Two on the Aisle - Theatre Reviews for July 18, 2019

This podcast is from episode number 532 of the program, originally broadcast on Thursday, July 4, 2019 and features reviews of the plays:

- CANDIDE, by Leonard Bernstein et al., at Union Avenue Opera

- LABUTE THEATRE FESTIVAL, SET ONE, by various playwrights, at The St. Louis Actors’ Studio

- MAMMA MIA, by Bjorn Ulvaiusk Benny Andersson, Stig Anderson, Catherine Johnson, Judy Craymet, at Take Two Productions

- FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED SUICIDE/WHEN THE RAINBOW IS ENOUGH, by Ntozake Shange, at The Independent Theatre Company

AND…

- RODGERS & HAMMERSTEIN’S CINDERELLA, by Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II, and Douglas Carter Beane, at The Muny

You can also see video and still pictures of the shows that we've talked about in all of our episodes by looking for us on all social media platforms...YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.  Search for "twontheaisle" on all of them. Here are the direct links:

Facebook: http://facebook.com/twoontheaislehec
YouTube: http://youtube.com/twoontheaisle
Instagram:  http://instagram.com/twoontheaisle
Twitter:  http://twitter.com/twoontheaisle

See you on August 1, 2019!

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

This is HTC media. The views and opinions expressed on the following program do not reflect the views or opinions of HTC or this station. Today we have new plays and a rainbow and we have three quite different musicals. Hi, I'm Bob Wilcox and I'm Jerry Korski go with us to the theater and we'll tell you what we've seen from our two seats on the aisle.

Speaker 2: 0:26

Welcome to two on the aisle, the podcast produced by HTC media in St Louis, Missouri. Two on the aisle. The podcast is an audio version of the televised and webcast program produced every two weeks that features a review of theater and opera productions around the St Louis area, along with a calendar of theater do to play around the region. The regular hosts of the program, Bob Wilcox and Jerry Karski have been posting and reviewing all over town for more than 25 years on local cable and more recently on the Internet. This podcast is from episode number five 32 of the program originally broadcast on Thursday, July 18th, 2019 and features reviews of the following plays candied at union avenue opera by Leonard Bernstein, the Labute theater festival, set one at the Saint Louis Actor Studio Mama Mia at take two productions for colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enough at the independent theater company and Rogers and Hammerstein Cinderella at the Muny in forest park. Now to start our reviews for this episode, Here's Jerry QRC. The playing of the ovature seemed cautious to me

Speaker 3: 1:35

on opening night of union avenue opera. His recent mounting of Leonard Bernstein's Candide. That will be my last complaint in this review. This Candide was one of union avenue's finest productions ever. The opera takes its name and its store from an Avella by the 18th century philosopher Voltaire. The title character is the illegitimate cousin of a barren in Westphalia. Candied leads, an idyllic life in the Barron's castle where his tutor, Dr Pangloss, teaches all his peoples that they live in the best of all possible worlds and that everything that happens is for the best. Candide is expelled from this Eden when he is discovered acting on his attraction to the Barron's daughter CUNA Gunda. He's pressed into service in an army that soon ravages his homeland, upending everyone else's life. Candied couldn't have Gunda Pangloss and other members of the household try to cling to their optimistic philosophy while suffering a series of misadventures and reunions throughout the world. To my ears, the music and Candide is as great as anything Bernstein ever wrote. The show is not as success. However, in its 1956 Broadway premiere, the review in the New York Times faulted Lillian Hellman's book for being too serious without homelands or Bernstein's involvement director Harold Prince revived deed successfully on Broadway in 1974 with less music than before and a new one act book by he wheeler. It was the starting point for a two act revision for opera companies. That version premiered under prince's direction in 1982 at the New York City opera, the conductor of that production, John Missouri, worked with Bernstein to include the composer's latest thoughts in a version that premiered the Scottish opera in 1988 still more revisions were to come from Bernstein himself and from the national theater in London. Union avenue chose to present the Scottish shop reversion. The most famous Aria in Candide is glitter and bigay in which CUNA Gunda struggles to come to terms with the horrendous assaults to which she has been subjected that union avenue, Brooklyn, Snow understood that this Aria is as much about characterization as it is about vocalization. She excelled at both while encompassing the Aureus full emotional range. She did the same and was matched by Jesse Darden is candied in the duet. You were dead, you know in which Coonan Gun Gunda in Candide reunite. After long separation, Snowden Darden got the complex tone exactly right in this fascinating number and they were equally impressive and everything else they did. We all know what an extraordinary singer Christine Brewer is. She demonstrated that she also has a superb sense of comedy as the disaster prone old lady whose calamities include the loss of a buttock. Thomas Gunther demonstrated remarkable versatility as Voltaire, Dr Pangloss and others. Costume designer Theresa Doggett cleverly made the major characters stand out by putting them in bright costumes while dressing the ensemble and white see out a swayzees attractive unit set. Michael Sullivan's lighting and Kate Sliwinski[inaudible] props gave director and Maria Pileggi the flexibility she needed to accommodate the changes of seen required by candies. Wide ranging travels, Pileggi and conductor. Scott Scoonover were of one mind in their collaboration. The music and the staging fully supported each other. The orchestra, the singers, and everyone else on stage and off should be very proud of their work.

Speaker 1: 5:24

Indeed, they showed, and I'm a, it was a delightful evening to spend with candied despite all the disasters that happened to him and all the others. Uh, I was impressed with what Anamaria Pileggi and the a scene designer, uh, CEO Sweezey. It was a really a unit set even though it covered many places, but it was simple enough. And yet I had no trouble following it or knowing where they were. I mean, one thing they put up a street sign to tell you where were, but I thought that was a very good approach to this opera. Not to junk it up with a lot of stuff that you don't need visually. It needs to have quick transitions, right? It's all about brightness and, and the performers were able to hold your attention quite well. You didn't need any other distractions for her, but they were convincing and it all, all worked quite well that way. And uh, the, the chorus on white sort of reminded me of the Opera Theater's production a few years ago where everybody was and why it is, I recall it. Our, our, our, our friend Robin Verheijen designed the costumes, well, let's hear some of that wonderful Bernstein music.

Speaker 4: 6:46

[inaudible]

Speaker 5: 6:47

[inaudible]

Speaker 4: 6:50

[inaudible]

Speaker 6: 6:56

[inaudible]

Speaker 1: 7:10

on the evidence of Neil labute latest contribution to the annual labute new theater festival. The playwright seems to be mellowing as he ages. The festival is the sampling of new short plays spread out for us by St Louis Actors Studio. The studio is artistic director. William Roth has developed a working relationship with playwrights, screenwriter and film director Labute each year. Labute provides a one act play performed at the festival named in his honor and he joins the panel that select six other plays from hundreds of submissions. Half of the selected plays are staged in the first two weeks of the festival. The other half in the second two weeks with labute play running with both halves. His play bears the name of an art museum exhibit. Great Negro works of art and I haven't decided if the name mocks the political incorrectness of the curator of the exhibit or if it correctly refers to a certain historical period. The museum was visited by a couple on a first date arranged online. Jerry is white, Tom is black and after a little jesting about their names, they look at the pictures, they discuss them carefully. Guardedly jazz, Tucker's Tom seems almost literally to be walking on eggs. Carly Rosenbaum's. Jerry holds herself stiffly her responses are good white liberal ones. He accommodates as it goes on a little too long, a little repetitiously. They do relax some and then it all goes off the rails, but rather gently. So for a labute and it no longer brings up his problems with Mormons. John Pearson directed Michael Lee long calls his weird piece, color timer. That's what Stacy claims to be here to TV editing studio. This is another first date. Aaron mild mannered psychologist and she are having lunch. She also claims to have a gun pointed at him under the table. She explains that this is actually the reality TV show to record the reactions of a person whose life is being threatened or is it Colleen backer does make Stacey appear a little unhinged with her unending flow of words and sideways glances per Shane Signal Reno. How terrified should he be? He goes back and forth with the flow of her words and he's also confused by Rachel Bailey's overstressed server director. Jenny Smith balances the tension with moments of comedy. Smith also directed Joe Sutton's privileged that overworked term Kafkaesque must be asked to labor again here. Of course, privileges set in a law firm. Peter has recently passed. The bar only does discover that he must pass another examination by a mysterious panel before he can begin his practice. We hear only the hurst voice, so the chair of the panel as Spencer Segments, Peter Sands bewildered in a pool of light. Eventually his uncle mark a member of the firm and helpful to a point a the monk Cuellar Chuck Brinkley Plays Him, tells Peter it may have something to do with what a cousin and some friends in high school had done in severely beating a fellow student they thought was gay. Peter finds the young man now grown and in changing arena was playing, still suffering. Psychological if not physical wounds because justice was never done to those who attacked him. They were privileged and other cousin Carly Rosenbaums bitter. Amy also a lawyer has failed to pass the panel. Is She not privileged? Is that what privileges about guilt by association or is it just the CAFCA s random irrational granting of privilege to some and not to others. Washington and used Carter w Lewis contributed as usual for me, the cleverest and most satisfying of the four. The title. Kim Jong. Rosemary eventually is explained. Jenny Smith plays Ronda a much be set single mother bearing her load of troubles and a very physically present canvas bag accompanied by her teenage daughter Beth made by Eley Hurwitz to be as teenage daughters are both one of the troubles and a help and bearing them there. Our conversation covers those troubles and includes world encompassing troubles as well. They're interrupted by the playwright himself or rather herself for Louis is played by Coleen backer taking a stand behind a and to explain the audience the many facets to this style og both as seen in mother and daughter and in the wider world. John Pearson came back to direct this one. Requirements for submissions to the festival. Warn that in addition to being no more than 45 minutes long and having no more than four characters, they will be presented in an intimate theater with limited technical resources all praise and to Patrick cuber for minimal flexible but sufficient sets complimented by some striking lighting by Huber and Tony Anselmo. Sound by Pearson Smith and Wendy Renee Greenwood costumes by Megan Harshaw, props by Smith Movement, coaching by Taylor, Pete's technical direction by Joseph Novak and theater marine and the very efficient sage manager, Amy Jay. Page. More a next three new plays accompanied by Labute.

Speaker 3: 12:46

Yes. And uh, I think you have given these uh, some very interesting analysis.

Speaker 1: 12:53

Well thank you. Thank you. While there interesting plays a, so I'd be glad to do the analysis.

Speaker 2: 12:59

You can follow all things too on the aisle, on Facebook by searching for two on the aisle and liking the page. And you can be the first to see reviews on youtube by subscribing to the two on the owl channel and checking the notification bell again, you can find us on Facebook and youtube by searching for two on the aisle.

Speaker 3: 13:19

Take two productions as presenting Mama Mia in the first staging by a community theater in St Louis. I was not surprised by how fine it is fans of Mama Mia have been waiting 20 years to be in the show. How bit they came out in droves for the auditions. Every part has a top notch performer. The same thing happened when take two did the first local production of rent at the Tower Grove Abbey, I will say of this year is Mama Mia. The same thing I said about 2011 is rent. The show doesn't need the Glitz of a Broadway Extravaganza. It just needs people who have the commitment and the capability to make it work. It's clear that everyone in this production is giving their best and they all have a great deal to give. This is clear from the first scene when Sophie Sheridan and her friends come on stage 20 year old Sophie is the catalyst for the action. She wants to find out who her father is before she marries her boyfriend Skye. She identified three possible fathers when she sneaked to peek at her mother's diary. Sophia's invited all three of them to the wedding without bothering to tell her mother, Sophie and their friends are not the most important characters in the show. Put. Don't tell that a Holly Jackson, the Sophie can be dumb. Earth is Ollie and Elise Brewbaker is Lisa. All three fill the stage with the joyous enthusiasm of youth and honey. Honey. This like all the others in the show is from the catalog of the Swedish pop group. ABA. The book by Catherine Johnson is based on Judy Kramer's original concept. The wedding will take place on a Greek island at the to Verna owned by Sophie's mother, Donna. The guests will include Rosie and Tanya, the backup singers in the band. Donna fronted before she built the to Verna. The three of potential fathers are Bill Austin. Harry Bryden Sam Carmichael. It's probably not a coincidence that their last names begin with a, B, and C. Bill and Harry hooked up with Donna when she was on the rebound from a serious romance with Sam. The combination of attraction, resentment in Donna and Sam's complicated relationship is fully embodied in the excellent performances by Heather Matthews is Donna and Jonathan high is Sam. Bill and Rosie have both become authors. He writes about travel. She writes cookbooks.[inaudible] as bill and Mira Bellini is Rosie give their characters winning personalities and capture the fun in their budding relationship. Sara Polizzi gives the requisite flair to the thrice Mary Tanya and Scott Daggett's frees leaves no doubt about why the good natured banker Harry used to be nicknamed Headbanger Jack Ryan Potato Skye Joey Franks as pepper and Rob Anissa settee gift find performances of the young men director Gary Long keeps the action moving at a well judged paste on an attractive set designed by Bill Baustein and just Smith and decorated by Tom Edmonds, Jen Kaneez choreography and Matt Stucco's lighting help give the show the right look. The orchestra directed by Nate Jackson and the sound designed by Kelly Ross cooker helped give the show the right sound. I wasn't a great fan of the show when it first came out, but it's grown on me over the years. That's fortunate because I'm sure I'll be seeing it again and again.

Speaker 1: 16:55

Yeah, there are already other productions locally, so obviously you just got the image of rights made available. Uh, eh. Yeah, and I'm not a great fan of this. I mean it's always fun and I know there are people, some of them I guess because they like Abba's music. But my biggest problem with this, I think is Abbott's music, because nothing wrong with the music itself, but it's the, someone pretty cleverly, I think, built the book around their music and put it in. So the songs come at a up at appropriate times, but they're also much the same. They don't help build the drama in it, by the way that they use the music in it.

Speaker 3: 17:37

But in this production, in any good production, the performers filled that in.

Speaker 1: 17:42

Well, they can't, if you don't have it there to work with, you can't. Totally. Yes, they, it. And they were very good performers and they did for me. They did for you. Good. Well, uh, well since you said this is growing on you and you're stuck with it on you for awhile, I guess, right? Yeah. It's good thing that it did work for you that way. Oh, well here are some of the I, I mean, I liked Evan's music. All right, so I'm willing to listen to some of it now.

Speaker 4: 18:42

[inaudible][inaudible]

Speaker 1: 18:43

some 2,500 years ago and Athens during a sacred festival. When choruses sang the triumphs and sufferings of Gods and heroes, one man stepped out of the chorus and became one of those gods and heroes. No longer were we hearing about what the God or hero had done. Now we were watching him do it and that moment we say when festivus stepped out of the chorus was the moment when drama was born in the western tradition. Now, the independent theater company has picked up the tradition that this was abandoned with our production of for colored girls who have considered suicide. When the rainbow is enough, it's author and Tasaki's Shawnee called it a chorio poem. It is actually a collection of 20 poems performed by a cast of six women. Some poems are performed by one woman, some by the shared responses with two or three more near the beginning as though starting with childhood, they joined in a circle. Singing and dancing nursery rhymes. Dina to our Dow ski provided choreography for other moments. Kelly G. Hunter is beautifully draped and richly individually with costumes flowed with the movements of the performers. Each costume displayed the color by which shiny identified her women. The lady in yellow, The lady in blue, the lady in Brown, the lady in Purple, the lady in Green and the lady in red, a rainbow. In their poems, they tell of the lives of colored girls. Sometimes the performer hers like this was become a character but not in a dramatic scene. Rather, they tell us what happened to them perhaps on their high school graduation night or when somebody walked off with all my stuff angry and funny. Or when a young girl discovered a hero for herself in the library, which Shanga herself did when she was a young girl in St Louis. Many of the poems are about men and few and happily men are unfaithful. They raise hopes that don't last. They promises they infect them with venereal diseases. The women mock the way it is. Men Say, I'm sorry, hardly meaning it. They tell of loneliness of abortions and they comfort one another. Near the end comes the gothic horror story over night with Bo Willy Brown until finally they say together I found God in myself and I loved her. I loved her fiercely. Acacia Lee was the lady in yellow, Chanelle quilling, the lady in blue, Chrissy Watkins, the lady in Brown, Sierra Case Smith, the lady in purple to Alicia Katurah, the lady in Green Yashica stem age, the lady in red, they brought their poems to life, found the melodies and rhythms of the poems as they spoke, stood out individually and blended as a group. Brittany Henry's direction kept the stage alive and found movement and tableaus to match the beauty of the poems, largely responsible, I think, for producing this independent offering. Henry also with mark Mobic designed, constructed and painted the panels of the spare set and she designed the sound. Karen Pierce designed the lights for colored girls who have considered suicide when the rainbow is enough is not a play, but it is an important unmoving Jim of American theater.

Speaker 3: 22:10

Yes, it is. And the involvement in the execution in this production were very impressive.

Speaker 2: 22:15

Yeah, yeah. If you're on Twitter and Instagram, you can find us there too. You can follow us on Twitter at two on the aisle and be among the first to find out about are uploaded reviews to youtube and any other special news that we have to announce. Plus on Instagram you can see some sneak peeks at the shows. We've just gotten video for the a for the next episode. When you follow us. Again, follow us on Twitter and Instagram. By looking for two on the

Speaker 3: 22:41

aisle, Muni magic was even more magical than usual for this year's children's show, Rogers and Hammerstein Cinderella, the new video screens at the sides of the stage were brilliantly used in the early scene where Prince tofor is fighting off enormous monsters. The touring productions at the Fox had nothing comparable. Nathan w assures video designed set exactly the right comic tone for the evening with the aid of sound designed by John Shivers and David Partridge. My favorite part was when a fallen monster's head appeared in one of the screens while it's feet were still visible in the other. The Muni kids and teams played woodland creatures with the aid of puppets designed and created by puppet kitchen, international director Marsha Milgrim, dodge and choreographer Joshua Walden. Adeptly integrated the puppetry into the action. They displayed comparable mastery in the crucial transformations engineered by the fairy godmother before Cinderella goes to the ball. The script presented at the Muni was the one Douglas Carter being wrote for Cinderella's first Broadway run in 2013 Rogers and Hammerstein created the musical for television in 1957 while retaining many traditional elements of the Cinderella story being did not retain traditional gender roles. Instead, he created a prince and a princess who can be role models in the 21st century. When we first meet Prince Tofor, he's a highly accomplished dragon slayer, but the usual pursuits of a prince leave him unsatisfied. He needs help to find his true path. His first meeting with Cinderella is not at a ball, but near her home where she impresses him with how kind she is to a woman in need. The Caleb Bennet's Ella was an ideal mixture of decency and determination. Jason Gotay embodied Tofurky uncertainty about what sort of a king he wants to be without making him seem weak. Cinderella isn't the only orphan and beans script. The prince is an orphan to a royal adviser named Sebastian has replaced the king and Queen and Oscar Hammerstein is original script for television. While rearing Prince Tofor, Sebastian has been an oppressive ruler. The inequality in the kingdom has stirred up opposition led by a character named John Michelle. He's a rebel, but a very sweet one. Chad bursts may, John Michel, exactly the sort of comic revolutionary needed a challenge. A comic tyrant like John Share's puffed up. Sebastian. John Michel is in love with Gabriele, one of Cinderella stepsisters, only one of them as evil and being script Stephanie Gibson's Gabriele was totally sympathetic. Well, Alison Fraser as the stepmother and Jennifer Cody is the other stepsister provided an abundance of Zany Nastiness. Victor Ryan Robertson was an excellent singer as Lord Pinkerton. Ashley Brown portrayed the fairy godmothers magic with the adroitness you would expect from the original Mary Poppins on Broadway Music Director Greg Anthony Resin led the Muni Orchestra and arousing account of the score in which the best known numbers include my own little corner. And 10 minutes ago the look of the show was enhanced by Paige Hathaway scenic design, Robin l McGee's costumes, Caitlin, I Adams wigs and rob Denton's lighting. My favorite part of being script, this is the loss of the class slipper. It isn't an accident. Cinderella takes charge of her life by losing the slipper on purpose. In doing so, she sets a much better example for young woman than a fairy tale heroin who just waits for her prince to come.

Speaker 7: 26:40

I had the one other things we can with the glass slipper was a little line,

Speaker 1: 26:45

uh, that uh, I guess being slipped in there saying, well look, it's made out of glass and that means you can only fit one foot. Cause I always wondered is there going around trying these shoes? I mean she would fit any number of people probably. How is that going to be? Just one. But if it's, I dunno how making out of glass makes it work better, but, uh, that's, that's what they said. So I believe that I believed everything else about it. Why not this? So, uh, I was a little disappointed in the ballgown for Cinderella. Uh, it wasn't the A, it was a brother colorful, but it wasn't the usual, you know, it's blue and white or something like that. And, and a big, big full skirt usually. And I, there were a number of the little girls dressed that way, and the audience,

Speaker 3: 27:31

it had to be something that could magically appear on her, uh, with, with a flash of the fairy godmothers wand. I think she had a one. In any case, it was part of the theater magic that it had to be that kind of gun.

Speaker 1: 27:45

Well, theater magic can do lots of things. I don't think it had to be that color or those various colors in order that, anyway, I know some little girls were disappointed with how it looked. Anyway, it's a Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein, so I think we should hear them.

Speaker 4: 28:08

[inaudible][inaudible]. [inaudible][inaudible][inaudible].

Speaker 2: 28:37

Let's take a look at what's going on in St Louis Theater for the end of July and the beginning of August, 2019 we'll start with the dinner theaters, the dinner detective, and it's run at the Hilton St Louis Frontenac murder mystery dinner show. It stops on July 27th murder in May at the limp mansion comedy mystery dinner theater also ends. It's run on July 27th claiming saddles will be playing at the Bissell mansion. Murder mystery dinner theater through the end of July. That's July 28th Mama Mia buy take two productions. We'll be playing through July 20th the Labute theater festival set to takes place at the Saint Louis actor studio from July 19th through the 28th Mamma Mia at southern Illinois University, Edwardsville. We'll play through July 21st footloose will be put on at the Muny and Forest Park through July 24th the 2019 cabaret gala will be playing at the cabaret project on July 18th Greece will play at stages St Louis from July 19th through August 18th overdone and screaming at optimum pitch. Please add first run theater from July 19th through the 28th jaws. The parody will be put on by a magic smoking monkey theater from July 19th through the 27th recipes for ice will be put on by Kirkwood theater guild on July 19th the final showcase and celebration of the cabaret project of St Louis will be on July 21st catch me if you can will be mounted by the Saint Charles Community College from July 23rd through the 28th the wizard of Oz will take place at Alton little theater in Alton, Illinois from July 25th through August 4th Labo and will be put on by Union Avenue Opera from July 26 through August 3rd Joseph and the amazing technicolor dreamcoat will be put on by Overdue Theater Company from July 26 through August 4th into the woods, will be mounted by Coca presents on July 26th and the 27th Mamma Mia will also be put on by hard road theater productions in Highland, Illinois from July 26 through August 4th paint your wagon. We'll be at the Muni in Forest Park from July 27th through August 2nd the all hands on deck show will be put on by Lindenwood University in St Charles on July 27th plaza. Suite takes place from July 31st through August 11th by act two theater in Saint Peter's and assisted living. The musical will be put on by playhouse at West Port Plaza from August 1st through the 11th

Speaker 1: 31:06

we'll be watching some of these productions from our two seats on the aisle

Speaker 3: 31:10

and we'll be watching the mail and the email for your thoughts on theater in this program and for items from the calendar. Send them to two on the aisle, h e c media 32 21 mccalvi road, Bridgeton, Missouri six three Oh four four or by email to t o t a@hectv.org.

Speaker 1: 31:34

Join us next time on cable in the web for lots of musicals, new plays and some silliness. We'll see you then.

Speaker 2: 31:45

This episode of two on the aisle was produced by Bob Wilcox and the associate producer was Jerry QRC. AGC media producer is Paul Langdon. Our host this week where Jerry Karsky and Bob Wilcox television director is Rick rebel, key segment editors and videography by Carrie marks, Paul Langdon, Ben Smith and Rod Myelin audio is by Paul Langdon, associate producers and studio camera operators. We're Carrie marks and Ben Smith said in lighting, we're by Paul Langdon, Carrie marks and Ben Smith. Our theme music was by Daniel McGowan. HGC technical support is by Jane Ballou and HGC media assistant producer, social media broadcast or podcast producer and podcast host is Rod Myelin too on the aisle was made possible with the support from the regional arts commission of St Louis. Don't forget, you can find all things to on the Isle Online, on Facebook, youtube, Twitter, and Instagram. Just go to each social media platform, search for two on the aisle and like subscribe and follow us there. Thanks for downloading the two on the hour podcast. We'll see you next time. This is an HTC media podcast.