As Heidi Schiller could have told Orpheus, “never look back!” But here I go….
By now Follies has more than a life of its own. It has several. As a musical play about the masks we wear, the shadows beneath, and inevitable disillusionment. As a procession of showstopping musical numbers. These lives coexist in a full production but look more like a Venn diagram in a concert version.
As presented at Carnegie a hall on Thursday evening the showstopping ethos prevailed. Most of the musical numbers are pastiches—loving and expert recreations of the various styles that have fueled music theater since the 1920s. Often bettering their source material. Designed to be performed by singing actors who knew and understood those styles for audiences who also knew and understood them. As the decades fly (thank you, Ben) some of those styles have vanished into forgotten antiquity and the songs are either freed to be reinterpreted or lose some of their meaning. Or both.
Which leads to the third life of Follies, as a cultural repository of its own performing history. All of which is recorded and available for easy comparison. So just as the ghosts of the Follies girls haunt the theater about to be demolished the ghosts of Alexis and Dorothy and Ethel and Barbara (and dear God, Elaine) and so on haunt the score. In a full production the audience might include people experiencing the show for the first time. At a gala event the entire audience knows the score better than the just-hired ensemble! Which helped when the amplification didn’t balance correctly sometimes and the words turned to mush. We all knew them anyway.
The performance was thrilling. The gimmick this time was that nobody played a character—the songs were divvied up one apiece among a large cast. Some veterans, some youth. There was connective narration by Ted Chapin and Kurt Peterson (the original Young Ben). There was an immense orchestra, lush and impressive but also often not well-balanced, led by Joey Chancey. And there was a cavalcade of brilliant acting/singing/dancing performers, ranging from quite young to 93-year old Hal Linden as Weissman.
Some of the brilliance would have worked in a full production. Christine Ebersole and Kate Baldwin were there as Sally. Some veered towards concert showstopper land, most obviously Jennifer Holiday, very much “still here” 41 years after Dream Girls. I thought Alex Gemignani would be singing Beautiful Girls with his beautiful tenor voice but instead he gave an impressive account of The Road You Didn’t Take. Beautiful Girls was sung by a stunning young tenor (Christian Mark Gibbs) with a muscular voice (and physique) quite far from the Kenny Baker style of the number but very impressive on its own merits. And there was dancing. I find it interesting that nobody cares about authentic vocal style but authentic choreography gets excavated. Who’s That Woman truly brought the house down. A few of the singers were too mic-dependent and the amplification system didn’t always balance properly with the orchestra so some of them got swallowed.
The heart of the show is one of the most antique numbers, One More Kiss. Viennese operetta. Light, girlish old-fashioned soprano voice: one old but still has it and one young and delicate enough to match. The best I’ve ever seen was Lucine Amara at Encores. The aria ends on a high A flat for Young Heidi, that’s the 5th of the tonic chord. And very much in the style. NOT high D flat, too operatic. I got into an argument with dear, beloved Sherry Zannoth of blessed memory after seeing Rosalind Elias as an old Heidi—she sang fabulously but was entirely wrong for the style. An Orlofsky voice rather than a Rosalinda. Sherry disagreed! Leah Horowitz went up the that spurious D flat in that version but so lightly that the note seemed an overtone. So I let it pass (thank you, Phyllis). At this concert Harolyn Blackwell provided an appropriate vocal tone, rather overmatched by her lush-voiced younger self—and they BOTH went for that high note. Pure circus. It got huge applause but lost me. In context that piece sets up Could I Leave You and this sure didn’t. This being a concert I guess it didn’t really matter.
One weird effect of omitting the dialog scenes was that the emotional wrenching of the second half was diminished. Instead we got Kurt Peterson triumphantly standing up from his “host” seat, taking up the original cane, and launching into Old Ben’s soft shoe number. The chaos at the end was cut—he called out for Phyllis and they wrapped up the show. The original ending is a bleak cold morning after a psychotic night. This was a tribute to still having “it.”
Follies is also a prism. The lyrics take on different colors depending on the age and life stage of the listener. Cindy and I had history with this show going back to college (she was Young Sally at Illinois Wesleyan). We saw every revival. She died three years ago. In Buddy’s Eyes has a meaning now that cuts deep: my reflection in her eyes exists only in my own memory. And “never look back” has become both profound advice about how to go forward and an impossible task when surrounded by the detritus of decades together. But I’m still here.
Full listing:
FOLLIES In Concert
"Prologue"
Joey Chancey and The FOLLIES Orchestra
Hosts - Ted Chapin and Kurt Peterson
"Beautiful Girls"
Weissman - Hal Linden
Roscoe - Christian Mark Gibbs
"Don't Look at Me"
Katie Finneran and Marc Kudisch
"Waiting for the Girls Upstairs"
Thom Sesma, Stephen Bogardus, Barbara Walsh, Carolee Carmelllo
Grey Henson, Ryan McCartan, Hannah Elless, Julie Benko
"Rain on the Roof"
Klea Blackhurst and Jim Caruso
"Ah, Paris!"
Isabel Keating
"Broadway Baby"
Adriane Lenox
"The Road You Didn't Take"
Alexander Gemignani
"In Buddy's Eyes"
Christine Ebersole"
"Who's That Woman?"
Karen Ziemba, Mamie Duncan-Gibbs, Ruth Gottschall, JoAnn M. Hunter, Dana Moore, Michele Pawk, Margo Sappington
Tap Dancers - Lauren Blackman, Julianna Brown, Jessica Chambers, Candice Hatakeyama, Alicia Lundgren, Abby Matsusaka, Erin M. Moore
"I'm Still Here"
Jennifer Holliday
"Too Many Mornings"
Norm Lewis and Nikki Renee Daniels
"The Right Girl"
Michael Berresse
"One More Kiss"
Harolyn Blackwell, Mikaela Bennett
"Could I Leave You?"
Beth Leavel
"Loveland"
"You're Gonna Love Tomorrow"/"Love Will See Us Through"
Fernell Hogan, Olivia Elease Hardy, Nina White, Miguel Gil
"Buddy's Blues"
Santino Fontana, with Lauren Blackman and Sarah King
"Losing My Mind"
Kate Baldwin
"The Story of Lucy and Jessie"
Alexandra Billings
"Live, Laugh, Love"
Kurt Peterson
"Finale"
Thanks for sharing this. Insightful as always. Particularly interesting to read your take on “One More Kiss” - both how it functions musically / dramatically, and personally. I agree - it is the beating heart of a show that is overstuffed with riches.