Of all the many kinds of performing arts, the toughest to pull together and get produced may be music theater, especially new music theater. In addition to finding the right playwright, producer, director, actors and designers, you have to add song and dance to the effort, which makes the already complex collaborative process even riskier to attempt and harder to develop. And, besides that, it’s all so expensive.
Given the difficulties of mounting a new musical, it’s a wonder that some of them do come to fruition and that a few of them are actually successful. As hard as it gets, people still keep trying to get their show on the boards.
One way of shepherding a musical to success is to give its creators a chance to solve problems and tweak strong points in an extended out-of-town tryout. That’s the traditional form followed in the past by such classics as “Fiddler on the Roof,” “Hello, Dolly!” and, in a more recent Chicago example, “The Producers.”
Far from Broadway
In a variation on this formula, some musicals now are being developed in not-for-profit theaters, far from New York. That was the case with “The Full Monty,” which had its tryout time in the not-for-profit Old Globe Theatre in San Diego; and in our new season, Goodman Theatre is readying a high-profile musical based on the drama “The Visit” for its Oct. 1 premiere here.
However, since the triumph of “A Chorus Line,” which was developed after extensive workshopping, there has been a growing tendency to put a musical on its feet through workshop productions or staged readings. There’s a danger in this method, since sometimes the workshops, in which the viewer can imagine the scenery and costumes, turn out to be far more interesting than the fancily finished product. And occasionally, even after a brilliant workshop run-through, the show is never heard of again.
Whenever the sorry history of the musical “Seussical,” a patchwork affair that tanked last season on Broadway, is introduced, people who were there for its legendary workshop production say, “Oh, but you should have seen it then. It was so wonderful.” Librettist James Lapine and composer William Finn had a successful workshop of their musical “Muscle” in New York last season, then brought it to Chicago in an unsteady, unfinished production at Pegasus Players. Glenn Close and Harry Connick Jr. famously played the leads in a once-only workshop of a production of “Pal Joey,” directed by Frank Galati, but the show fizzled when its producing organization, Livent, went bust.
What’s more, says Terrence McNally, librettist for “The Full Monty,” “The Visit” and the lost “Pal Joey,” “Too many shows get workshopped to death. All the life is squeezed out of them as they go through these endless workshops.”
The most recent hopeful to enter the staged reading level of development is “A Shine on Your Shoes,” which had its first outing two weeks ago as part of the new “music theater initiative” of the Ravinia Festival in Highland Park.
Written and directed by Leeds Bird with musical direction by Kevin Cole, this is a “new” musical using old tunes, in the fashion of “Crazy for You” and “My One and Only,” the 1930s tunes in this instance being by composer Arthur Schwartz and lyricist Howard Dietz.
For the staged reading in Ravinia’s Bennett-Gordon Hall, the actors carried their scripts and wore casual dress. Cole, his back to the audience, provided piano accompaniment, and Bird acted as master of ceremonies, setting and bridging the gaps between scenes. There were no dance routines, although Bird said he had seen them many times, “in my mind’s eye.”
The musical’s story, lovingly (and perhaps a little too much) steeped in theater and film history, concerns a gang of likable show business artists engaged in producing the legendary Schwartz-Dietz musical revue of 1931, “The Band Wagon,” at a small Michigan college. For years, they’ve been given a generous grant to produce such revivals, but at this point, a new bottom-line executive is in charge of the funding foundation, and there’s some doubt about the grant being continued. Fortunately, the new man is also young and romantic, and he soon falls in love with one of the musical’s pretty producers. After several complications, a bit of sadness, a lot of comedy and a trip to Mackinac Island, the show goes on and the lovers stroll off to the tune of “Dancing in the Dark.”
Dollars and cents
The 20 actors, many of whom had appeared two nights earlier in Ravinia’s concert staging of “Sweeney Todd,” were totally ingratiating, Bird was an engaging host, and Cole’s piano playing was a marvel.
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And, of course, you can’t beat such evergreen Schwartz-Dietz songs as “New Sun in the Sky,” “I Guess I’ll Have to Change My Plans,” “I Love Louisa” and “That’s Entertainment.” Without costumes, without scenery, without elaborate lighting, when a singer such as Paul Allesandro steps up to deliver a lovely, poignant rendering of “Something to Remember You By,” there’s beauty on the stage.
How well that first taste of “A Shine on Your Shoes” translates into a full production is not yet clear. As McNally points out, the goodwill generated by a successful staged reading can dissipate when the time comes to think about the dollars and cents of a big production.
Meanwhile, hope springs eternal; Cole and Bird are waiting to see what comes of their new work. And, just in case, they’ve got another show, with songs by Jerome Kern, waiting in the wings.