Broadway's Sunday in the Park with George


A memory play for me...

Throughout the 3 hours I was at the Studio 54 theatre earlier this month, watching the Broadway revival of Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George, I often had the strange feeling that my emotional responses to the production were not really about that individual production happening in real time, but rather about my memories of this piece.

I remember when I first watched the PBS broadcast of the original Broadway production. I watched it with a bunch of fellow actors on one of our rare nights off from the summer stock theatre where we were all working. I remember how much the piece's ruminations on art and being an artist and love and meaning in one's life moved me. I remember how the score washed over me, and I couldn't believe anyone could ever say that Sondheim didn't write beautiful melodies. I remember thinking that I had never seen a performance quite like Bernadette Peters'. I remember how robbed I thought the show was at the Tony Awards that year...the show and Bernadette...totally robbed.

I remember that Sunday in the Park was the first show I saw performed at Foothill Music Theatre after moving back from NYC to the Bay Area. I remember thinking that this director and production were spot on, and that i would like to work with them. Which I ended up doing in eight productions over eight years (three of them Sondheim.)

And I remember that when Foothill musical director Phil Garay died, a group of dozens of Foothill alums were pulled together to sing the stirring Act 1 finale, Sunday, at his funeral in San Francisco. The song has such dynamic range, and by the end, so much power and emotion...I don't know how we all got through it. May I say especially we sopranos who had to hit those high notes while avoiding a throat tightening with tears. But we did it. And we held that last note forever. And when we were done I, and many of the fellow performers and friends of Phil around me, burst into tears.

So, all it took, as I sat in the dark two weeks ago, to get me emotionally worked up, was the opening chords of any of a number of beautiful art songs within the show. I was always seeing and hearing Bernadette and Mandy Patinkin in my mind...remembering each of my favorite moments in their storied performances. And I was remembering all of my wonderful and poignant memories associated with this show.

So, was this an incredible production that stood on its own and would move anyone to become the sodden mess I was by the end? I honestly couldn't say.

I liked Jenna Russell as Dot/Marie, although her voice seemed a bit tired during Dot's demanding Act 1. Her Marie was more droll and memorable than her Dot, in fact...while for Peters it was her Dot that is indelibly etched in my brain.

Daniel Evans as George seemed a bit of a (paler) Mandy imitator in Act 1, but I think captured the modern-day Act 2 George, and his melancholy, perfectly...perhaps more movingly than Mandy, who always seems like he has it together really. My only distraction was in how different the Act 1 and Act 2 Georges looked from one another. And Evans in Act 2 reminded me very much of The Daily Show's Rob Corddry. I know, weird, but there it is. I kept having visions of Rob Corddry as George. Not Evans' fault, of course.

I will also say that I was very enthralled with the work of the very small ensemble playing the show. This is a piano-driven score, which is fairly rare, and with only the pianist, a violinist, a cellist and one woodwinds player, they created an intimate, chamber version of what I think is one of the most beautiful scores ever written. Lovely, absolutely lovely.

And you might have heard about the use of projections to create the visuals of this piece in 2008 (as opposed to the use of various flats and drops and cutouts back 20 years ago.) It really was used so effectively, mostly because it was not over-used. The audience reacted with wonder and pleasure to each creative and often mind-bloggling use of projection to create art on stage.

But most of the pleasures of this show, make no mistake, are entirely human and in the moment.

If you've been to Broadway or to see any big national theatre production you might have been there during one of the times they're fundraising for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids. The cast members go out into the house and encourage you to donate money for this fine charitable organization. often they're also "selling" autographed Playbills and posters in exchange for donations of varying levels.

For this show, they also offered all of the sketches that Daniel Evans made as George Seurat in Act 1 in exchange for varying donations. How could I resist?

Voila:


Posted: Sun - April 20, 2008 at 09:45 AM       EmailFeedback

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