I spent a very satisfying afternoon Saturday watching the national road company presentation (or whatever it's officially called -- the show starts its actual tour next year) of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “South Pacific” revival. There are many wonderful things in this show in addition to the fantastic score and they greatly restored my initial disappointment upon discovering that Rodney Gilfry would not be performing Emile deBecque in the matinee. Indeed, the Playbill insert was a complete pre-printed cast list of everyone playing their roles except Mr. Gilfry whose understudy – one Christopher Carl – would perform Emile.
This, of course, should have been anticipated by me. I suppose there are performers who don’t do matinees for various/sundried reasons and are contractually exempted from them. That doesn’t mean the theater is going to let the public know, however, and when “this public” reserved his seat, it was with the express anticipation of seeing Mr. Gilfry sing Emile.
Sigh.
So, how did “this public” overcome his disappointment? Well, it happened rather suddenly when the 25-piece orchestra began playing the restored Overture (as with all the music, they used original orchestrations from the 1949 production) and swept me into another world. Never mind that one of the ladies three people to the left of me was yakking and laughing about some thing or other…I glared…it was noticed and it quieted. Upon turning my attention to the Overture again, another gale of laughter erupted and I turned to the lady next to me and asked, politely, whether her friend was going to be talking and laughing throughout the “rest” of the performance. She shook her head no. I heard no more laughing/yakking after that.
This performance is at the Golden Gate Theater which is perched rather oddly “at” Market Street in the city of San Francisco but which has an address of “6th and Turk”…which is not a good neighborhood being part of the Tenderloin District (think XXXX adult clubs and video dives, winos and derelicts, etc., etc.) Happily, that is not true of the Market Street site of the theater itself, but they so closely abut the Tenderloin that one “feels” the seediness all the same.
The Golden Gate Theater was the site of one of the happier theatrical events I’ve experienced over the years – and that was a road company of “Annie” a few years ago. It’s an historic theater, as are all the San Francisco houses, but it’s not the best by a mile. It has been a long time since the Golden Gate was given a facelift. And the seats might have fitted the frames of 1950s patrons, but most of us were in close contact with one another…so much so that it was quite simple to read the body language of persons on either side of you. The honor for best theater in San Francisco, IMO, goes to the Curran Theater where I saw “Wicked” and “Dame Edna” and “La Boheme” and “Barbara Cook.” It is also where I plan to see a production of “The 39 Steps” during the Christmas holidays.
Back to “South Pacific”, the sound presentation was lacking. I’m not sure why, either. You can do wonderful things these days with speaker placements and baffling and all sorts of other stuff. There’s no reason why prime Loge seats should be getting subdued sound and, most puzzling of all, some weird feedback from time to time that garbled the spoken word.
Production-wise, the set is simple and dazzling. The design is truly wonderful with venetian-styled blinds done with what appeared to be wooden slats used to create the deBecque villa in one scene, Bloody Mary’s hut in another, and to create depth for other scenes. The lighting was superb.
I’ve read and heard a lot of criticism of the movie “South Pacific” over the years. After seeing this show – presented the way it was presented originally in 1949 – I have to say “Hah!” and “Hah!” again at the boo birds. There are problems in the show that were corrected in the movie. And there were things right in the show that were overproduced in the movie. So “Hah!” Take them apples, Mr. Goldstone.
One of the primary things I’ve read/heard about “South Pacific”, the show, was how perfectly it was cast and about “South Pacific”, the movie, was how awfully it was cast. Mary Martin was a superstar on Broadway. There’s no way she could have missed as Nellie Forbush. No way at all. For that time, it was quite “the” part for any great actress/singer – a female officer (nurse) on an island in the Pacific during the war. Nellie is a naïf, she’s from Arkansas and very much a child of her parents, her community and her part of the United States. Yes, this show deals with racism, too, and does it very well. But the show’s credibility has to rely on some sort of attraction between Nellie and Emile deBecque, the French planter who is much older than Nellie.
Fortunately for Emile, he has some AMAZING songs to sing to her. The music provides the romance even if the physical reality/character development between the two cannot quite make you believe in the relationship. Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza were well-matched…and in a show, good performances and great music can make you believe whatever the performers want you to believe. But the truth about this show is that the character of Emile deBecque isn’t very well-defined, isn’t very much-engaged and requires little more than a great voice and, hopefully, a masculine physicality that seems reasonably feasible for an attractive young woman to be attracted to. Much is revealed in his story about his youth, his life on the island, and his views on life and how time is not to be wasted. He believes that all it takes is one look…across a crowded room…and somehow you know. This is the kind of enchantment that can be wrought upon a stage. Ezio Pinza, the original Emile – were he alive today and auditioning for this show – would not be cast, I don’t believe. There was a time when actors like Pinza, Paul Douglas, Broderick Crawford, Edward Arnold and the like would be cast as viable suitors for beautiful women in shows and films. Today, it would be like casting Dustin Hoffman opposite – for grins – Drew Barrymore as a romantic suitor. The audience might accept the premise if it was a well-done comedy, but would anyone accept it as a romantic drama?
Christopher Carl was an acceptable substitute for Emile, all things considered. His voice is magnificent and he cut a very middle-aged manly figure…very appropriate for Emile. His performance, though, was a bit wooden and his blocking was uninspired. In fact, Nellie’s blocking in scenes with him seemed equally uninspired. Perhaps it looked great from the Orchestra Seats? I was in a Loge Seat, with four women to the left of me and a solitary, quiet, thin Asian man with opera glasses on my right. He was given to humming along from time to time and I never could quite figure out who he was singling out with those opera glasses. Our seats were quite good and everyone on stage was easily seen and heard.
Nellie was performed by Carmen Cusack. She has a great figure, she’s blonde, and her singing voice is a dream. She’s also from Texas. Her accent was so thick, you’d really believe Nellie was a hick from the sticks. That said, the role of Nellie is really one of a naïve young woman with no experience in life. She’s corny by today’s standards. In the film, Mitzi Gaynor nailed her solid. On stage, Cusack’s Nellie is plucky, pert and pretty. From time to time, her delivery was a bit over-the-top, and I expected a little less “theatricality”. Both leads sang beautifully, but I was disappointed, and a little annoyed, to find I was unmoved (and a little bit bored once) by them together. I was rather sad at that. Still am.
Where the show bursts forth with mega-wattage energy is from the casting of Bloody Mary and Luther Billis and the SeaBees and, not the least among them, Lt. Joe Cable.
Bloody Mary was wonderful. Actress Keala Settle, who is built wide and low and moves like a Sumo wrestler, was terrific as Mary. She has a low, guttural growl as Mary and her oft-expressed “You li-i-i-i-IKE?” engaged the audience at every turn. Luther Billis was less a blustering type as portrayed by Matthew Saldivar than was Ray Walston’s (in the movie) or the guy who played the role in the Broadway revival (whom I saw on the Tony telecast). Billis and his SeaBees picked the energy up dramatically from the opening (and a bit lethargic) scene on deBecque’s terrace. The SeaBees’ voices were extremely well cast and their singing was always joyous.
When Anderson Davis made his entrance as Lt. Joe Cable, there were a few gasps from the ladies. He emerged from downstage. Wearing his aviator’s cap and sunglasses, a leather flight jacket, a pistol on his right hip and a knife on his left and his khakis bloused and tucked into brown laced-up boots, Cable took the stage with a swagger that had the guy next to me noticeably tensing up. When Bloody Mary laid eyes on him and stealthily plodded over to size him up, you sensed something special was going to happen. When she growled, “You saxy man”, the audience erupted in laughter and applause. A great deal of tension was released and Joe Cable was an instant “star” in this production. His tenor is superb.
Director Bartlett Sher did so many things right in this production that it seems nitpickish to quibble over things that weren’t done. Emile has relatively little stage movement when he needs some. Perhaps Gilfry has the role down pat, but his understudy was wooden. Cable is left to stand and glower or hold an attractive pose (eye candy, I guess) under a spot while others are talking. The tableaux effect came to mind and it might have been very effective from the Orchestra Seats, but looked a bit under-directed from the Loge. I’d have preferred a more natural blocking of Cable actually facing others who are talking and “listening” to them.
Things that worked better in the show than in the movie are the wonderful juxtaposition of scenes that take place concurrently around the Thanksgiving follies. Joe Cable’s bout with malaria and spending weeks in hospital are missing in the film. Of course, we only see him when he has left the hospital looking for Billis backstage at the follies…he wants Billis to get a boat and take him to Bali Hai to be reunited with Liat. Meantime, Bloody Mary turns up with Liat and threatens him that Liat will marry a rich planter if Cable does not. Alternately during these scenes, we see deBecque show up and have a scene with Billis and with Cable; Cable has a scene with Nellie, and later he’s with deBecque. In each occurrence, IMO, Cable’s energy elevates the performances of deBecque and Nellie to professional standards I’d hoped they’d carry throughout the show (and it makes me now wonder if the two leads don’t get along). I’ve read reviews that indicate that Gilfry and Cusack are magical together. It may be, however, that Carl simply doesn’t get enough time to settle into the role before Gilfry reclaims it.
All of that Act II sequence is wonderfully staged and the show is strengthened by it. By the time deBecque and Cable are off stage and you hear their voices over the radio from their mission locations, the dramatic tone of the play becomes very serious. The last transmission is heartbreaking in its effect, primarily because of the impact the character has on the show. There is this wonderful transition from a beach scene, where everyone is getting ready to deploy, to the final scene at de Becque’s plantation villa. You see Marines and nurses and SeaBees falling into formation and singing a slow, staccato-like version of “Honey Bun” as they mark time in a march step. During this the blinds come down, the lighting changes and Nellie, Ngana and Jerome (Emil’s two children) come on stage for the final scene.
When you know what to expect during the scene, you hope for perfect timing. As Nellie is singing with the children, Emile appears on his terrace. I think Mr. Carl came on a bit too soon. The impact wasn’t “there”, for me, so that bit of magic was lost.
But the score is totally the thing, and I cannot imagine it being served any better on stage than it was in this production.
What the movie did absolutely right was put Alfred Newman in charge of the scoring/adaptation. It was phenomenal to hear the original orchestrations and then to realize how significant and expansive were the additions made by Newman and his orchestrators and, most especially, by choral master Ken Darby. I was amazed that the song “Bali Hai” had no choral accompaniment in the show. And I’m equally stunned at how much more effective the song is with the chorus and in the movie since Mary sings directly to Cable in the film. In this show, Cable is off to the side while Mary is singing to everyone. Of course, a female chorus does a version when Cable and Billis on Bali Hai, but it's brief and does not have the powerful effect on the song that the movie gives it. There were many touches that significantly enhanced the score in the movie without detracting from the quality of the originals. This show is a very different thing from the movie. Each has its qualities.
I’m “thinking” about seeing it one more time…with Gilfry as deBecque.
