Jordan Wright
June 23, 2014
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Brown Lindiwe Mkhize as ³Rafiki² in the opening number ³The Circle of Life² from THE LION KING National Tour. Copyright Disney. Photo Credit Joan Marcus Disney’s The Lion King roars onto the stage with a procession of African wildlife in its opening number “Circle of Life”. Director Julie Taymor, who also serves as Costume Designer and Mask & Puppet Co-Designer with Michael Ward, sends her exquisitely conceived creatures – giraffes borne on stilts, a massive elephant and whirling birds held aloft on bamboo poles – streaming down the aisles of the Kennedy Center’s three-tiered Opera House in a fantastical African menagerie. Taymor, who studied Bunraku, the Japanese style of puppetry in which manipulators appear openly, and wayan kulit,the art of shadow puppetry, has magnificently incorporated these concepts into this spectacular production.
It is expected that by now (the animated film version premiered in 1994 and in 1998 the stage version garnered six Tony Awards) that you are familiar with the story of Simba the young lion, King Mufasa his kindly father, Scar the evil uncle, Rafiki the baboon shaman, and Zazu the Red-billed Hornbill. They all inhabit Simba’s life, along with the strong-willed Nala, Simba’s childhood friend, Pumbaa the gassy warthog and Timon the wise-cracking meerkat. These are not the only characters we are treated to. There are hordes of wildebeests that stampede onto the stage, a pride of lions that dance around and lurking laughing hyenas who are lampooned by Pumbaa and Timon in the famous song “Hakuna Matata” meaning “no worries” in Swahili.
Lyricist Tim Rice and Composer Elton John’s score is beyond fabulous. “Can You Seen the Love Tonight” is one of John’s biggest hits. But it was Hans Zimmer who won an Oscar, two Grammys and a Golden Globe for the original film score and Soweto émigré, Lebo M, known as the “voice and spirit of The Lion King”, who contributed the gloriously rich African rhythms and melodies.
 Jordan A. Hall as ³Simba² and the ensemble in ³He Lives in You² from THE LION KING National Tour. Copyright Disney. Photo Credit Joan Marcus Most memorable are Simba, played by the adorable Jordan A. Hall who stalks and pounces his way into your heart. “I hate public pools,” he jokes after a dangerous dunk in the river; L. Steven Taylor as Mufasa, whose superlative voice cradles the emotions in “They Live in You” when he explains to Simba about his ancestors who reside in the stars; and Tshidi Manye as the wise Rafiki, whose evocative South African voice burns brightly in “Circle of Life” and “He Lives in You”.
Taymor’s costumes, using the vivid colors of tribal kente cloth, juxtaposes Set Designer Richard Hudson’s backdrops of grassy savannas and cerulean skies, while in desert scenes she employs the earthy shades of patterned Malian mud cloth to accentuate Hudson’s parched earth colored sets.
The Lion King is a lavish feast for the eyes and a paradise of music for the ears. I’d gladly swing from a baobab tree limb to claim it as one of my favorite musicals of all time.
Through August 17th at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St., NW, Washington, DC. For tickets and information call 202 467-4600 or visit www.Kennedy-Center.org.
Jordan Wright
June 20, 2014
Special to The Alexandria Times
 (l-r) Ryan Silverman as Terry Connor, Emily Padgett as Daisy, Erin Davie as Violet, Matthew Hydzik as Buddy Foster. Photo by Joan Marcus. In the late 19th and up to the mid-20th century, before The Age of Political Correctness, the public’s fascination with human oddities was an acceptable form of entertainment. Traveling freak shows, pop-up circuses and dime museums were part of our culture and there was hardly a man, woman or child who had not been enthralled by a pinheaded man, a giant or a person with extra appendages. Midgets Chang and Eng, Andre the Giant, and Jo-Jo the Dog-Faced Boy were headliners, as were the “Siamese” twins known as the Hilton Sisters. Side Show brings to life that bizarre era in American show business with the true and tragic story of the talented twins and the exploitation they endured.
Beautifully directed by Bill Condon (Oscar-winning screenwriter of Gods and Monsters) with gorgeous music by Grammy-Award winning composer Henry Krieger of Dreamgirls fame, and a touching story by veteran Broadway lyricist Bill Russell, this musical drama is a tumble down the rabbit hole into an “odditorium” where a tattooed lady with a propensity for dining on live chickens shares stage space with a three-legged man, a cannibal king, the lizard man, and a dozen other exotic creatures.
The story opens in Texas during the Depression, where the twins lead a dismal life performing in a San Antonio tent show with other “freaks”. Handsome talent scout Terry Connor (Ryan Silverman) discovers the girls, offering his credentials along with his partner Buddy Foster (Matthew Hydzik) in the jaunty and pun-laden tune, “Very Well Connected”. In all there are 24 smashing songs by Krieger.
 The company of the Kennedy Center production of Side Show. Photo by Joan Marcus The entire cast is a marvel. Many of the members play up to eight separate roles, led by the joined-at-the-hip Hiltons, performed spectacularly by Erin Davie as Violet and Emily Padgett as Daisy. Matching stride for stride, they dance, duet and, in one hilarious scene, pantomime a mock tennis match. The only thing they don’t do together is fall in love. In “A Private Conversation”, the show’s Phantom of The Opera moment, Silverman captivates in a duet with Padgett.
Robert Joy soars in the role of the archetypal slime ball, Sir, the sideshow’s manager, as does David St. Louis who plays his compassionate assistant Jake. St. Louis’s commanding bass-baritone in “You Should Be Loved”, moves earth and sky.
The show’s creative team gives us three-time Helen Hayes Award-winner Paul Tazewell, whose imaginative costumes span half a century from the twins’ Dickensian upbringing to Chicago’s Orpheum Theatre and on to the glitz and glamour of Hollywood where they become the toast of the town. Paul Kieve, whose stage and film illusions are legendary, dramatizes one of the most memorable scenes of the production when Javier Ignacio, performing a breathtaking illusion as Harry Houdini, sings “All in the Mind” in his haunting three-octave voice. I wished his were more than a cameo role.
Famed Special Effects/Prosthetics Designers, Dave Elsey and Lou Elsey who devised creatures for both Star Wars and Where the Wild Things Are, provide the rivetingly recognizable freaks.
Highly recommended.
Through July 13th at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St., NW, Washington, DC. For tickets and information call 202 467-4600 or visit www.Kennedy-Center.org.
Jordan Wright
June 16, 2014
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Fat Tony (Ed Dixon), Nick Cutter (Doug Carpenter) and Gino (Christopher Bloch) sing “Who Put the Mob In” in “Cloak and Dagger,”Photo by Margot Schulman. If you want to be cast in a major part, or nail half a dozen roles in the same production…and if you want the music to be heavy on the romance, comedy and pathos…maybe you should just write your own damn material which is exactly what Helen Hayes Award Winner Ed Dixon did. He set out to create the perfect platform for his talents, penning the book, music and lyrics to Cloak and Dagger or The Case of the Golden Venus, now having its world premiere at Signature Theatre. In his madcap homage to 1950’s film noir, Dixon wrote himself into over a dozen separate roles, giving Director Eric Schaeffer one hot hit. The energetic four-person cast is listed as Man One, Man Two, Nick and Helena, but there are countless reincarnations by Man One played by Dixon, and Man Two, played by Helen Hayes Award Winner, Christopher Bloch.
The story: Nick Cutter is a private dick on the downswing. Holed up in a shabby one-desk office in Manhattan, his world is tanking when in walks sexy, sharp-tongued firecracker, Helena Troy. (All puns intended by the playwright throughout.) Helena is being chased by gangsters-with-gats led by her goombah fiancé, Fattoni, a deese-dems-and-dose lowlife in pursuit of a purloined solid gold Venus statue. Can the adoring Nick save her from The Mob and solve the mystery of the statue? Not before combing every nook and cranny of New York, from Chinatown and Little Italy to Canal Street and 42nd Street, and every hellhole in between. “Follow the stench – cheap cologne and despair,” the frowzy landlady advises Nick as she tries to woo him in the tune “A Real Woman”.
 Nick Cutter (Doug Carpenter, center) and Pinsky’s Chorus Girls sing “Shake Your Maracas” – Photo by Margot Schulman. “You may be onto to something,” Nick acknowledges. “I’d like to be!” she retorts with a wink. When he worries Helena might already be a corpse, she suggests, “I’m sure she’s alright unless she fell in holy water in direct sunlight.” The gags come fast and furious and in a wealth of different accents. You gotta keep up.
Doug Carpenter, an appealing and handsome lead actor with a matchless voice to boot, is Nick Cutter. Some of the most moving numbers in the show are his – “The Worst of Times” and “The Best of Times”, the two opening numbers, and “Love Is” which comes after he’s fallen head over heels for Helena. Another terrific song is “Opium” sung with Man One, Man Two, Nick and Helena. It could easily spring Cole Porter from his grave dripping with envy. Erin Driscoll is Helena. Though her petite frame is somewhat overshadowed by the big galoots, she makes up for it as a belter who can sell a tune to a flock of nightingales…and does.
 Helena Troy (Erin Driscoll) strikes a seductive pose in “Cloak and Dagger,” – Photo by Margot Schulman. Behind a simple set of three doors, Bloch and Dixon weave in and out donning umpteen crazy costumes and emerging totally transformed in record breaking time. It’s a bonanza of double entendres, men in drag (Dixon does a potty-mouth Mae West), and some vaudeville-style hoofing (in “An Agent”, Bloch conjures Jimmy Durante and dances to “Hava Nagila”).
As important as the jokes are, the music is even more critical. And one way to gauge the value of a musical is not just by the score, but also by the lyrics. Would a singer choose any of these songs for a nightclub or cabaret act? Well, yes! Dixon has given songsters catchy tunes, creative lyrics and romantic ballads to choose from. There are nineteen numbers played by four musicians that trick us into thinking they’re an orchestra. Twenty-two year old Jordon Ross Weinhold, one year out of grad school, did the orchestrations and he is a veritable whiz kid.
It’s a clever detective story done in burlesque. What’s not to like?
Through July 6th at Signature Theatre (Shirlington Village), 4200 Campbell Avenue, Arlington, VA 22206. For tickets and information call 703 820-9771 or visit www.signature-theatre.org.
Video Credit on Preview Video is James Gardiner and Justin Chiet
Jordan Wright
June 16, 2014
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Bernie Engel as Roy Hubley escorts Elynia Betts as Mimsey Hubley to her wedding – photo credit to Matthew Randall Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite is a series of three vignettes set in Room 719 at New York’s famed Plaza Hotel. For this production Director Shawn g. Byers has chosen to represent three different eras throughout the hotel’s hundred-year history changing decors for each period. To set the mood and showcase the hotel’s glorious past, vintage photos of celebrities living it up in the hotel’s famed Palm Court and Oak Room are projected across the stage while music of the era plays in the background. It opens with the lovely lilting voice of songstress Alicia Keyes.
It is 2007 and Karen Nash (Amy Solo) greets her workaholic husband. Though he doesn’t recall, it is their anniversary and she has excitedly booked the same room where they honeymooned. Though they don’t even agree on that. “We’re some lousy couple,” he concedes.
 Amy Solo and Jack Stein as wife and husband Karen and Sam Nash celebrate their wedding anniversary at the Plaza Hotel – photo credit to Matthew Randall. Preoccupied with her age and weight, she has become a doormat to her svelte husband, Sam (Jack B. Stein), pardoning his insults and ignoring his foibles while they bicker and flatter with equal measure. Enter the sexy secretary, Jean McCormack played by Michelle Sumner. She drops by with “important” papers for Sam to sign, but with a suggestive tossing of her locks lets us know what’s up between them.
 Michelle Sumner as Jean McCormack and Jack Stein as Sam Nash – photo credit to Matthew Randall. If you think this is a clone of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf, you may not know Simon, a playwright fond of exploiting everyday human frailties with a massive dose of one-liners, sarcasm and slapstick more akin to the Marx Brothers and their style of physical comedy.
The second act takes place in the 1960’s. Photos of the Beatles, the Rat Pack and that most celebrated of all couples from the jet setter days Liz Taylor and Richard Burton, blaze across the stage. Slick Hollywood producer, Jesse Kiplinger (Richard Isaacs), tries to reignite a high school romance with 30-something Muriel Tate (Shelagh Roberts). Fueled by multiple vodka stingers and Muriel’s single-minded fascination with gossip about Jesse’s movie star cronies, an elaborate cat-and-mouse game ensues with the Lotharian Jesse trying every trick in the book to stop Muriel from leaving.
 Richard Isaacs as Jesse Kiplinger romances Shelagh Roberts as Muriel Tate – photo credit to Matthew Randall The final act references suite 719 at the turn of the 20th century – the hotel’s centennial. The very Victorian Norma Hubley (Anne Paine West) and husband Roy (Bernard Engel) have booked the Plaza’s Grand Ballroom for a posh wedding for their daughter, Mimsey (Elynia Betts). But the young woman has locked herself in the suite’s bathroom with a fierce case of wedding jitters. “Think about my life,” Norma pleads to her daughter through the keyhole. “Your father will kill me!”
 Anne Paine West as Norma Hubley and Bernie Engel as Roy Hubley explains their daughter’s wedding day jitters to fiancée Bordon Eisler played by Erblin Nushi – photo credit to Matthew Randall. In the film version Walter Matthau played all three male leads, and you will see echoes of his bumbling everyman style in Roy Hubley, whose approach to Mimsey vacillates between sweet talking to pounding down the door.
Set Designer Marian Holmes along with Set Dresser Larry Grey nail the changing décor of Suite 719, complementing the vintage “mod” fashions designed by Heather Norcross and Ashley Adams Amidon.
The entire ensemble gives solid performances throughout, delivering a tidily crafted version of the long-running Broadway show.
Through July 5th at The Little Theatre of Alexandria, 600 Wolfe Street. For tickets and information call the box office at 703 683-0496 or visit www.thelittletheatre.com
Jordan Wright
June 9, 2014
Special to The Alexandria Times
 James Waterston as Elyot, Jeremy Webb as Victor, Bianca Amato as Amanda and
Autumn Hurlbert as Sibyl Photo by Scott Suchman Noël Coward’s deliciously wicked Private Lives has got us in a tizzy. Is it scrumptiously witty or delightfully snarky? No matter. This heady romp of delicious vitriol is considered Coward’s best. It’s a doorknob-high glimpse into the lives of the very rich and not-so-well divorced…and we do enjoy a bit of schadenfreude through the keyhole now and again. Don’t we?
Sibyl and Elyot are honeymooners. Ditto for Amanda and Victor. Elyot and Amanda are exes whose marriage went up in funereal flames. By coincidence the couples share an adjoining terrace in a chic hotel somewhere in the south of France. When exes, Amanda and Elyot, espy one another across a boxwood planter, they go all monkey’s uncle. The question is, can their romance reignite? After some sparring and reminiscing, Amanda trills an old tune to Elyot. As they both begin to soften their stances, she merrily quips, “It’s strange how potent cheap music is,” one of Coward’s most recognizable lines.
 Bianca Amato as Amanda and James Waterston as Elyot in the Shakespeare Theatre
Photo by Scott Suchman Bianca Amato as Amanda leaves no small emotion un-exploited in this hilarious verbal sword fight. Her jaw-dropped double take upon discovering Elyot and her solo Rumba in red silk Chinese pajamas, are captivating. James Waterston as her ex, Elyot, matches her parry for parry and thrust for thrust in this comedy of clever insults. He even does a respectable turn on the piano. Kudos to Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen for the 1930’s musical selections and period arrangements, as well as the terrific lighting.
Coward saw the patterns of “emotional baggage” before the term was coined, and exploits the concept here as each couple transfers their fears and prejudices on their new relationships. He cannily intuited the futility of the snake that eats its own tail, ouroboros, while reveling in the high society that exalted it. As Amanda succinctly philosophizes, “Very few people are completely normal in their private lives.” Coward would know. He lived both sides of it.
 : James Waterston as Elyot and Autumn Hurlbert as Sibyl. Photo by Scott Suchman. The very petite Autumn Hurlbert plays Sibyl, rendering the character as crafty and manipulating a ditzy blonde as can be conjured up. But Elyot is suspicious of his new wife’s machinations and threatens to cut off her head if they don’t leave the hotel and the impending spousal confrontations. Ditto for Amanda v. Victor who duke it out before the marriage is consummated.
When the honeymooners square off in Act One, with Sybil and Victor refusing to leave, insults fly like raptors in sight of prey. That it is all fueled by cocktails and passion, gaiety and madness, is what makes being a fly on the wall so doggone alluring. And don’t we adore seeing the privileged get their comeuppance? Even the French housekeeper, played smartly by Jane Ridley, gets her digs in. “Idiotes!” she sneers at their absurdities.
 Autumn Hurlbert as Sibyl and Jane Ridley as Louise. Photo by Scott Suchman. Victor is played by the screamingly funny Jeremy Webb. Webb perfectly captures the scrappy, moon-eyed, cuckolded husband, whom Elyot describes as “all fuss and fume”, to a tee. He’s the perfect foil to the fabulously flippant Elyot, who tells him, “I think I’m cleverer than you are, but that’s not saying a lot!”
The high jinks and sophisticated repartee are backgrounded by the breathtaking sets of Allen Moyer, whose depiction of a grand hotel, and later Amanda’s bespoke Paris apartment, quite literally left the audience gasping (and applauding) in appreciation.
A rollickingly spiffy jaunt not to be missed.
Through July 13th at the Lansburgh Theatre, 450 7th Street NW, Washington, DC 20003. For tickets and information contact the Box Office at 202 547-1122 or visit www.shakespearetheatre.org.
Jordan Wright
May 9, 2014
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Photo by Koko Lanham. Tim Getman as George, Rob Jansen as Harris, Tom Story as Jerome, Alex Mills as Montmorency In a departure from the dance-centric, laser-lit, sexy productions I’ve come to expect from Synetic, along comes Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog). I suppose I wasn’t ready for it though I’d previewed a snippet of a trailer on their website and knew that the cast was all-male – – another anomaly. The first exercise for this reviewer was looking for the existentialistic message, I’d been told there was one, though you shouldn’t let that get in the way of the hilarity which gets off to a terrific start in Set Designer Lisi Stoessel’s version of a 19th Century England drawing room replete with chaise longue, Japanese screen and quaint settee. Here three down-at-the-heels high society bachelors, with an aversion to real work and a keen sense of the leisure life, are mulling over the state of their humdrum lives. To remedy their ennui the friends fantasize about camping in the great outdoors and decide to take a ten-day boating adventure on the Thames.
 Photo by Koko Lanham. Rob Jansen as Harris, Tom Story as Jerome. Jerome (Tom Story), a self-proclaimed hypochondriac, passes the time perusing medical journals, imagining he has every disease in the book, beginning with the letter A. “I have everything but housekeeper’s knees,” he proudly announces to Harris (Rob Jansen). All three of these blasé fops seize every opportunity to proclaim their views on the state of the world and their dissatisfaction of it. The kicker is in the actors’ to-the-manor-born delivery – – utterly deadpan and screamingly sardonic.
 Photo by Koko Lanham. Tim Getman as George. But, alas, these scions of British society are reduced to sharing rented rooms. And though only one of them, George (Tim Getman), has a job, at least Jerome has a dog to occupy his time – – a fox terrier named Montmorency (Alex Mills) – – whose doggy thoughts are translated to us by his master.
After reading of fatalities on the river and ominous weather reports they nevertheless decide to push off. Projections Designer, Shane O’Loughlin, effectively uses images projected onto the five-fold screen to capture the changing landscape of the men’s journey.
 Photo by Koko Lanham. Projections by Shane O’Loughlin. Their patter is straight out of the P. G. Wodehouse School of English Humor and Wit with room for Jerome’s waxing poetical, and metaphorical, about nature. “Night is like Mother,” expounds Jerome in one of his tender moments.
There are countless hilarious scenes as one hapless antic leads to another. When it is discovered that there is no mustard for their cold meat it nearly causes a riot. “I grow restless when I want a thing,” Jerome explains. Another scene has them trying to trick a teapot into boiling by pretending to ignore it. While on the boat, which they appear to have appropriated, it’s when they realize they have forgotten to pack a can opener for a tin of pineapple. After they try opening it with a knife, scissors and even an umbrella (which they have needlessly remembered to bring), they begin to go mad from hunger, threatening murder and mayhem upon each other. At this point the dog catches a rat which he unceremoniously offers up, challenging them to plop it into their crazy concoction of an Irish stew. Absurdity promptly ensues.
Alex Mills as The Dog, is adorable. His brilliant capturing of a dog’s personality (he studied footage of Jack Russell Terriers while others were rehearsing their lines) and excellent pantomime prove to be the most endearing of the script’s dynamic.
Through June 8th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1-866-811-4111 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
|