Lady Be Good
Encores - NY City Center - February 2015
Review by John Kenrick
All it takes to make a great 1920s musical shine is a sprinkling of bona fide star dust.
The Drowsy Chaperone didn't really make fun of such shows -- with a vapid plot, dim witted characters and crude physical comedy, it made fun of what uninformed people think these musicals were like. To fans of that recent hit, the delicious Encores concert staging of the 1924 hit Lady Be Good may come as something of a revelation. 1920s musical comedies have all the high style of a perfectly baked croissant, and are just about as flaky, too. But serving one up perfectly was no easy matter 90 years ago, and is all the more challenging today.
Of course, it help to have a director who understands how to layer this sort of pastry so it rises to the right height. Mark Brokaw, who helmed the Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella for Broadway staged this Lady Be Good with all the breezy insouciance one could wish for. But facts be told, no 1920s musical is remembered because of its director.
Choreographer Randy Skinner, whose tap ensembles in both Broadway productions of 42nd Street have never been matched, packs this Lady Be Good with one great dance number after another. But, another fact be told, no 1920s musical is remembered for its choreographer. Heck, that wasn't even the job title back then -- it was "dance director."
Filling the cast with a slew of fresh young faces is about as 1920s-appropriate as can be. But while Danny Gardner and Patti Murin are fine dancers with scads of charm, they cannot provide the star presence of the legendary team their roles were written for. There is no modern day equivalent of Fred and Adele Astaire, whose performances as a bankrupt brother and sister team scheming to make a buck made the original Lady Be Good a long-running hit in both New York and London. Colin Donnell has the looks, comic timing and dazzle factor of a star, but his role as a hobo unaware that he is actually worth millions barely give him a chance to shine here.
As it happens, this Lady Be Good gets its audience-thrilling coating of star dust from the same sources that all of the best 1920s musical comedies relied on -- magical songs and (in this case) two bona fide stars at the top of their game.
George and Ira Gershwin's score drips with their unique combination of clever rhyme, heartfelt emotion, and irresistible, jazz-tinted melody. Lovingly conducted by the incomparable Rob Fisher, who was the founding musical director of the Encores series, every song sounds as fresh and intoxicating as ever. New orchestrations by Bill Elliott (and a few others) are period perfect , right down to including some dazzling duets for twin grand pianos played here by Chris Fenwick and Greg Anthony.
The first star performer to bring this production out of the commonplace and into the rare is the impossibly handsome Douglas Sills, who plays an unscrupulous attorney with shameless comic relish. Accused of being a 'quack,' he haughtily replies, "A quack is an unlicensed medical doctor. I am a schyster!" Only a master of timing can make a line like that the showstopper it was once meant to be -- and Sills does. He also sings the familiar title tune with such brio that I couldn't help wishing that he had more opportunities to sing in this part.
It is safe to say that, more than anything, this Encores Lady Be Good will be fondly remembered by all those lucky enough to see it because of the showers of star dust provided by Tommy Tune. It has been 21 year since he served as production supervisor for the first revival of Grease, and a mind-blowing 31 years since My One and Only, his last appearance in a Broadway book musical. Here, he appears as a party entertainer -- a role filled in 1924 by the future voice of Disney's Jiminy Cricket, vaudevillian Cliff Edwards. This allows Tune to show up in the middle of each act to give the Encores audience something to shout about.
Whether backed by the ensemble for the rousing Gershwin classic "Fascinating Rhythm," or taking a solo turn to sing the rarely heard "Little Jazz Bird" (which he reluctantly cut from My One And Only in Boston), the 74 year old Tune danced and sang with a seemingly effortless joy and exquisite technique. As he danced, Tune literally stopped time, and for a few priceless minutes made it possible for every member of the audience to forget every care in our troubled world.
That is precisely what the best musical comedies of the 1920s were designed to do. And in this grand Encores staging of Lady Be Good, Tommy tune and company reminded a few thousand lucky ticket holders why this kind of pure, lighthearted entertainment is still an irreplaceable pleasure.
This production ran through Feb. 9, 2015.