IN New York

I had a revelation sitting in my orchestra seat in the Broadway Theatre last night at a preview of the sensational revival of Promises, Promises. The show is set in 1962, the same year that I sat in the very last row of the balcony in the same theatre at a performance of the flop musical Kean, starring the great Alfred Drake. My seat cost $1 (yes, $1)! I was a schoolboy with a not-very-substantial allowance, but that didn’t stop me from loving every second. My orchestra seat last night goes for $126.50. But let’s not talk about inflation. This show is worth every penny: all 12,650 of them. Memorable tunes, witty and intelligent book, spot-on design (although no man in 1962 would have worn a summertime white dinner jacket on Christmas Eve, as Tony Goldwyn does; small gripe), brilliant dancing (Turkey Lurkey, anyone?), seamless direction. Props to all concerned—Burt Bacharach, Hal David, Neil Simon, the designing Pask brothers, orchestrator Jonathan Tunick, Rob Ashford, et al—for a stupendous job. Kisses for Kristin Chenoweth, hugs for Katie Finneran and an old-fashioned standing ovation for Sean Hayes for his beautifully sung, heartfelt, funny, moving performance as Chuck Baxter. A theatre star is born.

Three friends—Johnny, Tunny and Will—set out to discover “life” in the new Broadway rock opera American Idiot. Johnny escapes to the city and shoots heroin. Tunny enlists in the military with dire consequences. And Will never makes it beyond suburbia, held back by a pregnant girlfriend and his own inertia. Portraying Will is Michael Esper. I recently spoke to Esper about the show. He’s definitely an actor to watch.


You’re the only one of the three friends who’s onstage the show’s entire 95 minutes. When you’re not interacting with the others, you’re downstage right, anchored to a couch, swigging beer, playing with a remote or taking a hit from a bong. What’s it like being adrift in your own world with this whole other show going on around you?


Those moments when I’m not participating are in some ways harder. It’s really lonely as an actor. Thankfully, it’s also lonely for the character because that’s what the character is experiencing. It requires a lot of concentration. I’ve built a journey for Will and Michael [Mayer, the show’s director] has helped me a lot with it. There’s always a life happening for me, even though it may not be the show’s focus at the time.


Like Will, you grew up in the suburbs. Any similarities?


Yes. All of the things Will experiences, I experienced intensely as an adolescent and young adult. Atrophy, disenfranchisement, sexuality, anger, the search for meaning. There was a lot about [suburbia] that was good, you know, but I had a really hard time. I felt very misunderstood, very much an outsider. I got made fun of a lot. You know, kids are mean and cliques form. I just never had the experience of fitting in with what I perceived the life around me to be., what success was, what popularity was, what ambition was. I had adversaries, but, in retrospect,t I think I also had imagined adversaries. And I think I may have fit in more than I thought I did at the time.


With it’s Green Day score, American Idiot is hardly an old-school Broadway musical. Do you have a favorite Broadway musical?


That’s really hard to say. I have a huge soft spot for Guys and Dolls. It’s not revolutionary, but there’s something about it that I just adore. I love that show so much.

I’m in the monority. Again. I actually found much to like in the new Broadway musical The Addams Family. I may have been the only member of last night’s audience in the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre never to have seen the 1960s TV sitcom or either of the “major” motion pictures. I had no preconceptions, other than the Charles Addams New Yorker cartoons, and like everyone else, I give them an A+. I also bypassed the reviews (mixed to thimbs-down), since I would be seeing the show post-opening night. Pre-opening buzz was another matter. The chatter from the Chicago tryout was loud and grim. Here then are some thoughts:


The show gets off to a dull start: flat-sounding, over-miked overture; pedestrian opening number; ho-hum situation. Wednesday’s in love with a wonderful guy, but unfortunately, Wednesday is a one-note samba on which to build a two-and-a-half-hour play. Her “normal” boyfriend Lucas is not much better (poor Wesley Taylor, he had more to work with in Rock of Ages). Grandma’s shtick is just that: shtick. Pugsley hardly registers; Lurch lurches around waiting for his big moment.


Gradually, however, and especially in the second act, things (including Andrew Lippa’s score) began to fly. Uncle Fester’s love song to the moon is totally wacko. Every Broadway musical needs a how-did-they-do-that number like this. The jokes by librettists Rick Elice and Marshall Brickman of Jersey Boys fame tend to the hoary, but when they land, which they usually do, it’s three-point all the way. And with Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth doing the piloting, the skies are bluer than blue. Nathan avoids the Max Bialystock thing and makes an endearing—and, in his own way, sexy—Gomez. Bebe looks great and talks with a slight curl to her lower lip. You can call her Morticia the irony maiden. And when Mr. and Mrs. A finally tango, it’s magic. There may have been talk of the stars crossing swords in rehearsal, but you’d never know it onstage. They’re the loopiest couple in town. Cheers, too, to Phelim McDermott and Julian Crouch for the gorgeous sets and costumes; and special mention to puppet master Basil Twist for the monster under the bed.


Next on my agenda: Million Dollar Quartet. Can’t wait.

Have you seen the Marquis Theatre’s new marquee on W. 46th Street? Can’t miss it: big red neon letters spelling out—what else but?—MARQUIS THEATRE. Not exactly subtle. But at least you can’t miss the new box office location. Lots of new street-level posters for current tenant Come Fly Away, too. What do you think?

The postponement of the New York opening of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Love Never Dies, the maestro’s sequel to The Phantom of the Opera, was announced today (April 6, 2010). The show is now expected to bow at the Neil Simon Theatre in Spring 2011 rather than Nov. 11, 2010. There have been complications following Lloyd Webber’s prostate cancer operation, and his doctors advise against long flights. The composer was to have traveled this summer to New York for auditions and rehearsals, but for the time being he will confine himself to projects closer to home in England.

Perhaps you spent your weekend, as I did, curled up in the kitchen with a cauldron of thick pea soup or on a long, drive in a downpour, listening to Decca Broadway’s new CD Love Never Dies and wishing you were in London for the opening last week of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s sequel to The Phantom of the Opera. Well, we’ve had our plastic sneak peek (Love’s Broadway opening is Nov. 11); cue the ballyhoo: What’s the verdict?


Like everything Lloyd Webber, the album’s a mixed bag, at least on a first listening. There are tunes that won’t let go once they’ve wormed their way into your consciousness. The Phantom’s first-act aria, “‘Til I Hear You Sing,” is one such. Some melodies reach for high art (”The Coney Island Waltz” is pretty, but dramatically a rung or two or five below Richard Rodgers’ “Carousel Waltz”); others get down and dirty (a bump-and-grind “Bathing Beauty” that is catchy but a pale “Let Me Entertain You”). There is endless exposition, but also snippets from Phantom artfully woven in. Several times, the composer flirts with rock, and you can hear the ominous notes of the synthesizer tuning up before he pulls back. There’s only one out-and-out rock song, “The Beauty Beneath,” and it’s a shocker, not just stylistically, but thematically. The Phantom (renamed Mr. Y since relocating to Coney Island, NY) discovers his son’s (yes: You have every reason to ask) fondness for music. It’s as if the father in finding a kindred spirit takes the chip off the old block to an opium den to celebrate. Guitar chords crash. “Do you feed on the need for the beauty underneath?” father asks son. Is music a “hunger that you can’t repress?” What’s a kid to say? “Yeeeesssss.” Call out Child Services. Has the Phantom been masquerading as Gene Simmons all along? As to the “big” number, the number Mr. Y’s been waiting 10 years to hear Christine sing, it’s a bit of a letdown. Ten years for this pretty bauble? Get a life, dude.


Having said my beef, the orchestrations (by his lordship and David Cullen) are lush and creamy and, frankly, gorgeous. Like the Phantom himself who’s down in the depths in The Phantom of the Opera and up in the air in his Coney Island eerie in Love Never Dies, the new score plumbs the depths and ascends the heavens. You may want to turn down the volume, but you won’t want to turnoff the machine. There’s plenty to come away humming.


But what about the lyrics? They’re usually the last thing you remember in a Lloyd Webber score. And Love Never Dies is no exception. Glenn Slater penned the rhymes here. “Hurry, please, before I freeze” is one of my favorites. Lloyd Webber’s tragedy may be that, with the exception of Tim Rice and T.S. Eliot, he’s never found a wordsmith who’s also a soulmate. Where’s his Oscar Hammerstein? Where indeed.


Word is the show will be revamped between London and New York, between now and November. Miracles do happen, and there’s always a doctor in the house. Especially on Broadway. In the meantime, give a listen. And let me know what you think.


Next on my agenda is All About Me. Can’t wait.