GUYS AND DOLLS
You’ve Simply Got to Gamble
Theatre Reviewer: Ron Milovac
(August 2009)
[Editor’s Note: We apologize for the lateness of this review… congratulations on a job well done!]
Anytime a community theatre attempts to mount a musical, it’s a gamble. Will enough people audition? Will they be able to sing, dance and act? Will the director be able to assemble a production team that will work cooperatively to stage the best show possible? Sometimes the theatre wins; sometimes it loses, and other times it’s lucky to break even.
The Peninsula Community Theatre opened its season with Frank Loesser’s classic musical comedy Guys and Dolls and all things considered, it comes out more on the winning side. You can bet that it was a good choice of show. Since its debut in 1950 it has been a staple of high school and community theatre stages and has been revived several times on Broadway. It has one of the funniest books ever written and almost every song is instantly recognizable, having been covered by pop and jazz artists since their inception.
Based on a series of short stories by Damon Runyon, Guys and Dolls depicts the lives of colorful New Yorkers who make a living as gamblers, gangsters, chorus girls and mission workers. Director Peter Natale was able to put together a cast that was almost perfect. Some of the guys and dolls seemed a little too young for their parts, but that’s expected and forgivable for a summer show when an abundance of talented high school and college students are available.
When the curtain opened we were treated to a colorful, if slightly crowded, set depicting the Roxy Theatre, the Save-A-Soul Mission and other storefronts. A trio of horse racing aficionados, Nicely-Nicely Johnson, Benny Southstreet and Rusty Charlie sing about placing bets in the “Fugue for Tinhorns.” This trio, energetically played by Trey Gwaltney, Andrew Gardner and Rob Fortner, do a great job with this number, as well as with the title song later in the show. Mr. Natale wisely chose to bring back the trio for it, as it is written to be done just as a duet between Nicely and Benny.
We are soon introduced to one of the lead characters, Nathan Detroit, portrayed by Ted Wilde. Mr. Wilde was a credible Nathan, but was unfortunately upstaged by a very bad fake mustache. It was hard to concentrate on his lines while wondering what that thing was under his nose. He also seems wasted in this part. Mr. Wilde is a solid baritone and Nathan doesn’t do much singing. We learn that Nathan runs a floating crap game and is having trouble locating a spot for the game. Gamblers from all over descend upon the stage singing how reliable Nathan is and how they are certain he won’t let them down. The men’s chorus sounded great. It was obvious a lot of time was spent on teaching the harmonies and credit goes to Mr. Gwaltney for his work as Vocal Music Director.
The next main character we meet is Nathan’s fiancée of 14 years, Miss Adelaide played by Alexandria Adams. She suffers from a cold, which she tells us is caused from waiting so long to be married. In one of the greatest comedy songs ever written for the stage, “Adelaide’s Lament,” Ms. Adams makes us laugh out loud and breaks our hearts at the same time. It’s a bravura performance; her singing and acting are perfection. She takes total command of the stage and we get excited each time she makes an entrance.
Another performer we are happy to see on stage is Meagan Johnson, who plays Sgt. Sarah Brown of the Save-A-Soul Mission. She has a beautiful soprano voice and can act appropriately uptight in the lovely “I’ll Know” or completely inebriated in “If I Were a Bell.”
Other good performances were turned in by Justin Giroux as the Irish cop (and comic foil) Lt. Brannigan, Jym Newton as the menacing gangster Big Jule and Erynn Millard as the mission general who has a very funny cathartic moment in the show-stopper “Sit Down, You’re Rockin’ the Boat.”
The choreography by Jessica Krop is lively, varied and well executed, though some dancers seemed a little self-conscious the first weekend. No doubt they grew more confident during the run of the show. Special mention must be made of Travis Crabtree who flipped his way through the dance section of “Luck Be a Lady.”
So, did PCT’s gamble of producing Guys and Dolls pay off? It’s better than even money that it did.