Kodaly (Jeremy Berrick) attempts to romance a
nothing-doing Ilona (Karen Leland) in She Loves Me.
(Provided by Novato Theater Company)
Lovely
IJ Correspondent
Article Launched: 10/31/2007 04:43:28 PM PDT Marin Independent Journal
There is a great line in the movie "Roxanne," Steve Martin's modern adaptation of "Cyrano de Bergerac," where Martin is asked by co-workers why he's in such a good mood all of a sudden, and Martin replies, "Because yesterday she didn't and today she does."
It is a wonderful movie that shares the same sort of buoyancy that carries along the stage musical, "She Loves Me," another great love story now in revival at the Novato Theater Company's Pacheco Playhouse, through Nov. 18.
And anyone who’s felt that feeling knows exactly what Martin was talking about. And we’re not talking a merely speculative, petal-plucking “She loves me, she loves me not” kind of she loves me. No, we’re talking a stop-the-presses, hold- the-phone, cancel-my-tango-lessons, jostle-the-postman (fling the mail!), shout-it-from-the-rooftops kind of she loves me.
And it is precisely this feeling that "She Loves Me" wishes to celebrate in song.. The fact that it does so without sentimentality is nothing short of miraculous, and probably the reason it has remained popular lo, these many years.
It is the third adaptation of a Hungarian play, "Parfumerie," by Miklos Laszlo, which also inspired Ernst Lubitsch's 1940 Hollywood comedy "The Shop Around the Corner," with James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan, as well as a 1949 musical version, "In the Good Old Summertime," with Judy Garland and Van Johnson. More recently, it was used as the template for "You've Got Mail" (1998), with Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks.
The setting is a place that doesn't exist anymore, mid-1930's "Mitteleuropa." The story revolves around two lovelorn clerks in a Budapest parfumerie - Georg Nowack (Larry DiMare) and Amalia Balash (Monica Norcia). Bickering colleagues by day, they are also unwitting pen pals by night, brought together anonymously by the 1930s Hungarian equivalent of couples.com.
It is not so much the elegant simplicity of Joe Masteroff's book, but the complexity of its score by Jerry Bock (music) and Sheldon Harnick (lyrics) that appears to have ensured it would stand the test of time. Bock wrote enough music for an operetta, and with a bright consistency of tone that respects the story's milieu.
DiMare is a nice-looking, light-footed leading man with a strong voice and an earnest air that makes him a quite likable Georg. But it his leading lady who is the star of this show.
The role of Amalia is usually cast with a 20-something ingénue, and is played accordingly. Norcia plays an Amalia who is somewhat older, closer to Norcia's own age. This throws all kinds of new shadings onto the role. For example, when she sings "Will He Like Me?" it is not sung by a young girl, nervous about a first date, but as a beautiful woman, fully grown, who fears that beauty has faded, in the hopes that this date could be one of her last.
This takes acting chops - and who knew? Norcia, who teaches voice in Marin, has an old-fashioned, classical vibrato that reminded me of Snow White. Although a veteran of past NTC productions, it was mostly as musical director ("Most Happy Fella," "Sound of Music," "The Fantasticks"), and only recently made the hop from the orchestra pit to the stage as one of the Pigeon sisters in "The Odd Couple." And then you couldn't really tell.
But when Norcia sings the stuffing out of "Will He Like Me?," a sweet, torchy show-stopper if there ever was one, (whose melody sounds suspiciously like "Do You Love Me?" from "Fiddler on the Roof," which the pair opened on Broadway in '64, one year later), all wonderings cease. That was a soliloquy, and as good an acting job as I've seen in community theater.
This musical is remarkably generous to all its performers: many supporting characters are given showstoppers, too. The standouts were Elliot Simon, a cartoon character of a man, as Sipos, particularly his big number, "Perspective," and Karen Leland's Ilona, the parfumerie's most unlucky woman in love. She sings "A Trip to the Library" like a two-fisted, tough-but-vulnerable wiseacre right out of "Guys and Dolls." Both were a joy to watch on stage, and a delight in their scenes together.
Also, NTC veteran Jeremy Berrick won an ovation at one of his exits as Ilona's smarmy suitor, Steven Kodaly. With his pencil-thin mustache and slicked back hair, Berrick plays Kodaly with all the oiliness and smooth class of a narcissistic song-and-dance man. Well done. Ditto Jarrett Battenberg's ambitious delivery boy, Arpad. Always a fine tenor, it has been fun to watch young Battenberg's acting skills grow, and they are much improved from his last NTC appearance in "Sweet Charity."
Jerrie Patterson's turntable-driven set on wheels is a miniature in Art Nouveau, making good use of the small space. A lot of work by a lot of people went in to the tasteful costuming - particularly stunning was Norcia's green-with-white lace Christmas gown, the lace sleeves somehow highlighting the grace with which this orchestra conductor makes use of her hands. And Jack Gallivan's lighting design often added a wintry violet glow, suggestive of an Eastern Europe twilight.
Everyone was singing the praises of music director Andrew Klein, who single-handedly carried the entire evening's musical accompaniment on piano at Friday's opener, and director Patterson, who returns to the NTC director's chair for the fifth time with this production. Together they took a difficult score -- with complicated rounds, quick patter songs, and songs sung contrapuntally among the principals -- a large cast and a small stage, and somehow made it all work beautifully.
In defiance of our own cynical 2007 instincts, "She Loves Me" turns out to be the still-living proof that, against all of the odds, some love affairs really do deepen with time.
REVIEW
What: "She Loves Me"
Who: Novato Theater Company
When: Through Nov. 18; 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 3 p.m. Sundays.
Where: Pacheco Playhouse, 484 Ignacio Blvd., Pacheco Plaza Shopping Center, Novato
Tickets: $10 to $22
Information: 883-4498, www.novatotheatercompany.org
Rating: Four out of five stars
1 comment:
found your site today and really liked it.. i bookmarked it and will be back to check it out some more later ..
Post a Comment