PPAC's 2010-2011 season

The Providence Performing Arts Center has announced its 2010-2011 season and I think it's a pretty strong one. It's also a milestone for me - I've seen every show. Here's the lineup:

Radio City Christmas Spectacular, Nov. 12-28

South Pacific, Dec. 7-12

Mamma Mia!, Dec. 28-Jan. 2

In the Heights, Jan. 11-16, 2011

The Lion King, Feb. 1-20, 2011

Blue Man Group, March 4-6, 2011

Next to Normal, March 22-27, 2011

Monty Python's Spamalot, April 15-17, 2011

West Side Story, April 25-May 1, 2011

Things kick off - literally - in November with the Rockettes in the Radio City Christmas Spectacular, which I saw in New York in 2008. It's a great show with some truly spectacular segments featuring those high-stepping dancers. And it'll definitely get you in the Christmas spirit. Here's my review.

Also on the PPAC schedule for next season are five musicals I really enjoyed on Broadway - South Pacific, In the Heights, The Lion King, Next to Normal and West Side Story. I can't say what the touring productions will be like but they're shows I'd see.

Honestly, I'm less enthused about Spamalot, Mamma Mia! and Blue Man Group.

The first two have stopped in Providence fairly recently. Mamma Mia! is a fun musical and I had a good time seeing it on Broadway. I was less enthused about Spamalot when I took in the tour at PPAC in 2008. And I saw Blue Man Group in Boston years ago. Different, but once was enough for me!

Of course South Pacific, West Side Story and The Lion King are classics that probably don't need an introduction from me. But theatergoers in Southern New England might not be as familiar with In the Heights and Next to Normal.

In the Heights, the 2008 Tony winner for Best Musical, refers to Washington Heights, a neighborhood at the northern end of Manhattan that's a Latino melting pot.

It's a sweet and heartfelt look at an immigrant community's hopes and dreams. I loved the choreography and the score that combines hip-hop and salsa with more traditional Broadway sounds.

Next to Normal is something so rare on Broadway, an original musical about a complex subject - a woman suffering from mental illness and the effect it has on her family.

People are divided on it but I gained a greater understanding of the devastating impact of mental illness and how difficult it is to treat. Plus, the vibrant rock 'n' roll score conveys so well what each character is going through. Tough to watch at times, yes, but utterly compelling.

Gee, Officer Laurents

There's an interesting column by Michael Riedel in the New York Post about director Arthur Laurents supposedly laying down the law to the cast of West Side Story over repeated absences. (Thanks to Steve on Broadway for the tip.)

"His tone, I'm told, was chilling. The 91-year-old told them that professionals don't miss performances, and that they'd better get their acts together or find another line of work."

Whoa!

I think there were five understudies the night I saw West Side Story but luckily, all of the principals were in. And I would have been disappointed if I'd missed seeing Karen Olivo in her Tony-winning role as Anita or Josefina Scaglione making her Broadway debut as Maria.

I'm sure this is a musical that takes a pretty heavy toll on its cast. I've sat close enough to the stage to see the sweat, so I know that some Broadway performers get quite a workout up there, especially in musicals. It's not the type of thing you'd want to do when you're sick or hurt.

The comments from (naturally) anonymous producers struck me as a tad unfair, making generalizations, painting everyone with the same broad brush - "Some of them are more loyal to their gym than they are to their show."

I'm sure there are lots of dedicated young performers on Broadway who go on no matter what. And I have no way of knowing whether the criticism of the West Side Story cast is justified.

Still, maybe there is a bit of a generational divide.

I think 79-year-old John Cullum, who was then in August: Osage County, made an interesting point in a Variety article in June about older actors treading the boards on Broadway:

"The young people are just as good as they ever were. If you work with people my age, though, you're talking about people who really feel terrible if they can't go to a performance. That mentality is really part of their makeup."

A medal for Chita Rivera

Congratulations to two-time Tony winner Chita Rivera, among this year's 16 recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, our nation's highest civilian honor.

The award will be bestowed today at the White House by President Obama and you can watch the ceremony beginning at 3 p.m. at www.whitehouse.gov/live.

And what a great homecoming for the 76-year-old Washington, D.C., native, born Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero. Here is what she said when the award was announced:

"When my mother was a child, she rolled Easter eggs on the lawn of the White House. And now, to receive The Medal of Freedom from our President, is truly a dream. I am deeply honored to receive this award and to be in such distinguished company. I only wish my parents were here to share it with...but they are!"

This year's recipients were chosen for being "agents of change," people who have blazed trails and broken down barriers.

Among her accomplishments, Rivera was the first Hispanic woman to receive a Kennedy Center honor. And coincidentally, also visiting the White House today is another Latina groundbreaker: there's a reception this morning for newly sworn-in Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. How fitting!

I've written before about how fortunate I was to see Ms. Rivera in the national tour of Chita Rivera: The Dancer's Life. That was in May 2007, when I was just starting to become a regular theatergoer. I knew who she was but I can't say that I knew a lot about her. And I never would have gone without a nudge from a wise friend.

I remember writing to my new e-mail pal Steve on Broadway and running down the list of everyone who was coming to the Providence Performing Arts Center that spring. He told me that if I wanted to see a true Broadway legend, I should make every effort to see Chita Rivera. So of course, I did. And of course, he was right.

What a terrific storyteller as well as a terrific singer and dancer! It was great to hear her talk about how she got her start, about working on shows like West Side Story and Chicago. I wish I could go back and see her again.

Update: Here are the White House comments on all of the Medal of Freedom recipients. The president used the words "sassy" and "electric" to describe Rivera, and I liked this quip: "Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero knows that adversity comes with a difficult name."

West Side Story

Gratuitous Violins rating: *** out of ****

A promotional photo for West Side Story perfectly illustrates one of the things I love about the current Broadway revival - the gang of Jets in midair, knees bent, seemingly defying gravity. Oh, those leaping, pirouetting chorus boys!

In fact, there is so much I loved about this show.

I loved watching Jerome Robbins' acrobatic, ballet-like choreography, wonderfully reproduced by Joey McKneely. After seeing Fiddler on the Roof earlier this year and now West Side Story, I'm totally in awe of Robbins' work.

As if that weren't enough, there's the gorgeous, instantly recognizable score by Leonard Bernstein, with poignant lyrics from Stephen Sondeim in songs like "Somewhere," "One Hand, One Heart" and "Tonight."

Arthur Laurents' book so effectively turns Shakespeare's tale of star-crossed lovers into a story about rival New York City gangs the Jets and the Sharks - and the prejudice faced by the Puerto Rican Sharks.

Josefina Scaglione, a 21-year-old Argentinian opera singer, is lovely as Maria, a young woman newly arrived from Puerto Rico, eager and appealing. Tony winner Karen Olivo gives a great performance as Anita. The girlfriend of Maria's brother Bernardo (George Akram), she's a wise and strong Latina woman and so much fun to watch in "America."

On the other hand, I've liked Matt Cavenaugh in other roles but here, he seems a little too clean cut as Tony, the Polish-American former Jet who spots Maria at a dance. He and Scaglione were sweet together as lovers but I had trouble imagining that he'd ever been in a gang or would ever do anything remotely violent.

Still, I think this revival does a good job of evoking the turf battle between the Jets, led by Cody Green's Riff, and the Sharks, led by Akram's Bernardo. Okay, maybe they don't all seem like gang members but Curtis Holbrook was scarily effective as Action, one of the Jets. There's one scene where Anita ventures into the Jets' territory that's truly horrifying.

But for me, the use of some Spanish dialog and lyrics in two of the songs, translated by In the Heights composer Lin-Manuel Miranda, didn't work. They ended up being distracting and I don't really think they added anything to the experience of watching the show.

It didn't matter as much to me in "I Feel Pretty" because that's obviously a comical song and it was kind of nice to hear Scaglione sing in her native language. But in "A Boy Like That," an emotional scene between Maria and Anita, I felt like I was missing something important. Plus, no offense to Lin-Manuel Miranda, but I wanted to hear Stephen Sondheim's lyrics!

True, the English translations were printed in the Playbill but I wonder how many people read them beforehand and even if they did, remembered them. Maybe super-titles would have helped, or a mix of English and Spanish so that you'd get the gist of what the song was about.

I guess the point was to accentuate the feeling of estrangement on the part of the Puerto Rican characters, of being strangers in a strange land. Laurents told New York magazine that "the idea was to equalize the gangs" by giving the Sharks their own language.

I think in West Side Story it's important to understand what the Puerto Rican characters are up against as they make new lives for themselves in New York City - and that comes through so clearly. I don't think the Spanish was necessary.

Still, sitting in the Palace Theatre, I definitely got a sense of why West Side Story, first produced on Broadway in 1957, is such a classic musical. This was my first time seeing it on stage and there were many times when I was simply swept away by the beauty of what I was watching and hearing.

Some musical news and views

Okay, it's been a few days since I've had a theatre-related post and there's quite a bit of interesting news, so it's time for a little catch-up.

The Broadway revival of West Side Story is launching a national tour starting in the fall of 2010. I think this is exciting. Sure, it's fun to see the new shows when they come on tour but it's also nice to catch up with the classics, especially one with a new twist. And a production that incorporates Spanish dialog and songs hopefully will attract a whole new audience. I'm assuming the tour will keep the Spanish parts. So it's definitely something to look forward to.

The Tales of the City musical is going to be developed this summer at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Conn., as part of the National Musical Theater Conference. It features a book by Jeff Whitty of Avenue Q and songs by the Scissor Sisters - Jason Sellards and John Garden. I've read the first book in the Tales series and I liked it. Sometimes you read about a planned musical and then, nothing. So I was happy to read that this one is coming together.

McG (Joseph McGinty Nichol) is in talks to direct the movie version of the Tony-winning musical Spring Awakening. I'm not sure how I feel about this one. On the one hand, he does have experience making music videos and a lot of time, Spring Awakening does feel like you're in a club listening to a cool new indie rock band. On the other hand, McG directed Charlie's Angels. I just don't know. I loved Spring Awakening on stage and I don't want them to mess it up.

Opening night for West Side Story

The Broadway revival of West Side Story opens tonight, at the Palace Theatre.

Here's part of what New York Times critic Brooks Atkinson had to say about the original production, which opened on Sept. 26, 1957 and ran for 732 performances:

"Gang warfare is the material of West Side Story, which opened at the Winter Garden last evening, and very little of the hideousness has been left out. But the author, composer and ballet designer are creative artists. Pooling imagination and virtuosity, they have written a profoundly moving show that is as ugly as the city jungles and also pathetic, tender and forgiving."

Of composer Leonard Bernstein and choreographer Jerome Robbins, he wrote:

"Using music and movement they have given [Arthur Laurents'] story passion and depth and some glimpses of unattainable glory. They have pitched into it with personal conviction as well as the skill of accomplished craftsmen."

While Atkinson mentions other members of the cast, he reserves his highest praise for the performances of Larry Kert as Tony and Carol Lawrence as Maria:

"Their balcony scene on the firescape of a dreary tenement is tender and affecting. From that moment on, West Side Story is an incandescent piece of work that finds odd bits of beauty amid the rubbish of the streets."

New York magazine on Arthur Laurents

I guess everyone will have their favorite parts of New York magazine writer Jesse Green's article on the irascible 91-year-old Arthur Laurents.

Laurents comes across as both fearsome and vulnerable. Mary Rodgers Guettel declined to be interviewed, saying "Call me back when he's dead." There's also this tender side that I wasn't expecting, mostly when Laurents talks about his partner of 52 years, Tom Hatcher, who died of lung cancer in 2006.

But this bit, about casting for the Broadway revival of West Side Story, I found among the most interesting. (And this is from Green, not Laurents.)

"The cast would be younger, and the Puerto Ricans, if not Puerto Rican, at least Hispanic. (This wasn’t always easy; Josefina Scaglione, the 21-year-old Argentine who plays Maria, was tracked down on YouTube.)"

I understand that perhaps he wanted a young, fresh face. But Green makes it sound as if Laurents was almost desperate. Thank God for YouTube. Otherwise, well I don't know what they would have done. Because, you know, young Hispanic actors and actresses are not easy to find!

Still kicking

I had the privilege of seeing the legendary Chita Rivera on stage in May, as she toured with her show "Chita Rivera: The Dancer's Life." Wow. Watching her sing, dance and tell stories, it was so hard to believe I was watching a woman who will turn 75 next month.

And she's a great storyteller as well as a talented singer and dancer. I loved hearing her talk about what it was like starting out, all the people she's worked with, including Dick Van Dyke, Gwen Verdon and Antonio Banderas. I really got a sense of her life, her career, what the dancer's life on Broadway is like, and what keeps her going.

So I was pleased to find out that in celebration of the 50th anniversary of "West Side Story," Rivera and some of the other original cast members from the landmark musical performed on Monday during the annual Gypsy of the Year competition sponsored by Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

At the Broadway Cares Web site you can look at pictures, like the one above, taken by Jay Brady, and watch the tribute to "West Side Story," which opened on Broadway on Sept. 26, 1957 at the Winter Garden Theatre.

The Gypsy of the Year is the culmination of six weeks of intensive fundraising, during which more than 64 Broadway, off-Broadway and national touring companies solicit donations for Broadway Cares. This year, they raised more than $3.9 million that will go to food banks, health clinics, and AIDS and family service organizations across the United States.

Broadway's "gypsies" are the talented dancers and singers who start out like Chita Rivera - in the chorus, and dream of someday having their own star turn.

At the end of "The Dancer's Life," Rivera said she often think of the one person in the audience who may be inspired to become a dancer, and that makes it all worthwhile. Whether or not you become a dancer after seeing this theatrical icon, she's definitely an inspiration.