Some thoughts on the 2012 Tony Awards

Watching the Tony Awards last night made me so happy that I braved a storm to see The Gershwins' Porgy & Bess before it came to Broadway, that Trinity Rep snagged Clybourne Park for a 300-seat theatre and that I set aside my qualms about movie-to-musical adaptations for Once.

In other words, I'm pretty happy about the winners, especially Once, which is the most unique and captivating new musical I've seen in years. It's the one show I've been recommending whenever someone asks me what to see on Broadway.

And the speeches from the winners seemed especially heartfelt and emotional. I was tearing up hearing Tony winner for Once Steve Kazee talk about his mother, who passed away from cancer on Easter Sunday. Anyone who's lost a parent knows how he felt.

I'm not sure whether Stephen Sondheim's angry letter to The New York Times cost the Follies revival a Tony win. I think most voters would be professional enough to judge the show on its merits. But a cast and creative team work so hard and it's such a tough business. I'm sure Sondheim's criticism of a musical he hadn't seen must have stung.

The one show I haven't seen that came across especially well was the British comedy One Man, Two Guvnors. James Corden's acceptance speech was hilarious, even though it was largely recycled from the Drama Desk Awards. And the scene they showed from the play: Who knew someone hitting himself in the head with a trash can lid could be so funny?!

Despite Tony wins for Michael McGrath and Judy Kaye, I'm still not interested in Nice Work If You Can Get It. Maybe if Matthew Broderick hadn't looked so tired and as my friend Tapeworthy said, gotten a better haircut, the musical number from the show would have been more exciting. Where have you gone, Ferris Bueller?

This comment from Alan Menken, who with Jack Feldman won Best Score for Newsies, was interesting: "We really owe it to the generation of kids who adopted this movie and insisted that it be brought to the stage." Before VCRs and cable channels like the Disney Channel, seeing your favorite movie over and over again wouldn't have been possible. And Menken is so close to an EGOT. Get that man an Emmy, stat!

As a show, the Tony Awards were just ok. Host Neil Patrick Harris was his usual charming and witty self. If you're interested and you've seen the plays and musicals, you'll tune in. If not, you won't. For me the best part was tweeting along with my fellow theatre fans. They made watching it at home alone on the couch a lot more enjoyable!

The one misstep was including a snippet of Hairspray performed live from the Royal Caribbean liner Oasis of the Seas. This is supposed to be a night to recognize the best in American theatre and that was underwhelming. Although I was impressed by the enormous size of the ship's theatre.

I'm sure the American Theatre Wing and the Broadway League were under a lot of pressure from CBS to include it. I wish they had stood their ground and made Royal Caribbean buy a commercial in a regular commercial slot instead of disguising it as part of the show. Besides, if I were interested in taking a cruise, I'd want to see more of the ship.

And the one thing I hate about all awards shows is how the camera is fixed on the nominees, to get their reaction as a winner is announced. I always avert my eyes. I just can't watch. It seems so cruel.

But regardless of who brought home a Tony, I loved all of the nominated performances I saw this season. You can find the complete list of winners here.

My favorite theatre of 2011

This year, it's easy to pick my favorite theatre. Tony Kushner's Angels in America, at the Signature Theatre, and Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart, on Broadway, stood far above anything else I saw in 2011.

Each playwright takes a very different approach to writing about the early days of the AIDS epidemic in New York City, and its devastating impact on gay men. But both tell absorbing stories brought to life by superb actors whose performances had me in tears. They are lyrical and angry and infused with humor and humanity and they will live in my heart forever.

The best of the rest:

Clybourne Park
This Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Bruce Norris, which I saw at Trinity Rep, draws its inspiration from A Raisin in the Sun. It examines how we talk about race in America both in the 1950s and today. The similarities and differences are at times subtle, at times in your face but always compelling. Norris's characters - why they behave the way they do - left me with much to think about.

The Mountaintop
Katori Hall's Broadway play imagines the final night of the Rev. Martin Luther King's life, in his room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. I was riveted watching Samuel L. Jackson as King and Angela Bassett as a hotel maid he encounters. I thought it was a fascinating look at the civil-rights leader not as an icon but as a man.

Follies
This Broadway revival was a great reminder of how great a musical can be when its stories and characters are truly original. Through Stephen Sondehim's songs and James Goldman's book, this is a show that speaks honestly - with humor and pain and poignancy - about what happens as we grow older.

How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying
Maybe it had something to do with the rapturous reception for the endearing Daniel Radcliffe as aspiring executive J. Pierrepont Finch, but the crowd just carried me along on this one. It was hilarious and the story of what you have to do to get to the top resonates today. The Broadway revival of Frank Loesser's musical had me grinning from beginning to end.

Porgy and Bess
I saw Porgy and Bess in its pre-Broadway tryout at the American Repertory Theater. It was my first time seeing the show and hearing the Gershwin score and I was captivated. What made this musical so moving for me was the romance at its core. I thought Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis were wonderful together.

Candide
I loved Leonard Bernstein's glorious score and the story, adapted from Voltaire by Mary Zimmerman. This production originated in Chicago but I saw it at the Huntington Theatre in Boston. It was an exuberant, inventive and melodic tale about a young man's adventure-filled journey through life. There were so many twists and turns, quirky characters and shifting locations that I was enthralled.

Real Broadway babies?

Has there ever been an actual Broadway baby? I'm not talking about a talented child performer but a real, live infant in a Broadway show.

I was so taken with seeing a baby in Porgy and Bess at the American Repertory Theater. Simply adorable! Since the musical is moving to Broadway in December, I'm curious about whether New York State has ever allowed a child that young to appear onstage.

Two children alternate in the role, Nile and Mackenzie Lee, the twins of cast member NaTasha Yvette Williams. (I remember her fierce Sofia from The Color Purple.) There's a note in the program that says they appear by permission of the Office of the Attorney General, Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

I've seen plenty of young kids in Broadway musicals: Mary Poppins, The Lion King and South Pacific, to name a few. Usually they've been old enough to walk. I think the youngest was the little boy who played Coalhouse Walker III in Ragtime but he only appears at the very end. For the infant Coalhouse, they used doll. (And they switch to a doll for Porgy and Bess, too).

I did a quick check of the Internet Broadway Database and found that there have been 18 Broadway performers named "Baby," 22 productions with the word "baby" in their title and numerous songs, including "Broadway Baby" from Follies. But I couldn't find any birthdates. And many of the actors date from the early 20th century. Baby seems to have gone out of style as a nickname.

Google wasn't much help when I searched for the youngest Broadway performer. All I could come up with were the youngest Tony winners: Frankie Michaels, 10, for Mame in 1966 and Daisy Eagan, 12, in 1991 for The Secret Garden.

I hope Nile and Mackenzie get to make their Main Stem debut. They'd look great at the Tony Awards wearing this.

Porgy and Bess

Porgy and Bess, at the American Repertory Theater
Gratuitous Violins rating: ***1/2 out of ****

I've mentioned that Porgy and Bess was never high on the list of musicals I hoped to see someday, for the same reason I spent decades avoiding Fiddler on the Roof. I was afraid it would be filled with stereotypical characters and dialogue that would make me cringe.

In both cases, I'm happy to report, I was so wrong.

I can't say much about the changes made by playwright Suzan-Lori Parks to DuBose Heyward's 1935 libretto. I don't know how director Diane Paulus' version of Porgy and Bess compares with all other versions. I'm not sure whether Stephen Sondheim will like it, if he sees it. All I can say is how this production affected me - and I was captivated.

Porgy and Bess takes place in a close-knit black enclave in South Carolina in the 1930s, where many of the men make their living from the sea. In some ways the inhabitants of Catfish Row reminded me of the Jews of Anatevka - hard-working people sustained by a deep and abiding faith as they try to survive in a world that doesn't regard them as fully human.

Not only was this my first time seeing Porgy and Bess, it was also my first time hearing the beautiful Gershwin score.

When Nikki Renee Daniels, playing Clara, a fisherman's wife, came out holding an infant - yes, a real baby - to sing the lullaby "Summertime," it was mesmerizing. Joshua Henry as her husband, Jake, could not have been sweeter, taking his son in his arms to give him some fatherly advice in "A Woman is A Sometime Thing."

I have to admit, there was something about seeing a baby onstage that got to me. (Nile and Mackenzie Lee, the twins of cast member NaTasha Yvette Williams, who plays Maria, alternate.) What a bold way to say that this not about stereotypes but real people, families. How could you not get drawn in to their stories?

But what made Porgy and Bess so moving was the romance at its core. Abandoned by her lover, Crown, who flees after killing a man, the drug-addicted Bess is shunned. Porgy, a crippled beggar, is the only one who will take her in. Watching this arrangement of convenience turn into real affection was stunning.

As Porgy, Norm Lewis simply won my heart. It was my first time seeing this veteran Broadway actor and he was so endearing - dignified and generous, never pitiful. When he sings "I Got Plenty of Nothing," you know he's probably happier than he's ever been before because, of course, he does have something - the love that this lonely man never expected to enter his life.

And Audra McDonald, ravishing in the fiery red dress she's wearing when we first see her, is remarkable as the tempestuous Bess. You can tell she's struggling - to stay away from drugs and drink, to be accepted by the community that has rejected her. With Porgy, you feel like she's found happiness and a home for the first time.

Of course you don't need me to tell you that Lewis and McDonald, a four-time Tony winner, have gorgeous voices. But they're also incredibly sexy in this musical and have great chemistry together. I loved the way Bess sat on Porgy's lap during "Bess You Is My Woman Now," as they expressed their feelings for each other.

Still, for all the tenderness, Porgy and Bess doesn't shy away from presenting the seamier aspects of life and the unsavory characters lurking on Catfish Row - or the era's stultifying racism.

The tone changed markedly when the musical's two white characters, Christopher Innvar's detective and Joseph Dellger's coroner, appeared and it was startling. The black residents grow quiet and extremely deferential, even as they're treated harshly and with disdain. It was a stark example of the fear that Jim Crow instilled.

I love being surprised by an actor I've never heard of before and that happened with Phillip Boykin as Crown. The sense of menace he brought to the role was palpable. Stocky and strong - he works on the docks as a stevedore - Crown was terrifying, a bully who preys on his own people. There's one very intense scene of sexual violence that was truly scary.

And David Alan Grier brought a light touch to the flashy dope peddler Sportin' Life, who looks down on his country cousins. He tempts Bess with "happy dust" and urges her to come to New York City with him. Grier was terrific giving his own cynical view of the Bible in "It Ain't Necessarily So." And Ronald K. Brown's choreography was fun to watch.

Now, I'm not saying everything was perfect. I though Act II felt slower paced than Act I. And at first, Lewis was dragging his bad leg at such an unnatural angle that I feared he'd do permanent damage. Traditionally, Porgy gets around in a cart pulled by a goat. But here, he uses a cane. I thought it worked fine.

The set by Riccardo Hernandez is pretty bare - evoking the simple wooden shacks of poor black Southerners. There's not much more onstage than a table and chairs. It was okay in the 540-seat Loeb Drama Center but I wonder if it'll get swallowed up in the 1,300-seat Richard Rodgers Theatre when Porgy and Bess moves to Broadway.

I'd read that this production changes the musical's ending, so I checked out the Wikipedia entry afterward. If you've seen Porgy and Bess before, the change is not what you may think it is. As someone who just assumed it was part of the original work, I found it compelling.

One of my favorite moments in the musical occurs near the beginning - the rousing, spiritual-like "Leaving for the Promised Land." It's so fitting because Porgy and Bess takes place around the time of a real exodus, the migration of 2 million African-Americans from the South to the North, Midwest and West in search of a better life.

What I think Parks and Paulus have done in the end is to bring us to that point of departure, with all of its anxiety and ambivalence. Both Porgy and Bess appear changed. Yet, there's always the temptation to go back to your old, bad habits. And despite the danger in staying put, it's difficult to leave the only home you've ever known.

Porgy and Bess premiered at the Colonial Theatre in Boston in 1935. Over the decades, its depiction of black life has made many African-American theatergoers and performers uncomfortable. The Gershwin and Heyward estates requested a revised production that would address those concerns and appeal to African-American audiences.

I can only speak for myself but what I saw was a warm, sensitive and nuanced portrayal of a community. I also think that the passage of time has helped. The characters in Porgy and Bess no longer have to stand for every black person. In the hands of this incredibly talented cast they are individuals - good and bad - and fully human.

Porgy and Bess runs through Oct. 2 at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass. Broadway previews begin Dec. 17 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, with an opening night of Jan. 12. According to the A.R.T program, the babies appear by permission of the Office of Attorney General, Commonwealth of Massachusetts. I have no idea whether there will be babies on Broadway but I hope so.

My fall 2011 theatre season is taking shape

I love season announcement season but this year I just didn't have the energy to blog about what's coming up theatre-wise in the Providence/Boston area for 2011-2012. Now that tickets have gone on sale, here's what I'm most excited about seeing this fall:

Porgy and Bess, American Repertory Theater

Technically, it'll still be summer but I can't think of a better way to kick things off than with Audra McDonald. I first saw her in 2007, in the Broadway revival of 110 in the Shade, and she was unforgettable. Her voice is gorgeous - so rich and nuanced. Plus, as I mentioned last week in writing about the controversy surrounding this production, I've never seen Porgy and Bess, although I know it takes place in an African-American neighborhood in South Carolina in the 1930s. I'm not even familiar with the songs. (Ok, I'm sure I've heard snippets of all of them somewhere along the line.) So this is my chance.

His Girl Friday, Trinity Repertory Company

Naturally, I like newspaper movies. His Girl Friday (as well as its inspiration, The Front Page) are two of my favorites and two of the best. But I've never seen either one onstage. And I've become a fan of playwright John Guare, who has adapted it for the stage. I think I was one of only a handful of people who enjoyed the Broadway revival of Guare's The House of Blue Leaves. I found the quirky dark comedy, and what it says about our obsession with celebrity, so appealing. I'm hoping His Girl Friday will make me laugh, too. Can't we all use one?

Circle Mirror Transformation, Gamm Theatre

Playwright Annie Baker's Circle Mirror Transformation is one of those works that got such terrific reviews off-Broadway, I wish I'd been able to see it. The New York Times called it "absorbing, unblinking and sharply funny." I don't know much about it except that it takes place in a drama class in a small Vermont town. Also, I think the title refers to an acting exercise. (Although I took a drama class in middle school and I don't remember anything with that name.) Anyway, normally I read too much about a show beforehand so it'll be good to go in fresh with this one.

Candide, Huntington Theatre Company

Again, this is a work I don't know much about except that it's based on a novella by the 18th-century French playwright Voltaire (which I may or may not have read in high school) and features a score by Leonard Bernstein. One of my fellow bloggers, Vance, at Tapeworthy, adored it and another, Bob, at Chicago Theatre Addict, didn't. Since I do love a good theatre discussion, I'll see it for myself and weigh in. And it's much more fun when we don't all agree.

Clybourne Park, at Trinity Rep

Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun ends with a black family buying a house in a white Chicago neighborhood in the 1950s. Trinity Rep mounted a production in 2009. Now, I'm happy to report, they're tackling Clybourne Park, Bruce Norris' intriguing and imaginative sequel. It takes place just before the Youngers move in and then brings the story up to the present day. The play, which won this year's Pulitzer Prize for Drama, has gotten great reviews and it sounds like the kind of meaty American work that I love. The Pulitzer citation called it: "a powerful work whose memorable characters speak in witty and perceptive ways to America's sometimes toxic struggle with race and class consciousness."

Les Miserables, Providence Performing Arts Center

I saw Les Miserables on tour in Syracuse years ago and I was thrilled by the whole grand, romantic epic. Sentenced to 19 years in prison for stealing a loaf of bread - can you imagine? I still have have my Les Miserables beach towel and the score remains one of my favorites. I understand that this time, there won't be a turntable but according to my friend Bob, from Chicago Theatre Addict, that hardly matters. I can't wait to experience it again with this 25th anniversary production. Just thinking about "Do You Hear the People Sing?" gives me chills. To the barricades!

Stephen Sondheim on Porgy and Bess

I've never seen Porgy and Bess. I'm not even sure I've ever heard any of the songs. So the objections raised by Stephen Sondheim to changes in the upcoming production go over my head.

In fact, some of the things that have gotten stuck in his craw are downright perplexing. In his letter to The New York Times, Sondheim says that the line "Bring my goat!" which apparently has been taken out, is "one of the most moving moments in musical theater history." Really?

To be honest, Porgy and Bess was on a list of works I had no interest in ever seeing. I knew it took place in a poor black community in South Carolina in the 1930s and I figured it would be a stereotypical portrait. The song titles made me cringe: "Oh, Dere's Somebody Knockin at de Do," "Here Come de Honey Man," "I Ain't Got No Shame." I could go on but you get the point.

Despite my reservations, I bought a ticket to see Porgy and Bess at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass., later this month, in its pre-Broadway engagement.

What made me change my mind was Audra McDonald, the four-time Tony winner who'll play Bess. I have enormous respect for McDonald. I figure if she's signed on, then I would give it a chance.

And I was glad to read the article in The Times that drew Sondheim's attention, in which representatives of the Gershwin and Heyward estates express their desire for a version of Porgy and Bess that would draw African-American theatergoers.

So it shocked me to read Sondheim's letter excoriating McDonald, director Diane Paulus and Suzan-Lori Parks, a Pulitzer Prize-winning African-American playwright who is adapting the book for the musical. To be frank, it's a bit unseemly for someone of Sondheim's stature to come down so hard before the first preview. With great power comes great responsibility.

The sniping at McDonald seems especially petty. She has been a fierce advocate for gay rights, for which she is rightly praised. So when she speaks as an African-American woman about her concerns with racism in Porgy and Bess, she deserves to be treated with respect.

I understand that Sondheim is speaking from the perspective of a musical theatre purist who has a great love for Porgy and Bess. But instead of calling out the largely African-American performers and creative team for their "arrogance" I wish he'd at least consider the viewpoint of African-Americans toward this work. It doesn't even seem to have entered his mind.

In an article in The Boston Globe, the performers and creative team talk about the work and about the importance of adapting it for a modern audience.

McDonald said that while she's performed songs from Porgy and Bess in concert, she's been reluctant to play Bess onstage. She mentions the "Sambo-type racist talk" that bothered her. “I want them to be real people in the way that Lorraine Hansberry was able to lift the shade and [let] everybody peer into a real American family with ‘Raisin in the Sun.’ ’’

Parks said the song “I Got Plenty o’ Nuttin’ ’’ “has stuck in the craw of many a folk, because people have interpreted it as the happy darky song: There he is, out of nowhere, for no reason, singin’ about how he ain’t got nothin’ and how that makes him happy.’’

Philip Boykin, who plays Crown, says: “There are things I’ve done in the opera ‘Porgy and Bess’ that I’ve hated for years. I’ve hated the lines.’’ But with Parks willing to hear suggestions, he’s been able to ditch some of them. “I just love it,’’ he said. “I love it, love it, love it, love it, love it.’’

I'll admit I'm not a purist. If somebody wants to remake my favorite movie, Casablanca, and have (spoiler alert!) Ilsa stay with Rick at the end, I'd say, "that sounds interesting." As far as I know Porgy and Bess did not come down from God at Mount Sinai, delivered into the arms of George Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. (And this idea that a work is sacrosanct, that it can never be reinterpreted or altered, isn't that how a lot of people feel about the Bible?)

The Globe article notes "what has been the greatest obstacle for Porgy and Bess over the decades: the perception that this depiction of a black community in the American South, written in dialect by whites, is a racist work."

No one wants to make Porgy and Bess unrecognizable. But there's a difference between making an audience confront its prejudices, no matter how uncomfortable that may be, and making them comfortable in their prejudices.

If we can make the portrayal of black people in the 1930s less offensive, if we can make black audiences feel welcome and performers more comfortable, while still retaining the elements that everyone says make Porgy and Bess a great work, then why not? Or at least, why not try?