This Fair Lady Overcomes
Her Frozen Difficulties
by TONY VELLELA
Sisters? Sisters!
Except for a few minor differences such as family background, social standing, education, original premise, and relationship to reality, they could almost be taken for sisters. Almost. Remember that catchy tune from the Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, Vera-Ellen picture “White Christmas?” It’s got a memorable lyric “Lord help the mister who comes between me and my sister, and Lord help the sister who comes between me and my man.”
At their core, two young women [late teen years to mid-twenties], consumed by their powerful drive to live their individualized, stand-alone versions of what it means to be an independent young woman, each with its own particular milestones, and each with its own hurdles to overcome, manage to enjoy more variety than you might expect.
Let’s start at the very beginning – a very good place to start . . . but, recalling an acceptance speech at a recent awards show which honored Meryl Streep, not this time. George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion” – a kind of Cinderella tale in which the views of some good old souls clash with the mores of some up-and-coming young heels – tests how genuine, how enduring true attraction between people can be.
What does endure in the current, dazzling revival at Lincoln Center of Lerner and Loewe’s “My Fair Lady” is the fascination one academic type, the natty Professor Henry Higgins [Harry Hadden-Paton] displays for one flower-seller, whose place of business is a certain particular street corner directly across from the entrance to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. When the young blooms-booster Eliza Doolittle [Lauren Ambrose] shows no interest in the verbal solicitations from her upper class admirer, the usual routine between a certain type of young lady and a certain type of on-the-make ‘decent’ young dandies, this professor boasts to a colleague that, given six months, he can convert Eliza from a soot-smudged bouquet barker into an Upper Class lady whose presence would be welcomed in London’s finest sitting rooms. With his reputation as a wagerer on the line, Colonel Pickering [Allan Corduner] decides to make it a real challenge, with a large sum at stake. Higgins has his own reputation to protect, confident in his ability as an expert in speech patterns to identify a person’s home district by listening to how he/she pronounces any group of words or phrases. Bewildered but a chance-taker herself, Eliza sees their game as a chance to give herself a real boost at actualizing her own personal dream, to open a small but respectable flower shop, with an emphasis on ‘respectable.’ Because he must have as much time as possible to train his pupil, he insists that she move into one of his guest rooms, a development that creates a ‘what’s up?’ reaction from the household staff, as well as from Eliza. Two words emerge as part of the wager, and threaten to have police raid the premises. And faster than you can say ‘black’ and ‘mail’ – the enterprise welcomes in a new do-nothing partner.
While the professor’s interest in Eliza is genuinely academic, the flower girl still struggles with how the set-up will actually play. And when the set-up seems to be all set, another player emerges: the actual owner of the house, Mrs. Higgins. – a.k.a. Henry’s widowed mother [Diana Rigg, enjoying a revival of her own recently]. Her interest has nothing to do with money. What she wants is assurance that there will be no scandal. And when it appears that this story line has finally, finally played its last trick, yet another secondary character, with what would be a game-changer role anywhere else, shows up, ready to claim his stakes. He is Freddy Evynsford-Hill, [a spry, engaging Jordan Donica,] the young chap who knocked over Eliza’s flower stand way back at the start of Act One. His claim? He’s decided that he is in love with Eliza. No – really.
There are other folks who have real claims to the tale of Eliza and . . . well, Eliza’s ne’er do well Dad, for an instance, whose sock ’em rendition of ‘Get Me to the Church on Time’ threatens to ignite the inside of the tavern near the end of Act Two, because the number’s got the power to do just that. Why, you wonder? Because two-time Tony Award winner Norbert Leo Butz is cast in the role. Watch Norbert create specific moments that give his character the confidence a true rogue has. He struts like a veteran rooster after a good night’s ‘work.’ I’m just sayin.
And those are the basics. What we have here is an eight-times-a-week, fully-cast living breathing MGM Arthur Freed Technicolor picture, on stage, right up there, with the thrill of the proceedings under the direction of the master director Bartlett Sher, choreography compliments of Christopher Gattelli and music direction by veteran music director Ted Sperling. Does Eliza learn how to pronounce the rain in Spain? Sure. Could they have Danced All Night? Place your bets. Does she order the horses to move their bleedin’ arses? Anyone on west 64th street will tell you the answer to that one.
And there’s one more surprise, one that most New York theatre folks wondered about when it was announced a few seasons back that Lauren Ambrose [HBO’s ‘Six Feet Under’] was set to star in the first full-scale revival of ‘Funny Girl.’ The quirky young woman as Fanny Brice? Didn’t happen, and there are those who were thankful at the time for it.
The last, and maybe the least expected by those who think the Mississippi River is where the Pacific Ocean starts, was this development. This lady can belt . . . b-e-l-t! She has more left-over musical chops when she wraps up a number than many leading ladies who need those little hairline mics to boost their volume. And she’s got more than volume. Her Eliza has real stakes in the outcome – a real future with a real longed-for life. Her Eliza is real, not simply a very good singer-dancer. Ambrose gives us a young woman with every kind of character development.
Even record-breaking heat on the street can’t seem to help “Frozen” from getting a basic story line to emerge. The Disney company learned many lessons since its first foray into the Broadway biz. When they tried to muscle their way onto a place on the Great White Way with “Beauty and the Beast,” the result was a show that could have been lifted from a theme park stage. But they caught on quick. Sadly, the current offering from the Mouse House has more in common with “Tarzan” than any of Disney’s subsequent projects. With “Tarzan,” what they had going for it was a proven brand, a very familiar title that does half the work of winning over an audience, regardless of their age. “Frozen,” however, seems to believe that the extreme success of a new cartoon story, with no familiar antecedent, will be enough to make the sale. And, after all, that’s the name of this game – sales. The “Frozen” team – music and lyrics by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, and book by Jennifer Lee – hoped to parlay the great success of the animated feature into a real story, forgetting that it takes more than a familiar brand name to make an audience get the satisfaction it expects when plunking themselves down in those seats, unless you have not yet made it out of the mid-teen years.
“Frozen” wants us to accept the thin-as-ice premise that two sisters who have been the closest of friends will accept the doomed fate of who-knows-what that has bestowed a mostly lethal curse on one of them, a curse that gives her the power to freeze anything she aims to destroy. When their mother recognizes this condition in the daughters, she chooses to isolate the one with the higher level of danger in her ability to inflict, choosing to isolate the more dangerous one, Elsa, to keep her from harming the other sister, Anna.
If you have seen the picture and can recall the specifics, please forgive any errors made here in the retelling of the myth. This is a myth, after all, with no previous tale that I’m aware of, that the stage musical can draw from, to explain or justify the whats and wherefores we are asked to accept.
No love interest for Anna emerges until the arrival of Prince Hans, who tries to undo the curse’s effect and free his beloved from the entanglement that Anna is part of. The love the sisters have for each other makes the love-struck couple trapped by older sister Elsa’s power she does not wish to use. In the interim, the King and Queen have died, making the girls orphans. Somewhere along the way, other players in this saga are introduced – the ice-seller Kristof, with his own interest in Elsa whose livelihood is threatened by the sister’s ability to put him out of business; Olaf the snowman, and Sven the reindeer. There is a redeeming event that frees Elsa from her cold curse, and reunites the girls, although what it is is hard to explain. What does transpire is a happy ending ending, but still not warm enough to give the plot enough heat to melt away whatever icy constraints have kept this adventure from making any sense, enough at least from bringing order to its disparate parts.
The full-throat power ballad “Let It Go,” given such intensity by virtue of Idina Menzel’s providing her voice for the cartoon, is still the high point, and fortunately Caissie Levy does give it justice here. And when Levy makes her gorgeous entrance, every pre- and early teen girl in the audience rises as one at the sight of their herine showing up. It seems likely that the only element from this “Frozen” that will survive even a record-breaking heat wave is that forceful number that dominated the airwaves for more than a year.
On a point of personal privilege, a phrase etched into T-V audiences for any of Dick Wolf’s “Law & Order” franchises. Please accept my gratitude to everyone who sent good wishes after learning that it was a two-hospitals, fractured hip surgery that had me sidelined for many weeks recently. Your expression of concern is a true boost to the recovery process.
On Book
To provide a chronicle of how the Lerner & Loewe canon fits into overall grand history of the most iconic musical titles, treat yourself to Martin Gottfried’s engaging, captivating volume “Broadway Musicals.” Yes, it is possible for it to take the place of your coffee table. But it’s worth it . . . and if you’d like another take on the history of America’s most valued contribution to the arts, including that of Lerner & Loewe, delve into Larry Stempel’s well-written” Showtime – A History of the Broadway Musical Theatre.”
———————————————————————————————-
TONY VELLELA wrote and produced the PBS series about theatre, “Character Studies.” His Best Play award-winning work “Admissions,” at the New York International Fringe Festival, was published by Playscripts. He has written several other plays & musicals, including “Maisie & Grover Go to the Theatre,” published by Art Age Press. He has covered theatre and the performing arts since 1968, his articles and reviews appearing in dozens of publications, including Parade, Rolling Stone, The Whole Earth Catalog, the Christian Science Monitor, Crawdaddy, Dramatics, USA Today and the Robb Report. He has taught theatre-related courses at several institutions, including HB Studio. and the 92nd St. Y.
————————————————————————————————-
CARMEL CAR & LIMOUSINE SERVICE, in business since 1978, has been selected as the official transportation company for Intermission Talk. Its wide variety of services, including special theatre packages, and reservations, are available at www.carmellimo.com, the Carmel App, or 212 – 666 – 6666.
———————————————————————————————
Books referred to, or recommended in Intermission Talk, are available at or through Manhattan’s Drama Book Shop, 250 west 40th street, NYC 10018, 212 – 944-0595, or at www.dramabookshop.com.
———————————————————————————————–