Parade

From: "will stackman" profwlll@yahoo.com

Subject: Quicktake - "Parade" by Alfred Uhry and Jason Robert Brown

Date: Mon, May 14, 11:12 PM

Quicktake on PARADE

     Speakeasy is ending their season with Boston's first professional production of Uhry and Brown's Tony winning "Parade", a large cast music drama based on Alfred Uhry's book. He's better remembered for another modern classic, "Driving Miss Daisy." Jason Robert Brown is better known for his quasi-autobiographical reversed order romance, "The Last Five Years" which Speakeasy also produced plus his revue, "Songs for a New World." Director Paul Daigneault has assembled a impressive cast of 29 musical actors to recount the fate of Leo Frank, a Jewish factory superintendent from Brooklyn, who managed his father-in-law's factory in Atlanta in 1913. He was falsely accused of raping one of his young female employees, sentenced to hang. When the governor commuted this sentence, citing faults with his trial, a mob lynched Frank. The real murderer, presumed in this retelling to be a black janitor who testified against Frank at his trial, was never tried.

     Produced at Lincoln Center by Hal Prince, "Parade" had a disappointing first run, but has since found a place in the ongoing development of American Musical theatre. The principal cast members are two Speakeasy favorites, Brendan McNab, seen in "Kiss of the Spider Woman," as well as last fall's "See What I Wanna See," and Norton winner Bridget Beirne, who played Queenie in their production of La Chieusa's "The Wild Party." Also prominent is Timothy John Smith, recent IRNE winner from Lyric's "1776." as a local reporter who seizes on the case as his chance at fame. Paul D. Farwell plays both the through character of a Confederate veteran, and sickly Judge Roan. Austin Lesch, seen regularly locally and just in from the national tour of "Altar Boys: opens the show as confederate soldier when young, singing "The Old Red Hills of Home," something of a theme for the piece. Edward M. Barker is the rascally janitor. There are also first rate performances from local music theatre regulars. David Krinnit is the suave and unpricipled prosecutor,Dorsey, while Terrence O'Malley is the "dancing governor", Slaton. Gerald Slattery doubles as the local barkeep and Frank's "good old boy" lawyer, Luther Rosser. Brett Cramp is Tom Watson, a local firebrand preacher and anti-Semite, who joins forces with the prosecution. Speakeasy veteran Kerry A. Dowling, seen this fall in "The Women" is affecting as the victim's mother, Mrs. Phagan.

     The show's design by Eric Levenson is an elegant unit set which efficiently suggests the various locales required. Stacy Stephen's period costumes, including numerous changes, give a real sense of pre-WWI Atlanta, trying to make its way into the 20th century, still very much "olde South." IRNE winner Karen Perlow provides the necessary flexible lighting design. Changes of set pieces and furniture are handled a vista by the ensemble with admirable dispatch. Jose Delgado conducts a an ample pit orchestra with fellow IRNE winner Paul S. Katz at the keyboard. Don't let this "Parade" pass you by.

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"Parade" by Alfred Uhry and Jason Robert Brown, May 12 - June 16

Speakeasy Stage Co. at Roberts Studio, Calderwood

BCA, 529 Tremont, (617) 933 - 8600
Speakeasy

The Wild Party

From: "will stackman" profwlll@yahoo.com

Subject: Quicktake - "The Wild Party" by Andrew Lippa

based on the poem by Joseph Moncure March

Date: Wed, May 11:59 PM

Quicktake on THE WILD PARTY

     Those with fond memories of Speakeasy's production of Michael John LaChiusa's version of "The Wild Party" a few season's back are liable to be slightly disappointed in Andrew Lippa's approach to the same material. Not that the New Rep's current production just could be the sharpest and most energetic small music theatre presentation of the season, but that Lippa's one-man show (book, music, and lyrics) seems something of a pastiche. He's tried to meld the jazz and music theatre sounds of the Roaring '20s with contemporary styles with mixed results. He's also concentrated on four principal characters, leaving the rest of Moncure's menagerie mostly as background. None of the four are particularly well motivated.

     First there's Queenie, the archetypical blonde nightclub dancer, played Marla Mindelle, the center of most of the numbers, bored after three years living with Burrs, a vaudeville clown with a dark side. Burrs gives Todd Alan Johnson, seen as Mac the Knife previously at the New Rep a chance to play full-throttle. The other woman, who shows up for the party is Kate, a nightclub singer and old friend, played by Sarah Corey, who appeared in "Caroline or Change" as Mother, with an agenda to break things up. She's accompanied by Black, played by Maurice E. Parent, seen last season as Coalhouse in "Ragtime." He and Queenie hit it off, Sarah vamps Burrs, and tragedy ensues. But the major motivation behind it all seems to be terminal boredom, not a particularly dramatic emotion.

     The rest of the characters are given somewhat short shrift, though Leigh Barrett as Madeline True, Lesbian, has the show's most memorable number, the solo "An Old Fashioned Love Story." Jake Mosser and Ilyse Robbins as Eddie the Prizefighter and Mae, his diminutive partner, have their own musical hall number, "Two of a Kind" but no plot, and Phil the Broadway producer, played by Brian De Lorenzo, is really just part of the ensemble. Director Rick Lombardo has assembled a fine ensemble and choreographer Kelli Edwards generates a lot of erotic heat from them, with the help of Betsy Adkins and Ilyse Robbins as Dance Captains. One could only wish that all this talent had stronger material to work with, It's a show certainly worth watching, there are effective and challenging musical moments, masterfully handled by music director Todd C. Gordon, but the aftermath isn't a hangover, but rather like a large dinner of Chinese takeout where everyone ordered their favorites, a lot got sampled, but the result wasn't particularly satisfying. The ending is typical of this problem. When Queenie, whose world has crashed around her, should be waiting for the cops, she sings a rather moralizing power ballad and exits into the night. End of show.

     The design for "The Wild Party" is uniformly superb with a mirror filled set by IRNE winner Janie E. Howland, spot-on period costumes by IRNE winner Frances Nelson McSherry, and effective contemporary lighting by Franklin Meissner, Jr. Properties by Erik D. Diaz and a number of small movable pieces, notably the brass bed and the bathroom give a sense of Queenie and Burrs' hermetic world. All that's lacking is the author's dramatic focus, despite the best efforts of all involved. Sometimes you can't have everything. Incidentally, the New Rep is adding a summer show this year. Leigh Barrett, Andrew Giordano, and Maryann Zschau are doing "Side by Side by Sondheim" July 7 - 22 on the Arsenal Mainstage. That'll be something.

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"The Wild Party" by Andrew Lippa, April 25 - May 20
New Repertory Theatre at Arsenal Center for the Arts

321 Arsenal St. Watertown MA, (617) 923 - 8487
New Rep

The Flu Season

From: "will stackman" profwlll@yahoo.com

Subject: Quicktake - "The Flu Season" by Will Eno

Date: Sun, Apr 29, 10:31 PM

Quicktake on THE FLU SEASON

     Whistler in the Dark, which has performed previously at the Charlestown Working Theater--and no doubt will do so again--is currently presenting the Boston premiere of post-modern playwright Will Eno's "The Flu Season." over in Watertown. The Black Box space opened officially last fall with the New Rep's production of Eno's more recent "Thom Pain (based on nothing), a monodrama performed by Diego Arciniegas. Eno's earlier play has a cast of six, two omnipresent as the Prologue and the Epilogue, whose commentary frames the action. Prologue is Ed Hoopman, who recently completed a run as Hamlet for the New Rep's school tour, while the acerbic Epilogue is Jennifer O'Connor, one of Whistler's Artistic Associates and Company Manager of the Imaginary Beasts from Lynn for which she last played a Dromio.

    The storyline concerns the Man, played by Nael Nacer and the Woman, done by Meghan Newsmith. Both are newcomers at a residential mental health facility, where they interact, barely, with the Doctor, done by David LeBahn, and the Nurse, Shelley Brown, two rather superficial professionals. There's an air of autobiography about the situation, which may simply be Eno's way with words and fervid imagination. A somewhat predictable plot takes a little too long to unfurl, but director Ben Fainstein and the cast hold the audience's attention.

     The various locales around the sanitarium are indicated by a few movable pieces of furniture and Andrew Dickey's area lighting. The tragedy of the Woman is largely due to the lack of affect on the part of the Man. No one's past is really much explored; this is very much a play in the present. Whistler in the Dark has previous presented works from the world stage. With this effort by Eno they come to these shores (Brooklyn), but will open next fall with another Howard Barker enigma "A Hard Heart." Before then we may see some local writing at the second "Fever Fest," this time to be presented at the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center Aug. 23 - 25. Imaginary Beasts will be doing a show based Lorca's puppet pieces about "Don Cristobal and Sena Rosita," Aug 9 through 18 at the Arsenal Black Box. Both companies are outstanding examples of the new wave of Boston's theatre Fringe. By the way, the title of this piece may refer to the winter season during which the action unfolds. Or it may not. With Will Eno you never know.

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"The Flu Season" by Will Eno, Apr. 27 - May 5

Whistler in the Dark at Downstage Black Box, Arsenal Center for the Arts

321 Arsenal St. Watertown MA, (617) 923 - THTR
Whistler in the Dark