MORE MUSICAL THEATRE FROM NYMF

By Rob Lester

Would you believe two musicals where the main male character, who is also one of its two writers of book, music and lyrics, is in a plaid shirt throughout the show. In each case, he is singing, narrating, playing guitar and acting from the vantage point of knowing how the story ends --- while we also see another actor in a copy of that plaid shirt enacting the scenes from the past. In one play, he's looking for love for himself. In the other he's telling us about his mom who, after years of marriage, unexpectedly finds herself attracted to a woman and jumps into a relationship? Mayhem ensures. Would you believe that later in the week, the NYMF Festival brought me a different musical about a different mother of a different boy who also, after years of marriage, unexpectedly finds herself attracted to a woman and jumps into a relationship? Mayhem ensures, but nary a plaid shirt to be seen.

Let's begin with the strongest and richest item of these three on the menu: We feel welcomed by the plaid-shirted singing narrator who sets us at ease, suggesting we can sit back and enjoy a good time. Do we ever! Its title and cartoon publicity design make you expect it to be a campy, outrageous goof and although, yes, there are broad and boisterous elements to My Mother's Lesbian Jewish WIccan Wedding, it is also endearing, occasionally thought-provoking and tender, and has the kind of character humor that doesn't just skim the surface and take the easy laugh always. Characters grow and think and are worth caring about and rooting for, but we're always engaged and entertained, won over thoroughly by some wit and actors with sharp timing. Liz Larsen plays Claire, a post-divorce wife and mother starting her life over, going north to Canada for a fresh start, having no inkling that she'll find herself suddenly attracted to a woman (Ann Harada, known to many from Avenue Q). Well, it's a different kind of Avenue "Q" -- she's suddenly here (in Canada), she's queer and quickly gets used to it, even though she grew up in Nebraska in another generation where she never heard anyone talk about Lesbians. What was Nebraska like, she is asked: "It's so flat you can watch your dog run away for three days." But there's nothing flat and little that is pat about the humor in this musical. Though its songs are weakened by lazy rhyming (mom/son.........I/ tonight .... band/ plant... trees/ Irene), they are generally sparkling and well performed by a nifty, nimble cast, directed with loving care and economy and specificity by Stafford Arima. OK, so the title kind of gives away some of the plot, doesn't it? Guess what: that doesn't matter because there is so much that works, you can just enjoy the ride and enjoy the company of these often clever and likeable characters. The only thing that's cold is Canada. Well, that and the icy relationship between the divorced parents. I told you it was kind of believable.

The show shows some track marks in its road map and construction: glib at times, winking but wise, taking the needed musical theatre shortcuts to get from Point A to Point B, but they are smart turns that come with smart turns of phrase, most of the time. It's fun. A few inside jokes are noted: like the nod to Wicked by including the phrase "defying gravity" in the song about the study of witchcraft (the "wiccan" of the play's title). There is no weak link in the cast, which includes its two writers: Irene Sankoff and David Hein -- the strolling, singing narrator in the plaid shirt, the son of Claire, telling her story and his story. And guess what? It's based on his real-life story and the two writers had their own wedding at some point: they are married to each other. But it's not the Lesbian wedding of the title that is the centerpiece -- it's everything leading up to it, as people learn about themselves and each other, surprising themselves and each other. A scene and song chronicling Gay history without histrionics is a showstopper, as it becomes more than just a plot point, and the applause I heard was clearly more than just an audience responding to a scene in a play, but rather an endorsement of empowerment and survival. Though surprising in a mostly cute and chipper musical, it did not feel false or self-indulgent. Why? because the characters had become real and were worth identifying with, because the show is played and directed from the heart, not just the funnybone. A special bravo to the young actor in the other plaid shirt, playing the teen son of the divorced parents: Lev Pakman, studying at NYU and with some professional experience in opera and less in musical comedy, is a comic delight. His timing and reactions are excellent and he adds energy when not playing David, being used as part of the ensemble. With cheer and dispatch, and perhaps emphasizing the way attitudes changed in a generation, he accepts his mother's newly-discovered sexuality, a surprise to her after she hems and haws about breaking the news. "Well, Dad has a girlfriend now. So I don't see why you shouldn't have one, too." And, being of the no-worries, no-drama persuasion, he has a "Well, that's that!" attitude, and he skips the drama about Mama and sort of skips off, once again, to play video games. As the son of a psychologist and teacher of psychology, he's constantly prodded to express and explore his feelings. What do you want, he is asked. What he really wants, he says, is some money. Sometimes you have to be practical. He needs to buy some textbooks. And this musical is kind of a textbook example of how to blend comedy, songs and heart and mix in the message --- food for thought that comes from caring that doesn't feel manipulative. In this case, it's a message about embracing differences, taking chances, seeking your own happiness and being open. Hopefully, it will have a run that's open, too.

V-Day is a tale about a poor shlump, a city Everyman named Josh Cohen. He has a shirt that's plaid and luck that's bad, having his apartment robbed of everything except one CD and an empty DVD case (the robbers took the DVD), and being lonely and all too single on the titular Valentine's Day. His only silver lining is that he'll do his annual purchase of buying a whole lot of candy at 50% off the next day and the survival of his survival skills. That most prominently means his sense of humor about the absurdities of life. Luckily for the audience, he shares that humor with us and is a genial fellow, whether he is directly addresses us or, parading his hindsight, the other actor who portrays him in the flashbacks. Hapless and snarky, shruggingly perceptive while persevering, and down to earth while down on his luck, he is a walking Murphy's Law waiting for the loophole. It arrives. It's a check for a lot of money, but he can't figure out how to handle what must be someone else's mistake. Darn that pesky sense of integrity he's burdened with! There are lots of laughs in this contemporary comedy with songs, some broadly in the style of Neil Diamond -- a running joke, as that's the CD the robbers left behind. And, we're told there is what we glean from the perspective Diamond's songs, known as "Neil life," and what he experiences as "real life" --- living "in a sea river of cockroaches and Nazis." There are some original ideas and some recycling of old jokey formulas. We get the pushy, whining, disappointed Jewish mother who says she's so upset she'll put her head in the oven, but her husband says she can't because she's not familiar with where the kitchen is. Yuk, yuk, yuk, but well done. And part of the fun is having the writers who collaborated on the songs and script, Steve Rosen and David Rossmer, portray the two versions of Josh and having the musicians regularly and suddenly switch gears to pop up from their seats to pop up as characters in small roles --- sometimes for just a line or two --- and then it's back to business as usual. It's fun and frisky. Mostly light-hearted it is, but becomes warmer-hearted and cozy near the end. It sags a bit in the middle with some predictability and self-satisfied self-pitying and Seinfeldish smug mugging, but is mostly breezy and smart, if sometimes smartass and crass in its attitudes. Like some Valentine's Day candy, it melts in your mouth and once you bite into it, it can be nutty or gooey, crisp or mushy, sweet or with a hard shell, but it's mostly rather good. Refreshingly unpretentious, it seeks to entertain and does have a longer shelf life possible than the scheduled NYMF run or like some Valentine's candy --- especially with versatile, sharp actors like its creators and Sara Chase, who is a delight, and those whose main hat is as musician: Danny Stone (bass), Hannah Sielatycki (drums) and Vadim Feichtner (piano, musical direction), but are involved and funny, observing or interacting and bringing us the music. With Ted Sperling's bright, energetic direction, this one-act zip-through is entertaining with little straining. Comfort food of comedy!

Having a cast full of Broadway pros makes us think we're in safe hands, but sometimes the comedy (I use the term as loosely as the husband character holds his marriage vows), a sex farce with songs, Pandora's Box, feels like a slap in the face...or elsewhere. Case in point (lessness): the case of one of two songs about rear ends, "Slap My Butt." The butt of some of the jokes and smarmy songs is how sex drive drives everything and too bad if you have feelings or other people get in the way. The id becomes idiotic. What is meant to be ha-ha funny good clean, dirty fun is tacky and stereotyped to the hilt and not terribly funny or sexy. Not only does the vulgar leading male character of a husband have frequent philandering miles logged, he lies about his affairs and treats all the women like possessions, insulting, condescending, sneering and leering. It's based on a French film called Gazon Maudit, and maybe something is lost in the translation/Americanization/musicalization, or maybe its cavalier humor is lost on me, and I am missing misogyny's charms, and am too easily offended by the insults thrown and cliche representations of groups of people in the anything-for-a-cheap-laugh humors. Sticks and stones and all that. What I do know, is that credulity is stretched thin early on. With its banter replacing dialog, logic tossed to the wind for the sake of another awkward situation played for yuks, I wasn't surprised to see that bookwriter Maria S. Schlatter works mostly in TV and comedy. They have an Emmy-winning director, Gary Halvorson. Broadway veteran Wayne Cilento, who harks back to the original A Chorus Line, is co-director and did the musical staging. There is a diverting madcap number set in a club and some things are kept whirling like spinning plates you may or may not want to watch spinning. It plays like a sit-com (some would say "sick-com") and is not without some effective moments and attractive, snazzy melodies from composer/lyricist Glen Roven, who is at the piano, ably. The standout song is the serious one which stands out like the good version of the sore thumb, "One Great Love," powerfully and persuasively delivered by Luba Mason in a one-scene role as a prostitute with a heart of gold and a voice of gold. It stops the show. Some will find the doings just crazy shenanigans and fizzy, flip frenzied fun. The plot becomes more and more convoluted and the characters increasingly insensitive. As the switch-hitting housewife at the center, Kerry Butler, plucky princess of Broadway cheer (Xanadu, Hairspray, Beauty and the Beast and off-Broadway's Bat Boy), resorts to some "Gee, aren't I cute" poses and pouting, but has some nice singing moments and some warmth in the early scenes. She wants to have her cake and eat it, too. Impressively, Deidre Goodwin, also Broadway-experienced, finds dignity and strength in the role of the woman who comes into her life and bed and, maybe, heart. When all three are sharing the house with wifey sleeping with each three nights a week, and peaceful co-existence being considered possible without crashing and burning and ...well, there is where the musical jumps the shark. Or was it way earlier? And the ending.... Well, really now!! You must be joking. I guess they thought they were.