee, she was saving her energy for the evening show. And it wasn't just me. The guy sitting next to me and I were chatting it up during the interval and he also felt Paige's performance was not at 100%. It happens, I guess. Over the years, Sunset has become a guilty pleasure and I would love to see what could be done with a more intimate version of the show. - at the Adelphi Theatre, London

Treat yourself to a play or musical this week!

Til later....