Cabaret

After the initial smile the news of Cabaret's revival brought to my face, it soon turned slightly sour.  Don't get me wrong, I love the show.  What brought a little disdain to the whole affair was to learn that this is not a fresh revival -  it is actually just a resurrection.  It's literally a repeat engagement of the exact same production that graced the stage at Studio 54 over 10 years ago.   It's possible they took the liberty of changing a few things, but certainly nothing major.  It's a re-run - and one that you have to pay for all over again.

What further depressed me is that Roundabout artistic director, Todd Haimes, boldly proclaims this re-run fact right in the Playbill.  This run is a limited engagement for a subscription-based not-for-profit theatre company.  So what provocative theatre are they actually producing? Mr. Haimes, don't you think most of your subscriber base has seen the show already?  You mention in your introduction in the playbill that "a new generation will have the chance to see this incredible piece live on Broadway".  

Well Mr. Haimes, this grand, dark albeit very enjoyable "revival" will mostly be seen by the same subscriber who already saw it before and had first dibs this time around at the tickets before the "new generation" even had the chance to buy in.  It's also a cheap trick.  You aren't investing in a new production or provocative, fresh, adventurous theatre.  No, you simply hire the same choreographer (Rob Marshall) and the same director (Sam Mendez) and even the same leading man (Alan Cumming)!  You are not fooling this subscriber one bit.

If you really wanted people to see this show then you should have gathered up investors (I'm sure there would have been many willing ones) and brought this production of a revival direct to Broadway in a commercial run where everyone who wanted to see it could have.  What we have here is a lazy excuse for a slot in the season - reviving a very successful show on the backs of your paying subscribers who expect more than re-runs in their season.

All my complaints aside, the show itself is a remarkable and potent theatrical journey back in time.  It's message, penned by the duo of John Kander and the late Fred Ebb is as sharp and pointed as it was in 1966 when it first debuted.

Alan Cumming (Emcee) is as dark and playful as anyone ever was in the role.  The Kit Kat Klub boys and girls are a sexy and bawdy ensemble.   I saw Michelle Williams' (Sally Bowles) understudy the night I saw it so I cannot opine on Ms Williams' abilities.  Aside from the dark Mr. Cummings, who never fails to entertain, I found Herr Schultz (Danny Burstein) and Fraulein Schneider (Linda Eamon) to be the show's stand-outs both vocally and dramatically.   Bll Heck (Clifford Bradshaw) turned in an admirable yet run-of-the-mill performance.  The Orchestra, or the Kat Kat Band as it is known (all fit and buff themselves onstage and in-your-face), was an outstanding component of the show.

So I'm annoyed as a subscriber to Roundabout, yet pleased, once again, with a fine production and an evening spent enjoying an important and provocative work in the theatre.  There's even doubt the show will be Tony worthy again as it actually won a Tony the first time around and simply took a 10 year break before resurfacing virtually unchanged.  I guess in the end though, Life is Beautiful... Everything is Beautiful.... Life is a Cabaret.

The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures

Tony Kusher's much anticipated new work is fantastically engrossing, scintillatingly intellectual, and mentally exhausting - all at the same time.   From minute 1 to minute 210 (that's 3 and 1/2 hours, folks) you are on the edge of your seat absorbing every word, watching every movement, and processing, processing, processing.  Make no mistake, this is a heady play.  It's not for everyone, but certainly for those who are up for the mental gymnastics that it sponsors.  See it before it's too late.  Run.  Don't Walk.

What is this play about, you ask?   Well, there are so many layers here, it's hard to convey.  It's literally about a man's decision to kill himself before Alzheimer's gets him.  Adding a few more layers - it's a play about politics, relationships, marriage, economics, labor, sexuality, religion, suicide, and sex - just to list a few.  I'm not kidding.  There are others.   But let me try to boil it down to something simpler.  It's about family and struggle.  That's it. Family - all the good, all the bad and everything in-between.  It's also about struggle - in the family, among the family, outside the family and everything in and around the family.  There are really two kinds of families - the ones that look on the outside to be perfect, but are really a big mess on the inside - and the ones who look (and act) like a hot mess on the outside, but at the end of the day nothing, and i mean nothing, could tear them apart.  Gus Marcantonio and his family are the most definitely the latter.  A mess so hot they make August Osage County's Weston family look like dry ice.

The cast is superb - a better ensemble cast than any I have ever seen.  They seemed like an actual family rather than individual actors simply cast in the roles.  The performances were sublime.  At times there were 7 or 8 family members on stage and every single one of them was talking (arguing, more likely) at the same time and you could still follow the argument, the thoughts, and the scene.  And when a play lasts over 3 and 1/2 hours, you bet they were damn good if I'm using such superlatives.  Each and every actor brought his game to the stage.  (Michael Esper apparently brought his game and a rockin' hot bod, puppy dog eyes, and boyish smile to accompany it... but i digress).  Kudos in no particular order or preference to each performer in the cast:  Michael Christofer (Gus), Linda Eamond (Empty), Michael Esper (Eli), K. Todd Freeman (Paul), Hettienne Park (Sooze), Steven Pasquale (V), Molly Price (Shelle), Matt Servitto (Adam), Danielle Skraastad (Maeve), Stephen Spinella (Pill), and Brenda Wehle (Clio).

I don't pretend to know all the layers Mr. Kushner has written into the play.  Heck, I don't even know much about Karl Marx, but that's not what's needed to understand this play.  Listen carefully and absorb the feelings, emotions, the feelings and tones, the over arching them of family, struggle, and identity will reveal themselves to you as the minutes tick away into hours on Gus' (and your) watch.

Life (x) 3