The Songs Are Still De-Lovely in ‘Anything Goes’
By DON SHIRLEY
Los Angeles Times

When mounting “Anything Goes,” ignore the title sentiment.
The show is primarily a string of mediocre gags and great songs. A revival should maintain professional standards in both the comedy and the music.

For the REPRISE! version of the 1934 chestnut, at Freud Playhouse, director Glenn Casale and musical director Gerald Sternbach keep the standard high.

In fact, the REPRISE! method of putting the band on stage and using a stripped-down set may be the best way to handle a show with such a flimsy plot and cardboard characters. The point is to put the gags and the songs and the satire of celebrity worship up front, presented straight to the audience without scenic distractions, almost as if we’re back in vaudeville. If the shipboard shenanigans involving cross-class romances and mistaken identities make no sense, it doesn’t matter.

Rachel York plays nightclub impresario Reno Sweeney with sparkly sophistication. She has a big voice, but isn’t a Mermanesque buzz saw; she treats the songs with a degree of subtlety.

She’s decked out handsomely by costume designers Steven Howard and Bob Miller — first in a slinky beige evening gown, but more memorably in a bright red-and-white shipboard ensemble that picks up on her red lipstick and white teeth as she opens her mouth to sing.
Brent Barrett looks like an Arrow Shirt model as Billy Crocker, the story’s stockbroker/stowaway. His voice suggests the era’s crooners, yet he also manages to unveil a lower range with some heft.

Billy’s romantic preference for the ingénue Hope Harcourt over the effervescent Reno is unfathomable. Nonetheless, Hope’s rather lackluster qualities do not reflect on Anastasia Barzee, who plays her with a lustrous sound and a good sport quality.

Jason Graae leads the comic pack as Moonface Martin, a gangster who is more often scared than scary. Anyone who has seen Graae’s work knows that he could sleepwalk his way through this role and still get laughs. Fortunately, he’s wide awake and provides much of the production’s pulse.

DeLee Lively, whose name sounds as if it could be a lyric from the show’s song “It’s De-Lovely,” is big and brassy as Moonface’s moll with a heart of cheese. Larry Cedar is light and reedy as the wealthy Brit who takes such joy in learning American slang that you can almost see why Reno turns her attentions to him.

Sally Struthers gets laughs as Hope’s mercenary high-society mom. She’s doing a part that once might have been played by Jean Stapleton, her “All in the Family” mom. Fred Willard is on hand too, doing shtick as Billy’s tipsy boss.

Choreographer Dan Mojica’s troops, especially Austin Miller as the ship’s purser, have a few moments to shine, despite limited space, and do their part to keep our minds off the plot. This is the 1987 version of the original book, adapted by Timothy Crouse and John Weidman, but much of the patter is still lame. And the story is saddled with a wince-worthy subplot about two Chinese immigrants.

Cole Porter’s score is the show’s redeeming glory, and musical director Sternbach treats it with care.

This is the first REPRISE! show since the death of the group’s original musical director, Peter Matz, who was more of a genial audience presence than most of his peers because of his placement on stage and his occasional interventions into the action.

Matz is honored with a program page and with a paragraph in a note by producing artistic director Marcia Seligson. He isn’t mentioned from the stage, however. Instead, the cast does an encore rendition of Porter’s “Take Me Back to Manhattan,” as yet another tribute to the spirit of New Yorkers.

Anything Goes
By JOEL HIRSCHHORN
Daily Variety

Star quality is alive and well at the UCLA Freud Playhouse. The REPRISE! Production of Cole Porter’s “Anything Goes” offers a performance by Rachel York that combines old-time magnetism with charisma, elegance and all-around talent. York’s crystal-clear voice, crack timing and dancing ability make her a logical current candidate for the title “first lady of the musical stage.” This electricity (seen in Broadway’s “City of Angels” and “Les Miserables” as well as the recent London version of “Kiss Me Kate”), along with first-rate “Kiss Me Kate” leading man Brent Barrett and an outstanding cast, turn “Anything Goes” into one of the season’s prime crowd-pleasers.

Although the book was written for the 1934 Broadway show, this version is based on 1987’s Lincoln Center production by Timothy Crouse and John Weidman, which added “All Through the Night,” “Friendship” and “It’s De-Lovely” to the original score. The plot is pure farce, a powder-puff concoction that relies on wizards to breathe life into it.

Wizard No. 1 is director Glenn Casale, who brings a modern sparkle to old-fashioned characters. He sets up the story with tycoon Elisha Whitney (Fred Willard) about to set sail for Europe and unaware that his employee Billy Crocker (Brent Barrett) has sneaked on board to pursue his dream girl, heiress Hope Harcourt (Anastasia Barzee). Billy’s pal entertainer Reno Sweeney (York) wants him to love her instead, but Billy – a stowaway – has to concentrate on hiding from the ship’s captain, assuming disguises that include posing as famous gangster Snake Eyes.

Hope adores Billy too but is engaged to stuffy Lord Evelyn Oakleigh (Larry Cedar), a match encourage for financial reasons by her mother Evangeline (a charmingly addled Sally Struthers). Also on hand is a genuine gangster, Moonface Martin (Jason Graae), Public Enemy 13 and lusting to move higher up the list.

York first expresses her yearning for Barrett with a sizzling interpretation of “I Get a Kick Out of You” and their duet, “You’re the Top,” has an airy, Fred and Ginger appeal. Barrett, immaculately dressed in blue blazer, yellow vest and tie, evokes 1930’s polish and style. He’s that rare male lead with chiseled features who also has a sense of humor and warmly expressive singing voice. We want him to wind up with York, and there’s a sense of discomfort when the plot yanks them in different directions.

Fortunately, there’s no time to dwell on who gets whom, because Jason Graae’s gangster, a strutting, comedic Cagney in a pinstriped suit, often upstages the sexual complications. He does a rousing “Friendship” with York, and when he and Barrett are tossed into the ship’s jail (amusingly designed by Bradley Kaye with bars dropping from the ceiling), he sings a riotous takeoff of inspirational songs, “Be Like a Bluebird.”

First act closer, “Anything Goes,” feature topnotch tap dancing. The number is so powerful, you can’t help feeling it should end the show. “Blow Gabriel Blow” also allows choreographer Dan Mojica to shine and included a brief homage to “Singing in the Rain.” Barrett’s “Easy to Love” showcases the song’s enduring beauty.

Act two doesn’t quite sustain the supercharged momentum of the first half, but DeLee Lively is amusing as not-so-dumb-blonde Erma and Barzee gracefully transcends her pallid part as Barrett’s true love. Willard’s tycoon is right on target.
Most crucial of all, Gerald Sternbach’s pulsating orchestra shows every Porter classic off to best advantage.

ANYTHING GOES
By LES SPINDLE
Backstage West
Critic’s Pick

Following REPRISE!’s breathtaking summer revisit to Sondheim’s watershed classic Follies, it seems the company is on a roll. The current mounting of Cole Porter’s seafaring lark brings together a crackerjack cast to reassert the unalloyed pleasures of first-rate Broadway fluff. Director Glenn Casale helms a sharp-looking, smooth-sounding, and altogether exhilarating rendition.

REPRISE! presents the 1987 Lincoln Center version, which improved on the dated 1934 show, thanks to Timothy Crouse and John Weidman’s snappy revision of the four-author book, the restoration of cut numbers, and evergreen Porter songs imported from other shows. The new version breezes along through fast-moving slapstick complications and a nonstop parade of sublime tunes. Yet above all, it’s the casting that makes this production soar. It should be no surprise to those familiar with Rachel York that, in the role of evangelist-turned-songstress Reno Sweeney, she steps up to the plate and scores a homer. She’s closer to a leading-lady ingénue type than other character actors who have played this role—including Ethel Merman and Patti LuPone—but she radiates a stellar take-charge charm of her own. Her sassy, joyous renditions of big dance numbers—the title song and “Blow Gabriel Blow”—are showstoppers, and when she croons the effervescent “I Get a Kick Out of You,” the feeling is mutual.

But she’s scarcely alone in grabbing the spotlight. Brent Barrett has the requisite comic timing and musical panache to make leading man Billy Crocker utterly irresistible, and he’s perfectly matched with the sweet-voiced and lovely Anastasia Barzee as his would-be fiancée Hope. Two veteran performers sink their teeth into choice supporting roles, with sidesplitting results. The ideally cast Jason Graae has a field day as wily mobster Moonface Martin, who’s disguised as a clergyman. Graae’s customary indulgence in audacious adlibs, such as a Shirley Temple inflection and the Faye Dunaway slapping scene form Chinatown, exemplify his infallible comic instincts. Sally Struthers, who has made a triumphant career segue from young sitcom actor into sparkling musical comedy performer, is likewise a hoot. She gleefully plays the haughty dowager Evangeline Harcourt, whose prim-and-proper values can take a quick detour when it comes to cold cash.

In the stock role of gun-moll bimbo Erma, DeLee Lively charms the admiring flock of sailors with her saucy “Buddy Beware” while simultaneously working her comic magic on us. Fred Willard generates major laughs as the nearsighted fussbudget businessman Whitney, and Larry Cedar is hilariously befuddled as stuffy Lord Oakleigh, Billy’s rival for Hope’s affections. From leading players to gypsies, musical director Gerald Sternbach and choreographer Dan Mojica have elicited seamless and sparkling song-and-dance efforts. Sternbach’s orchestrations snap, crackle, and pop with the zesty melodies of Porter’s hit-filled score.

Bradley Kaye’s minimalist set, Steven Howard and Bob Miller’s lovely costumes, and Tom Ruzika’s superb lighting capture the show’s stylish flair. As York and Barrett croon their way through “You’re the Top,” they could easily be referring to the blissfully entertaining production.

 

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