ENERGETIC TINA IS A WONDER OF VISUAL AND MUSICAL DYNAMICS

 
TINA:  THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL is a jukebox musical.  The songs were not written specifically for this script, but are part of Turner’s history, both when she was partnering with her then husband, Ike Turner, and when she was a solo act.  
 
In contrast to many shows of that classification, such as MAMA MIA, ROCK OF AGES and MOULIN ROUGE!, songs aren’t shoehorned into a trite plot, but flow naturally in the story.
 
Tunes include “I Can’t Stand the Rain,” Don’t Turn Around,” We Don’t Need Another Hero,” “Proud Mary,” and her biggest hit and anthem, “What’s Love Got to Do With It.”  
 
TINA takes the theater-goer on a journey from the Queen of Rock and Roll’s humble beginnings in Nutbush, Tennessee, where she is abandoned by her parents, to her transformation into a mega-celebrity.  
 
“Her live shows have been seen by millions, with more concert tickets sold than any other solo performer in music history.”
 
Written with Turner’s guidance, she insisted that, “the show does not hold back on the storytelling, and be truthful.”  All the glory, the celebrity and happiness of her life, is balanced with the abuse she and her mother were subjected to by her father and then her personal hell inflicted by her jealous verbally and physically aggressive husband.   
 
What you get is “the inspiring journey of a woman who broke barriers [and personal angst] and became the Queen of Rock n’ Roll.”  Set to the pulse-pounding soundtrack of her most beloved hits, it spotlights one of the world’s best-selling artists of all time who has won 12 Grammy Awards.   
 
The show displays all of the star’s notorious dance moves, her obsession with revealing dresses which accentuate her famous well-formed legs, sparkly iconic costumes and outlandish wigs, and her love of bright lights and expansive sets.  This is full-out Tina.  (Don’t be surprised to see lots of coiffed and costumed “Tina-look-alikes” in the audience.)

When it opened in London, and then on Broadway, the show received generally positive reviews from the critics.  Comments included, “astonishing,,” elegantly staged,” and "As bio-musicals go, this is as good as it gets." Other stated, "the show is slickly choreographed, beautifully designed and roof-raisingly well-sung," as well as, “the production becomes a full-blooded rock show that is life-affirming.” 

At the end of TINA, THE MUSICAL, the entire Connor Palace opening night audience was on its feet screaming, singing and dancing.  And, then to top it off, for an extended period the cast and orchestra put on a mini-Tina concert.  
 
The touring production, under the direction of Phyllida Lloyd, with choreography by Anthony Van Laast, is as well-done as the Broadway production.  The pizzaz, opulence, and visual razzle dazzle light up the stage.
 
The cast is outstanding. Naomi Rodgers sizzled as Tina on opening night.  She shares the role with Nurin Villanueva.  The duo change-off so who you see depends on which performance you attend.
 
Young Avyvah Johnson almost steals the show with her dynamic and delightful portrayal of Young Anna-May (young Tina Turner).  Her voice and stage presence resulted in a screaming curtain call.
 
Also strong were Carla R. Stewart as Gran Georgeanna and Roz White as Zelma.
 
Garret Turner is nasty-right as Ike Turner, Tina’s controlling, abusive and vindictive husband.  
 
Locals might spot BW Music Theatre grads Gordia Hayes on stage as a swing and starting May 13, Roderick Lawrence will assume the role of Ike Turner.
 
Capsule judgment: If you love the music of Tina Turner…you will love THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL.  If you don’t know her music…you will love THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL.  If you don’t like musical theatre…you will love THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL.  Get the idea…you will love the TINA TURNER MUSICAL.
 
THE TINA TURNER MUSICAL runs through May 14, 2013 at the Connor Palace in Cleveland’s Playhouse Square.  For tickets: 216-241-6000 or www.playhousesquare.org

BUBBLY BLACK GIRL lights up stage at Karamu

 

It’s been called “…[a] sharp and tasty new musical…charming…as the show ingeniously turns professional perkiness, the lifeblood of the American musical, into a funny, poignant comment on ethnic self-denial.”

It’s been described as “The play opens with an explosion of music…accessible and enjoyable to people of all races and genders…the bubbly mixture of humor and pathos makes for an entertaining—but not feather weight—show.”
 
Audiences have been apprised that it “speaks with wisdom and resonance not only to African-American audiences that share her experience and reference, but to any sensitive soul who ever has been on the outside, struggling to fit in.”
 
What am I talking about?  THE BUBBLY BLACK GIRL SHEDS HER CAMELEON SKIN, Kristen Childs’ musical now on stage at Karamu, Cleveland’s home to the nation’s longest performing Black theatre.
 
Karamu, where Russell and Rowena Jellife, two Oberlin graduates, in 1915 founded a settlement house on the corner of East 38^th Street and Central Avenue, that eventually became a magnet for many of the best African-American artists.
 
In the 1920s the Jellifes sponsored the Dumas Dramatic Club, which eventually evolved into a well-known and respected Karamu theatre under the guidance of Reuben and Dorothy Silver.  During the tenure of the Silvers “works by African American authors such as Langston Hughes and LeRoi Jones, as well as classics from the American theater were staged.”  Colored-blind casting reigned and there was a general atmosphere of interracial theatre.
 
In the 1960s and 70s “Urban unrest and the growing Black Arts Movement forced a reconsideration of Karamu's goals as they related to interracial theater.”  The Silvers were replaced, the dramatic performance space floundered with confused lack of purpose until Tony Sias, the present President and CEO, took over.  Now, under his guidance important and appropriate plays like BUBBLY BLACK GIRL are being staged.
 
As Sias describes the present script, “It is not often that we see a coming-of-age story about a young Black girl on stage, especially one who is an artist, trying to self-actualize in America.” 
 
He goes on, “While we use music and humor as our mantra, our [Karamu’s] tradition is to have you walk away with a better understanding of how the theatre is not only a place of entertainment, but a place where stories of fiction can help us relate to and learn how to cope with and tackle real life experiences.”

BUBBLY BLACK GIRL asks a series of questions centering on “What's a black girl [Viveca] from sunny Southern California to do?  White people are blowing up black girls in Birmingham churches. Black people are shouting ‘Black is beautiful’ while straightening their hair and coveting light skin. The answer?  Slap on a bubbly smile and be as white as you can be! In a humorous and pointed coming-of-age story spanning the sixties through the nineties, Viveca blithely sails through the confusing worlds of racism, sexism and Broadway showbiz until she's forced to face the devastating effect self-denial has had on her life.”

It must be remembered when seeing and evaluating productions of shows done at Karamu and other community non-Equity theatres, that their casts are usually populated by enthusiastic but often undertrained and non-professionally experienced performers.  They are seldom, if ever, “better than Broadway,” in spite of the views of friends and family.

BUBBLY BLACK GIRL is a case in point.  While expertly directed by Nina Dominque and creatively choreographed Kenya Woods, the cast is often stretched beyond their acting, singing and dancing abilities.

Highlights of this production include Kennedi Hobbs, who is pleasing as Viveca (aka Bubbly), Dayshawnda Ash, who brings down the house with her rendition of “Granny’s Advice,” and Jaren Hodgson who is properly obnoxious as Director Bob (Bob Fosse, in obvious disguise).

Edward Ridley, Jr. and his musicians do an incredible job of interpreting the score. Joe Burke’s projection and Cameron Caley Michalak’s scenic designs help enhance the production.

Capsule judgment:  No, it’s not a production better than Broadway, but THE BUBBLY BLACK GIRL SHEDS HER CHAMELEON SKIN gets a very creditable production and continues the role of Karamu in presenting Black-themed shows to its appreciative and enthusiastic audiences. 

BUBBLY BLACK GIRL runs through May 14, 2023 in the Jelliffe Theatre, 2355 East 89^th Street.  There is free parking in a guarded lot adjacent to the theatre.  For tickets go to karamuhouse.org 

WHAT WE LOOK LIKE @ Dobama

It’s always exciting and challenging to see a “new” play script come alive in a staged production, especially by a creditable performance company.  WHAT WE LOOK LIKE, now being presented at Dobama, CLE’s self-proclaimed off-Broadway company, is a case in point.

Written by B. J. Tindal (they/them) a Black queer playwright, the script had its inaugural production at Oberlin College in February of 2019.

It is a 155 minute-play with intermission (ignore the notation in the printed program, if you get one, which states, “This play will be performed with no intermission.”)

Billed as, “Both hilarious and poignant, WHAT WE LOOK LIKE is the story of the Hodges - a black family that has recently moved to a suburban white neighborhood. When the youngest son is asked to draw a family portrait at school, he creates an imaginary white family and the Hodges are thrown into a spiral.” 

Playwright BJ Tindal says, “It’s about images of family and how race intersects with that and the pressures it puts on family units.”

Tindal had an interesting path to become a playwright.  At Oberlin, he had his hopes set on majoring in creative writing. When he didn’t get into the required intro-level course his first semester, the aspiring playwright enrolled instead in an African American Drama course.

“Even though the department doesn’t have a playwriting concentration, the class influenced his decision to pursue theater and sparked the inspiration for a play that would help Tindal launch his career.  The script was WHAT WE LOOK LIKE, a play he developed his first year at Oberlin.”

The play grapples with ideas of what a family is supposed to look like and how that can be damaging for some and beneficial for others.  Tindal explains. “It’s about images of family and how race intersects with that and the pressures it puts on family units.”

WHAT WE LOOK LIKE premiered in the fall of 2014, Tindal’s junior year. It was presented again in spring 2015 during Commencement/Reunion Weekend.  It now gets what is being called “The Professional World Premier” at Dobama.

The Dobama staging, under the direction of Darius J. Stubbs, does an adequate job of creating as good a production as possible with the often unfocused and overly long script.

The show starts off with great promise with a dual play going on in the same acting space.  The black family is realistically portrayed and the white family is presented in “Father Knows Best” and “The Brady Bunch” stylized sit-com over-exaggerated to perfection. This format quickly disappears and we get a multi-topic tale of parental confusion, over-done teen-age angst and unrequited love, a tip of the toe into lesbianism, a contrast between white and black child rearing, an unrealistic tale of a child shuttled between two families with one set of parents unaware of the action, the revealing of why the black child drew himself as part of a white family and a “last supper” that includes overdone revealing of the entire convoluted plot.

At times the script, which needs much dramaturgy work of red pencil crossing out of extraneous scenes and unnecessary plot twists, is funny, other times it creates situations, such as the over-done black son’s infatuation with the white girl next door, and “stupid dad” segments, and bogs down.

The cast, Aamar-Malik Culbreth, Diwe Augustin-Glave, Rob Grant III, Alexa Fatheringham, Katricemonee Headd, Katie Booze-Mooney and Andrew Gorell all basically develop the character(s) they portray.  Several, however, have difficulty projecting so they can be heard, carrying on “inside-voice” conversations, rather than thrusting his/her voice to the furthest corners of the space.  

Vocal projection is especially important in the poorly configured Dobama long-thin stage where voices don’t carry well to start with and those seated in the extreme stage right and left seats miss much of the dialogue.  (I could just hear the ghost of Donald Bianchi, the theater’s perfectionistic founder, screaming, from the last row, “I can’t hear you,” his epic admonishment to an actor who failed to project.)

Capsule judgement:  Often with plays of new playwrights, over-complicated plots, over-done premises, and the need for extensive cutting waters down the effect of the premise.  This is the case with WHAT WE LOOK LIKE.  The Dobama staging, under the direction of Darius J. Stubbs, does an adequate job of creating as good a production as possible with the often unfocused and overly-long script.

WHAT WE LOOK LIKE runs through May 14, 2023. For tickets:  call 216.932.3396 or go to https://www.dobama.org/ 

Humor, resilence and life-affirmation highlight must-see BECOMING DR. RUTH at CPH

 

It’s been called “exquisite,” “a masterclass performance,” “wonderful,” and “optimistic.” I’d label it “MUST SEE.”  What?  Cleveland Play House’s BECOMING DR. RUTH.   The script, written by Mark St. Germain, premiered in July, 2012 at the Barrington Stage in the Berkshires, played at Hartford Theaterworks, and was brought to NYC’s Westside Theatre, before being reimagined by the Theatre J, the nation’s largest and most prominent Jewish theatre.  It is the purpose of that theatre to “preserve and expand a rich Jewish theatrical tradition and to create community and commonality through theater-going experiences.”  This script does exactly that!   The one-woman show is a heart-warming, have the Kleenex available, theatre masterpiece which stars Naomi Jacobson, who appeared in this production at Theatre-J.  (Note: “The CPH’s production staff is responsible for the sets, costumes, lighting, props, furniture, scenic painting, sound, and special effects used in this production.”)   The 90-minute play, which takes place on June 9, 1997 in an apartment in Washington Heights, New York, follows Karola Ruth Westheimer (nee Siegel) from her birth on June 4, 1928, in Germany, to Switzerland when she was put on the Kindertransport by her parents, through her many moves to such places as Mandated Palestine, where despite being 4 foot 7 inches she joined the Haganah and was trained as a sniper, to France and the United States, and three marriages. She earned an M.A. degree in sociology and a doctorate at 42 years of age from Columbia. Over the next decade, she taught at a number of universities, and had a private sex therapy practice. “Westheimer's media career began in 1980 with the radio call-in show Sexually Speaking, which continued until 1990. In 1983 it was the top-rated radio show in the country's largest radio market. She then launched a television show, The Dr. Ruth Show, which by 1985 attracted 2 million viewers a week.”  Dr. Ruth, a name given to her by one of her listeners, spoke openly, using the scientific and “real-people” language to talk “dirty” while giving clarification and advice about sexual issues.   She changed the way many think and talk about sex and relationships.   The CPH production, directed by Holly Twyford is creatively staged.  With a fascinating set design by Paige Hathaway, lighting by Colin K. Bills, and projections by Sarah Tunderemann, the technical aspects of the show, minus poor sound design, which made listening to the phone calls difficult to understand, are outstanding.   Capsule judgment:  If you only go to one theatrical production this year, make it BECOMING DR. RUTH! Bravo!  Bravo!  Bravo!  The theatre’s public relations states, “Due to the intimate size of the Outcalt Theatre and this production featuring one performer, please consider wearing a mask inside the theatre. Masks are not required, but are encouraged.” BECOMING DR. RUTH runs through April 23rd at the intimate black-box Outcalt Theatre, in the Allen Theatre Complex.  For tickets 216-400-7000 or https://www.clevelandplayhouse.com/

Pleasing AS YOU LIKE IT opens second half of GLT’s 61st season

 

With a repeat of its mission “to bring the pleasure, power and relevance of classic theatre to the widest possible audience,” Great Lakes Theatre opened the second half of its 61st season with a pleasing version of William Shakespeare’s enchanting comedy, AS YOU LIKE IT.    Ironically, the play was the first production of the theater at Lakewood Civic Auditorium, their original home. It was at LCA that the most famous of GLT’s alums, Tom Hanks, starred in his first professional performance, which garnered him a Cleveland Critic Circle’s Best Actor recognition in the Bard’s TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.     AS YOU LIKE IT, was also the first show produced in the Ohio Theatre, the new home of GLT after it left Lakewood and moved to downtown Cleveland in 1982 to become the first resident company of what is now called Playhouse Square, the largest contiguous cluster of theatres west of New York.   According to the program’s notes, “Classic theater holds the capacity to illuminates truth and enduring values, celebrate and challenge human nature and actions, reel in eloquent language, preserve the traditions of diverse cultures and generate communal spirit.  At one point there were many professional theatre companies in the country, but, presently GLT is one of only a handful of American theaters that have stayed the course as a classic theater.”    The play highlights the usurping and injustice on the property of others, but ends, as all Shakespeare comedies do, with reconciliation and forgiveness.  It also uses the Bard’s oft-writing devices of concealed identities and cross-dressing. AS YOU LIKE IT follows its heroine, Rosalind, as she flees persecution in her uncle's court, accompanied by her cousin Celia, to find safety and, eventually, love, in the Forest of Arden.  In the forest, they encounter a variety of memorable characters, notably the melancholy Jacques, who speaks many of Shakespeare's most famous speeches (such as "All the worlds a stage," "too much of a good thing" and "A fool! A fool! I met a fool in the forest").”  Though not the most critically praised of Shakespeare’s plays, the script, which is an audience favorite, the script has been adapted for radio, film, and musical theatre. The GLT staging, with effective scenic and lighting designs by Rick Martin, pleasing costume designs by Kim Krumm Sorenson and incidental music and sound designs by Matthew Webb, is directed by Charles Fee, the theater’s Producing Artistic Director. AS YOU LIKE IT seems like a perfect vehicle for Fee, noted for his love of farcical double-takes, exaggerated characterizations and oft-uncontrolled humorous staging devices.  For some reason, Fee decided to control his usual dynamics and present a more pastoral approach to the script.  Yes, there is humor, but of a more controlled nature than is the Fee trademark. Jodi Dominick is lovely as Rosalind.  Studly Nick Steen is his usual appealing self as Orlando.  Mandi Jenson charms as Celia.  M. A. Taylor makes for an appealing Adam, the faithful servant who follows Orlando into exile.  CAPSULE JUDGMENT:  AS YOU LIKE IT, is an audience- pleasing production, which should make for a fine introduction to the works of Shakespeare for any student groups who will come to the Hanna Theatre as part of the GLT’S mission to introduce not only adults, but students to classical theater. AS YOU LIKE IT runs through April 8, 2023. Next up:  AIN’T MISBEHAVIN’, the jazzy musical celebration of Fats Waller.  April 28-May 2.  For tickets call 216-241-6000 or go to GreatLakesTheater.org