Saturday, August 26, 2017

Prince of Broadway

B+

While there are many things I could find fault with about this revue of musical highlights from Hal Prince’s long career, the important thing is that I enjoyed it a lot. When I get the chance to hear over 30 songs, mostly from shows I greatly enjoyed, performed by talented actors backed by a 16-piece orchestra, I am not about to grumble over what could have been better. Some have criticized the very concept of the show, pointing out that it is in no way an artistic biography of Prince. I’ll grant that the total information contained in the narration by the actors who take turns impersonating Prince amounts to less than in his one-page program note in Playbill. Nor does the show make clear what Prince’s unique contribution was to the material selected. Some have groused that stripping songs of their context diminishes them. That might be a problem for people unfamiliar with the shows they were plucked from, but clearly it was no problem for an audience of Manhattan Theatre Club subscribers. There are shows I wish they had included more of and others I wish they had used less of. One could question why they chose to include numbers from shows that have been so recently revived (Fiddler on the Roof and She Loves Me) and two that are currently running (Phantom of the Opera and Sweeney Todd). On the other hand, omitting them would have deprived us of the pleasure of Chuck Cooper’s Tevye and Karen Ziemba’s Mrs. Lovett. Despite all the nits one can pick, the bottom line is that I found the show thoroughly entertaining. The cast of nine is wonderful. In addition to the six whose work I have enjoyed in the past (Chuck Cooper, Emily Skinner, Brandon Uranowitz, Michael Xavier, Tony Yazbeck and Karen Ziemba), there are three talented newcomers (Janet Dacal, Bryonha Marie Parham and Kaley Ann Voorhees). The modular set by Beowulf Boritt ranges from the minimalist (a couch) for A Little Night Music to an elaborate pop-art backdrop for It’s a Bird… It’s a Plane… It’s Superman. William Ivey Long’s attractive costumes supply a lot of the context. Choreographer Susan Stroman, who also co-directed, created a vigorous tap number for Yazbeck’s Buddy in Follies. Jason Robert Brown not only wrote the clever overture which contains fragments of 17 songs but provided the excellent musical arrangements and the closing number. David Thompson is credited with the book, such as it is. Prince himself gets the director credit. If you are a fan of musicals, by all means go. There’s something here for everyone. Running time: 2 1/2 hours including intermission.

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