the company way
by Douglas Messerli
Frank Loesser (music and lyrics), Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock, and Willie Gilbert (book, based
on the work by Shepherd Mead) How to Succeed in Business without Really
Trying / New York, Al Hirschfeld Theater, 2011 / the performance I attended
was a matinee on May 7, 2011
I will admit to a certain
sentimental attachment to the American Musical Theater, although I feel, given
the quality of the musicals for which I care, there is no reason for apology.
Most of my friends who cannot comprehend my love of this genre have perhaps
never seen a musical comedy before 1970, when the genre, as far as I'm
concerned, almost died. The handful of good musicals since that time have been
so few (most of them composed by Stephen Sondheim) that one might almost say
that the form has died out. Today, except for revivals, musical comedy is for
audiences who like songs consisting of three memorable notes, repeated through
chorus upon chorus of driveling lyrics sung at very high decibels. But then, we
do, from time to time, have wonderful revivals of the older works of this genre
that remind us of what the musical theater was all about.
I have never before sat in an audience with so many first-time theater-goers, mostly teenage girls and their slightly stunned families in tow. The girl next to me was celebrating her sixteenth birthday and "just had see" Daniel Radcliffe, this revival's star attraction, "in the flesh." In some senses the freshness of the fans was a treat. And Radcliffe, a trouper already at age 22, was not about to disappoint them.
Radcliffe, who I suspect has by this time quite settled into his
performance, was better by far than the critics led audiences to believe.
Although, as the New York Times
suggested he is not a natural "song and dance man" (I am not quite
sure what that means, and when I think of such figures I can only conjure up
Robert Preston and Robert Morse, the original J. Pierrepont Finch, neither of
them great singers or even able dancers!), he can now belt out a tuneful song
and, with the help of the able chorus, jump, leap, and hoof it across the stage
quite ably. Once in a while you can still see him grimace a bit, as if
muttering deep within, "I'm gonna be great!" And, at moments, he is! If nothing
else you have to recognize that Radcliffe is giving his all, which
unfortunately, if you have seen Robert Morse in the role—I saw only the movie
version, but listened to the original cast recording so many hundreds of times
in my youth that the old wax stereo recording is all scratches and scrapes—is
just not enough.
Oddly, given the fact that he has now been nominated for a Tony for a
supporting role (while Radcliffe was ignored), John Larroquette seemed far less
engaged in the piece, speeding through his lines at times as if he were trying
to catch a plane, and other times performing on cruise control. When
Larroquette "woke up" once or twice in his role as J. B. Biggley, as
he did in "Grand Old Ivy," he was quite charming, with both him and
Radcliffe performing brilliantly. Unfortunately, director/choreographer Rob
Ashford could not leave a good thing alone, bringing a whole chorus of football
players to dance along, wiping away one the few enchanting character
encounters.
Most of the other cast members are quite excellent, particularly Ellen
Harvey as Biggley's executive secretary, Miss Jones, Mary Faber as Smitty, and,
although a little young for the role, Rose Hemingway (at 27 she seems more a
neophyte than Radcliffe). Christopher Hanke makes the nasty Bud Frump almost
likeable. And, although her humor switched on and off at times, Tammy Blanchard
is basically a hilarious Hedy LaRue.
Finch is highly likeable, even charming, but he is without a single
moral principle in his desire to rise up the corporate ladder, and within
hours, so it seems, he shifts into the positions of a junior executive,
advertising manager, and, even after a disastrous failure, is elected Chairman
of the Board, all before you can say, ROSEMARY, the woman with whom, along the
way, he has reluctantly fallen in love.
Biggley's nincompoop nephew, Budd Frump, tries his best throughout to
trip up Finch, as the other executives, terrified by Ponty's swift rise in the
company and fearing the discovery of their own ineptitudes, plot to destroy
him; yet Finch (as he reminds everyone F-I-N-C-H) miraculously survives each
battle, primarily because he is so self-centered that he fails to see the
restless men on the prowl.
The most famous song of the musical is Finch's love song to himself,
sung into a mirror of the men's room as he shaves:
Yes, there's that face,
That face that somehow I trust.
It may embarrass you to hear me say it,
But say it I must, say it I must:
You have the cool, clear
Eyes of a seeker of wisdom and truth;
Yet there's that upturned chin
And that grin of impetuous youth.
Oh, I believe in you.
I believe in you.
Women in this male-dominated world
are all secretaries, whom the males are reminded, should not be treated like
toys—but nonetheless are. In today's world, it is clear that the efficient and
trustworthy Miss Jones, the smart Smitty, and the quick-plotting Rosemary would
be at the head of the World Wide Wicket Company instead of out bowling or
wickedly spinning webs to find husbands. But in 1961...well, those gender lines
were at the musical's satirical heart. Today the plot
For all that, I think the audience was willing to overlook the datedness
of the piece if only the actors could come together and enjoy their own spoof.
But time and again, it seemed, Radcliffe was not the only one grimacing.
Everybody seemed to be playing it "the company way," refusing to get
excited about anything. Two of the best dance numbers of Lambert and Fosse's
original, "Coffee Break," (such a difficult number that the movie
dropped it), and the sprightly "A Secretary Is Not a Toy," seemed lackluster
in Ashford's staging, while at other times, as I mentioned, the director seemed
to suck all the attention away from the actors through the introduction of
gratuitous routines.
Finally, despite Radcliffe's pluck and elfin charm, I kept missing the
puckish comedy of Robert Morse, the silly imperiousness of Rudy Vallee, and the
jazz inflections of Michele Lee's voice.
One piece, alone, came to life and created for its few minutes the magic
that might have stood as a beacon to these young performers. The last full
number of the musical, "Brotherhood of Man," was so richly sung,
punctuated by Ellen Harvey's coloratora soprano, and so thrillingly danced that
it almost redeemed everything else. If only the cast might have realized that
"brotherhood" earlier in the show, How to Succeed might have gone straight to the top!
In the end, however, it didn't matter. The young girls and their
families stood up in celebration and absolutely roared (I've never heard as
loud of an applause) as Radcliffe bowed appreciatively to his fans.
Los Angeles, May 13, 2011
Reprinted from USTheater (May 2011).
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