Kiss Me Kate--1999 Broadway Cast Album

Yes, I am guilty of stuffing the ballot box of late with votes for Brian Stokes Mitchell, but after the disturbing Assassins, I needed some light-hearted musical entertainment, and the revival cast of Kiss Me Kate seemed the right choice. It did the trick, reminding me that Broadway musicals can be smart, witty, and singable without giving you the wiggins.

I'm not certain I agree with the orchestration changes Don Sebesky made to this score. The notes in the liner booklet go on an on about how the new orchestrations (and slight alterations to the score) helped to place the music more specifically in the time-frame of the play (Shrew--Elizabethan), or of the play-within-the-play (Baltimore 1940s-50s). While I hear those differences, I don't think they were needed for a good ol' time at the theater. And what justifies the very modern version of "Another Opening Another Show" with its American Idol-inspired vocals? Adriane Lenox sings it well, so I suppose you can justify anything.

What I don't have to justify is the cast--top-notch throughout. Perhaps one of the benefits of remounting a Broadway classic in a high-profile revival is that you have access to professionals who have heard and sung this music all their lives and know how to do it. Marin Mazzie proves herself particularly versatile, in a role which requires both belt and legato singing.

Kiss Me Kate
Music and Lyrics by Cole Porter
Book by Samuel and Bella Spewack
Opened originally in 1948
This revival opened in 1999
Cast: Brian Stokes Mitchell, Marin Mazzie, Lee Wilkof, Amy Spanger, Michael Berresse, Michael Mulheren

Assassins--2004 Broadway Cast Album

With the recent release from prison of Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme it seems as good a time as any to dig into the stack of albums waiting for my Thinking and put Sondheim's Assassins on the player.

This is the only Broadway cast album of this show, because the original 1990 incarnation was produced by Playwrights Horizons and never produced on Broadway, although that cast was recorded.

I have heard bits and pieces of this show before--I have a vague recollection of a video clip of Patrick Cassidy (from the Playwrights production) singing "The Ballad of Booth"--but that was all I knew of the show. Given that musical snippet I was hoping for a show with some pastiche musical styles fitting the eras of the various assassins, and while there is quite a bit of that, there was not enough to keep my ears riveted.

Neil Patrick Harris is the vocal stand-out of this vocally good cast. Besides singing more than anyone as he portrayed both the Balladeer and Lee Harvey Oswald, NPH has the right vocal tone to sing Sondheim's music well. By that I mean he has a lightish, forward-placed voice that can hopscotch around the turns in Sondheim's melodies.

My problem with this show is probably more thematic than musical; I don't find the exploration of the mind of a killer to be interesting. At first I thought the show was exploring how Presidential assassins are really just footnotes to history, but the end of the show with Lee Harvey Oswald and the reprise of the opening "Everybody's Got a Right" were too creepy for that interpretation. Whether you believe guns kill people or people kill people, there are lots of both on display.

This is the first appearance of one of my favorite actresses, though, Becky Ann Baker. I've never seen Ms. Baker live (and don't actually know if she's been in other musicals besides this production), but I loved, Loved, LOVED her in the television series Freaks and Geeks from the late 1990s. The whole series is one of my favs, but I digress...

Music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim
Book by John Weidman
Originally produced in 1990
Opened on Broadway in 2004
This cast: Neil Patrick Harris, Becky Ann Baker, Michael Cerveris, Marc Kudisch, Denis O'Hare, Mario Cantone

Flower Drum Song--2002 Broadway Cast Album

I've previously watched the film version of this show, so I thought I knew what I was in for when I popped the cast album of the 2002 Broadway revival of Flower Drum Song into the player. Turns out this revival was a very different show from the original, as evidenced not only by the synopsis of the show and the notes by Ted Chapin provided in the booklet to the CD, but also by the music itself. The score is re-orchestrated, the book re-written, characters re-arranged, and songs re-assigned.

All of this is thanks primarily to David Henry Hwang who approached the Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization about reworking the show for a contemporary audience. I don't know if that means that the show is no longer set in the 1950s, the notes don't discuss that. But from my recollections of the film, several characters are missing, and the notion of arranged marriage from the original story has been taken out.

Lea Salonga starred as Mei-Li in the version, and her singing on this disc is very good from beginning to end. Ms. Salonga has a warm and lovely music theater voice which general traverses well into her head voice. The character of Mei-Li is given the song "Love, Look Away" which was sung by the character of Helen in the original version. This is a wonderful song, and Ms. Salonga sings it well, although I have some slight issues with the tempo and some of the rhythms taken in this version. Other good singing from this cast is given by Jose Llana as number one son Ta (although if there is a number two son, he's not on the disc), and Sandra Allen as Linda Low.

Less successful to me is turning "Don't Marry Me" into a duet. Jack Soo was so droll and funny in his delivery of this song in the film version, I missed the character of Sammy Fong in the 2002 arrangement (two characters have been combined here).

There is a moment in the second act finale that I need someone to explain to me. The actors seem to step out of character and announce where they were born. I suppose this is to show how diverse the Asian community is, but I wonder how it worked on stage. I certainly can't blame the R&H Organization or Mr. Hwang for wishing to rework Flower Drum Song for a new incarnation, but I do wonder if they went too far.

Flower Drum Song
Music by Richard Rodgers
Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II
Book by David Henry Hwang
This version opened in 2002
Cast: Lea Salonga, Jose Llana, Sandra Allen,

Ghost Light Monday--Julie & Julia at the Multiplex

How could I not talk about the uber-blog and the movie which it spawned? I did encounter Julie Powell's blog before the book was published, but after she had completed her 365 journey. Safe to say that Ms. Powell is the woman who launched a thousand blogs--including this one.

Well, the film incarnation of Julie & Julia is delightful. Some have criticized the inclusion of Ms. Powell's story in this film. They believe that Julia Child is worthy of her own film, and while I agree with that comment, I think the Powell parts of the story help put Mrs. Child's accomplishments into perspective, which we wouldn't get just from the 50s portion of the tale. We also get some information about the Childs that it would be ackward to reveal in their section of the film.

Meryl Streep captures all the joie de vivre and determination that is Julia Child, along with her vocal and physical mannerisms. We only see a bit of the saucy (pun intended) Julia, apparently she was not adverse to four-letter words and strong sexual innuendo, as I learned when I read both My Life in France and another biography called Appetite for Life.

Do Re Mi--1999 Encores Cast on CD

For a while in Chicago there was a series of musical concerts based on the Encores Series in New York. Ovations (as the Chicago incarnation was called) lasted one season, maybe two. Listening to this recording of an Encores production of Do Re Mi has made me miss the Chicago version.

I didn't know anything about this show until I bought this recording probably 5 years ago. I'm sure I bought it because Nathan Lane starred in it. While the talents of Mr. Lane are ably on display on this disc, there is a lot of other stuff to appreciate here, too.

Let's start with the singing of Brian Stokes Mitchell. Yes, I know I've gone on and on about Mr. Mitchell before, but this is some of his finest singing, in my humble opinion. He taps into all of his baritonal colors and richness and still has the ability to reach into his upper register. His Act I "I Know about Love" shows off all of Mr. Mitchell's abilities and is a wonderful song to boot. I don't know why I had never heard it before; it deserves a life outside the show. I will add it to my list of "lonely" songs for my one-man show in my head.

The most recognizable song from this score is "Make Someone Happy". But that song doesn't interest me nearly as much as others from the show--"It's Legitimate" (a Politics and Poker-type quartet), "All of My Life", "Cry Like the Wind", even the kitschy "That's What's new at the Zoo" are fun in their own ways.

The original cast for this show was also interesting--Phil Silvers, John Reardon, Nancy Walker and Nancy Dussault. I wonder if I can find that recording?

Do Re Mi

Music by Jule Styne

Lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green

Book by Garson Kanin

Opened on Broadway in 1960

This cast from 1999

Cast: Randy Graff, Heather Headley, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Nathan Lane

Spring Awakening--Live on Stage

It's not your mother's musical.

I listened to and liked the cast album of this show when I bought it at the start of my Year of Musical Thinking, so I was glad when the Broadway tour of Spring Awakening finally made it to Chicago. I saw yesterday's matinee, with a lot of blue hairs (some might say I saw it with a lot of other blue hairs) and a surprising number of young people.

Perhaps the timing was right for this incarnation of the show--Forbidden Broadway makes fun of the idea that people in the Midwest would be offended by the language, themes, and plot points of this show. Offering the production during summer vacation probably allows more teenagers the chance to see it than would have during the school year. This is clearly a show for an angst-ridden audience of young people. I'm an angst-ridden member of the middle-aged, but I still appreciated a lot of this show.

From the time it was written in 1891, Wedekind's play which forms the book of this show has drawn ire, anger, shock, and banning. I believe I had to read it in a theater history class during college because the play holds some kind of lofty position for being so often censured. I imagine there are still audiences that would like to see this show with blatant representation of teenage sex (both gay and straight), masturbation, and references to incest, S & M, and abortion just go away. But that's part of the point of the show, and I believe the reason behind the creators of the musical version choosing this story: these aspects of life aren't going away, and not talking about them doesn't do anyone any good, and can actually do a lot of harm.

I talked about my reactions to the score when I listened to it last July, so I'll try to only talk about my reactions seeing the show live here.

I was caught unawares of the Bill T. Jones choreography in this show (despite the fact that he won a Tony for it). It was very sparingly used, with only a couple of very obvious moments of choreography. I could have actually used a little more. Given the "inner monologue" aspects of the music for this show, I found it at times very static to look at. Although what choreography there was, was again some kind of representation of the characters' inner angst "bleeding" out into the visible.

When this show premiered a lot was made about the actors using hand-held mics. Since this is only for the music, I didn't have a problem with it--again it was a way to separate the outer and inner realities. I did find that it wasn't consistent--which did bother me. There were times when characters sang without a hand-held (but still had the wireless mic used to amplify their dialogue). I couldn't discern if there was a commonality to when a visible mic was used or not used during song.

The cast of this tour is all very good and one of the strongest points of the show. I particularly liked the singing voice of Sarah Hunt (a recent high school graduate) who played Martha. I wished she had more to do in the show.

I was a little confused by the set for this show. It clearly has aspects of a turn-0f-the-last-century school building--perhaps a gymnasium. But the back wall is cluttered with a range of items. Maybe these are intended to be symbols of the cluttered minds of the teen characters, but that point wasn't made clearly enough if it's true.

A friend who attended the show with me, said he felt like this show would be a defining item for a generation--like Hair was, or Rent for earlier generations. He may be right; perhaps too early to determine that. I do feel the way this show communicates (with the music being outside the show, but inside the characters) is a very contemporary method of expression.

I should mention that the Playbill I have shown in this entry is not how the Playbill looked for the Chicago production; there was just the title, no carefully cropped photo of the lead couple copulating. Apparently, we blue hairs can handle the stuff on stage better than in our advertising and print materials.

Spring Awakening
Music by Duncan Sheik
Lyrics by Steven Sater
Book by Franz Wedekind
Opened on Broadway in 2007
Tour Cast: Christy Altomare, Angela Reed, Sarah Hung, Steffi D, Gabrielle Garza, Claire Sparks, Henry Stram, Anthony Lee Medina, Andy Mietus, Ben Moss, Matt Shingledecker, Blake Bashoff, Jake Epstein

Thinking on Holiday

It's time for my annual sojourn to the Canadian wilderness, so while my Musical Thinking won't stop while I'm away, my posting will. I have lots of tapes and CDs in the pipeline for when I return.