Porchlight Theater

Do Re Mi – Porchlight Theater – May 24, 2018

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Thomas Wolfe, not to be confused with the Tom Wolfe who recently shuffled off this mortal coil, was the author of the 1940 posthumously-published book, You Can’t Go Home Again, a catchphrase that has become an essential part of our culture. The Porchlight Theater disdains this advice by producing its Porchlight Revisits series, unearthing musicals that have been laid to rest long ago.

In the past year I have seen Woman of the Year, Merrily We Roll Along, and They’re Playing Our Song, all for the first time, as part of this series, and am looking forward to seeing 1776 in the fall. (Seats will be a lot cheaper than Hamilton, which I understand covers some of the same material.)

The 1960 musical Do Re Mi, which is not to be confused with the song Do Re Mi from the 1959 Broadway show The Sound of Music, or the 1958-1960 television quiz show Dough Re Mi, should be packed back in its box and left to be a footnote, along with many other shows that produced one memorable song. And that song in this case, Make Someone Happy, is best remembered by me for the version by Jimmy Durante at the end of Sleepless in Seattle.

The best thing about this production was the always-interesting, detailed background and historical context of the show that the theater presents prior to the opening act of each revisited play. Also, the actor playing the lead not only looked like Phil Silvers, who created the role on Broadway, but also played the role to the hilt, as if he had been a vaudeville star like Silvers.

But we also had to suffer through songs like What’s New at the Zoo, which had nothing to do with the plot, and made me yearn for If I Could Talk to the Animals. All this after having to change seats because the air conditioning system was dripping on ours. I love the Porchlight Theater, but stay away from seat F20 in warm weather.

Memphis – Porchlight Theater – April 22, 2018

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I first saw Memphis in 2011 when it came to Broadway in Chicago at the Cadillac Palace Theater. I remembered it as a high energy show (with a message), and so it is again at the Porchlight Theater, whose intimacy makes it all the more electric (though, as noted below, I might have preferred more acoustic).

Because the show was still in previews, we received an audience response form encouraging us to give the Artistic Director our suggestions and constructive criticisms about the performance. With apologies to The Rolling Stones, I said I know it’s only rock ’n’ roll (and I like it), but please turn down the volume. The four of us who went together to the show were in agreement that the music was almost painfully loud in spots and that it would be nice to be able to hear all the lyrics.

A detail I had forgotten about the show is its amusing snipe at Perry Como, which is consistent with the opinion of my recent Newberry Library music class instructor (see post on Adult Seminars), who made a special point of telling us how mundane he thought Como’s singing style was and then played one of his records to prove it. (Como fairs somewhat better in the movie Blast from the Past, where Brendan Fraser’s character fawns over Como’s rendition of Round and Round to the amazement of Alicia Silverstone’s character.)

Because it was my first time in the balcony at Porchlight, I was relieved to discover that its front row had plenty of leg room and was far enough back from the railing that my fear of heights was not triggered. It’s easier to enjoy a show when your only concern is permanent hearing loss.

They’re Playing Our Song – Porchlight Theater – March 7, 2018

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The online Urban Dictionary defines porch light as “someone who attracts trouble, or crazy people. Like a porch light attracts bugs and unwanted pests, i.e. mosquitoes.” Unlike Sheldon Cooper in The Big Bang Theory, my mother never had me tested. Nevertheless, I don’t think I’m crazy (who ever does), and the rest of the audience, on this and other nights at the Porchlight Theater, seemed perfectly sane to me.

The only trouble I have encountered at the theater is that Michael Weber, the theater’s Artistic Director, sometimes goes into a little too much detail when giving his pre show history lessons on Porchlight Revisits nights like this. So, while it’s interesting to see pictures of all the actors who starred in the 1,082 performances of the Broadway run of They’re Playing Our Song, did I really need to know that lyricist Carole Bayer Sager has several dogs that sleep in her bed with her and her current husband?

As for the show itself, I read a review of a 2010 Los Angeles production that said the show “doesn’t have the weight to require a 2 ½-hour running time” and “would have been much more enjoyable with a loss of 20 minutes.” Porchlight lost more than that (and it wasn’t even Daylight Saving yet – don’t forget to reset your clocks this weekend). It did the show in one hour and forty minutes.

In addition to the stars, Lorenzo Rush, Jr. and Sharriesse Hamilton, both of whom I saw in the theater’s 2014 production of Ain’t Misbehavin, there are six performers who act as their inner voices, singing backup, dancing, and inspiring the emotions and mimicking the movements of the leads. Great stuff. Wouldn’t everything be more fun if we had a few inner voices following us around, singing and dancing? Hopefully that wouldn’t require everyone getting tested.

Merrily We Roll Along – Porchlight Theater – February 24, 2018

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Though I have enjoyed many Porchlight shows, I skipped the recent production of Billy Elliot. Having seen the Broadway in Chicago production in 2010, I wasn’t interested in seeing another version of this cross between Rocky (if he were an 11-year-old who quit boxing to become a dancer despite his father’s fear that people would think he was gay) and The Full Monty (if the men were 11-year-olds who kept their clothes on but wore cod pieces).

I was happy, however, to see Merrily We Roll Along (though now I can’t get the tune to Old Friends out of my head). While not near the top of Sondheim hit shows, the current version (revised in 1994) is said to be far superior to the original 1981 Broadway production, a flop that had 52 previews, but only 16 performances, which isn’t even close to a record. The 1965 musical, Kelly, closed after one performance (which made me think of The Producers, though I’m not suggesting any financial irregularities).

Speaking of financial irregularities (and remember I wasn’t), at dinner after the show (at Hash House a Go Go), the conversation turned to the FBI report on the latest NCAA basketball recruiting scandal, and in particular to the Wichita State University Shockers. This led Cindy, a former Kansas resident, to inform me that the team’s mascot is a shock of wheat named WuShock. As I have never lived on a farm (though I could smell some from my dorm room in Urbana), Cindy also explained to me what a shock of wheat is, which led me to think of Groot in Guardians of the Galaxy (technically an extraterrestial, sentient, tree-like creature), and led the restaurant manager to tell me that, in nice weather, when they have the sliding windows open, birds fly in to peck at the shocks of wheat on display in the restaurant. As far as I know, this is not a recruiting violation (though the NCAA rules are rather arcane), and the birds maintain their eligibility, which is more than I can say for current high-profile college players implicated in the recruiting scandal, some of whom, like Kelly, may soon be one and done.

The Rest of Theater 2017

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In other posts I’ve singled out some of the plays I went to in 2017. Here’s a quick survey of the rest of them to wrap up 2017 (you’ve probably received all your bank tax statements by now also).

I saw two plays at the Porchlight Theater, Scottsboro Boys and Woman of the Year (at the theater’s new location), where I discovered Meghan Murphy (see blog on Big Red and the Boys). Both are Kander and Ebb shows, but otherwise couldn’t be more different, one serious and based on a true story, the other lighthearted and not, like me.

When the Marriott Lincolnshire Theatre wasn’t underwater from flooding, I saw She Loves Me and Honeymoon in Vegas. Same usher, coincidentally. She remembered me because we discussed at length the need for me to keep my legs out of the aisle the first time (as my friends know, I always try to get an aisle seat). If the usher is reading this, I was just kidding about tripping the actors, really.

I saw Parade on my first trip to the Writers Theater. The play introduced me to the music of Jason Robert Brown, which is what led me to see Honeymoon in Vegas, for more music from him. That and the flying Elvises.

Five Guys named Moe (also my first time at the Court Theater) is not actually a show about five guys named Moe. What little story there is, is just an excuse for Big Moe, Four-Eyed Moe, Eat Moe, No Moe, and Little Moe to sing and dance. Worked for me. Give me Moe.

But not more King Charles III (Shakespeare Theater). I’m not an Anglophile. I just didn’t care about the characters. But I ran into an old friend at the show, who bought me a drink, so all was not lost.

The two characters in Mr. and Mrs. Pennyworth (Lookingglass Theater) are storytellers, which was appropriate given my foray into storytelling in 2017. But the best thing in the show was a giant, mythological boar (as opposed to the real bore in King Charles III).

The lead actress in Born Yesterday at the Greenhouse Theater was like a medium channelling Judy Holliday, but not in a cataleptic state. She was able to move about the stage.  Indeed, this medium was well done.