Sweeney Todd

Sweeney Todd - The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
a kate west review
music & lyrics by Stephen Sondheim
book by Hugh Wheeler
directed by John Doyle
at the Ahmanson Theatre
Center Theatre Group
135 North Grand Ave, Los Angeles 90012
playing March 11 - April 6, 2008
contact 213-628-2772 or www.centertheatregroup.org

The much-talked about Tony-award winning new Broadway production of "Sweeney Todd" has arrived in Los Angeles. John Doyle (the same director who brought the new version of Sondheim's "Company" to New York) directs Stephen Sondheim's acclaimed operatic piece about a bloody barber this spring.

Sweeney Todd (played by David Hess), a long-suffering British barber (formerly Benjamin Barker), whose wife and child were cruelly stolen from him by an abusive Judge, returns to London years later to wreak revenge and falls in with his mad match Mrs. Lovett (Judy Kaye). In this take, the Greek-like tragedy is accompanied by stylistic orchestration and staging which, while certainly innovative, tend to take away from the raw emotion and passion of the story's essence.

The cast is strong, especially Lauren Molina as Todd's lost daughter Joanna and Judy Kaye as the nutty meat pie maker Mrs. Lovett, who takes in Todd and inspires him to start slaughtering people ("A Little Priest"). Frustrated over not being able to reach his nemesis the Judge, Todd grows even more reckless ("Epiphany") and it sends him closer and closer to the edge, until the final destruction consumes all. There are some inexplicable casting choices, such as Pirelli, the outrageous rival barber, being played by a woman (Katrina Yaukey), and while it is interesting that every cast member plays a musical instrument, it is also a gimmick that steals some richness from the original piece.

This production plays more like a stylistic concert version of a once-dimensional and multi-layered musical. The actors literally play out to the audience and do not make eye contact with each other or connect, leaving us even more disconnected. The essential horrific barber chair is missing and the blood and gore is also representational, with the actors donning red spattered white jackets when killed and red paint poured from bucket to bucket. The violence is so stylized in fact, that it distills and objectifies the intensity we should feel.

The music is still Sondheim great ("The Ballad of Sweeney Todd", "Johanna", "Green Finch and Linnet Bird") and the voices all Broadway quality, but the stories don't always come across and if you bring a friend who has never seen the show, he/she may be lost. For instance the "By the Sea" number where Lovett conjures up such delightful visions for the disillusioned Todd would read better with more nuance as would sweet Tobias (Edmund Bagnell) reassuring Lovett that nothing will harm her ("Not While I'm Around"). Every relationship, from the dueling barbers ("The Contest") to Anthony (Benjamin Magnuson) pursuing Johanna in "Ah, Miss" and "Kiss Me" and Todd grimacing through "Pretty Women" with the Judge would be better served with more interaction between the players.

The set is one towering piece on the back wall where the actors take props they need from time to time - another stylization, along with a not-too-subtle interchangeable coffin. To those not familiar with the story, it is about retribution and vengeance and how bitterness corrupts the victim more than the aggressor. It is a dark and tragic tale and the opera-like score deserves an epic-like production, in emotion and visual riches, but this modern minimisation diminishes the overall effect and may leave many cold and untouched.

The Original Score:
Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1979 Original Broadway Cast) Read more!

Tim Burton's Sweeney Todd

Sweeney Todd
The Demon Barber of
Fleet Street
a kate west review
DreamWorks & Warner Bros.



Pairing quirky film director Tim Burton (“Pee-wee’s Big Adventure,” Nightmare Before Christmas”) with Stephen Sondheim's darkly bloody musical "Sweeney Todd" seems like the perfect macabre fit. And for the most part, the movie works fairly well. But there are a few lapses. Primarily, much of the main cast do not come from Broadway or sing professionally. As theatrical genius Sondheim creates complex, discordant scores, this presents a bit of a challenge.

Johnny Depp is Sweeney Todd (formerly Benjamin Barker), a long-suffering British barber, whose wife and child were cruelly stolen from him by the envious Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman). He returns to London years later to wreak revenge and falls in with his mad match Mrs. Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter). The Greek-like tragedy unfolds more and more bleakly as the story goes on and Burton knows quite well how to provide a somber and terrifying mood in spite of some musical shortcomings.

Depp takes on this musical challenge gamely, and is a black demonic Todd, indeed. Although his voice is less Broadway and more pop, it works for him and his wretchedly tortured misery pervades all nicely. Weak link Helena Bonham Carter on the other hand, is grossly miscast. She sings pathetically weakly (“The Worst Pies in London” and “A Little Priest”) and her subtle performance does not fit the grotesquely extreme character of Mrs. Lovett, the psychopathic meat pie maker (Broadway fans will remember Angela Lansbury bawdily booming her little heart out). She looks nightmarish enough, but needs to be much bigger in order to posses the role of someone who can so strongly influence the demon barber of Fleet Street. After all, she needs to convince Todd to butcher people for pies (not that he needs much convincing in his crazed state).

The supporting roles are all fine, such as Alan Rickman’s brooding and lecherous Judge Turpin and audiences unanimously delight in Sacha Baron Cohen’s outrageous rival barber Signor Adolfo Pirelli. The young and rambunctious barber’s assistant Tobias Ragg, earnestly played by Ed Sanders, is a special highlight of the film (sweetly singing of Pirelli’s magical elixir and “Nothing’s Going to Harm You” in devotion to Lovett). Jayne Wisener is all right, if a little wispy and airy, as Todd’s lost daughter Johanna (“Green Finch and Linnet Bird”) as is her love, Anthony Hope (Jamie Campbell Bower). Timothy Spall is a properly slimy henchman to the Judge as Beadle Bamford.

Musical theater purists may protest some of the necessary cinematic changes, such as cutting the operatic opening number which sets the tone for the stage show and basically narrates the story in the grand old fashioned style of ancient tragedy. But since the film medium is one of narration in itself, we don’t need such heralding. The rest of the tunes are intact, including Depp’s eerie introductory “London”, the weirdly delightful “By the Sea” Mrs. Lovett sings to Todd, in foolish hope of a normal life. The makeup, costumes and set are quintessential Burton and most of the acting is quite strong. Again, the main problem is the inconsistent singing.

The constant blood and gore absolutely define Todd’s character as do the dire consequences of one’s action. Abject life and death lessons are to be learned here. If you approach the film as a specific adaptation of a certain work, of Burton’s version of a Sondheim story, it can work for you. Go with someone unfamiliar with the musical, without prejudice, so you can see it with fresh absurdist eyes. No plot giveaways here, just prepare yourself for deep tunnels of horror.

Directed by
Tim Burton

Produced by
Richard Zanuck
Walter F. Parkes
Laurie MacDonald
John Logan

Written by
John Logan
Christopher Bond (story)

Music by
Stephen Sondheim
Hugh Wheeler

Cinematography
Dariusz Wolski

Editing by
Chris Lebenzon

Starring
Johnny Depp ... Sweeney Todd
Helena Bonham Carter ... Mrs. Lovett
Alan Rickman ... Judge Turpin
Timothy Spall ... Beadle Bamford
Sacha Baron Cohen ... Signor Adolfo Pirelli
Jayne Wisener ... Johanna
Jamie Campbell Bower ... Anthony Hope
Laura Michelle Kelly ... Beggar Woman
Ed Sanders ... Tobias Ragg
Anthony Head ... Ballad Ghost
Peter Bowles ... Ballad Ghost


The Original Score:
Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1979 Original Broadway Cast) Read more!

Sunday In The Park With George

Sunday In The Park With George
a kate west review
music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim
book by James Lapine
directed by Oanh Nguyen
musical director Bill Strongin
at the Chance Theater
5552 E. La Palma Avenue, Anaheim 92807
contact (714) 777-3033 or www.chancetheater.com
Thursdays-Sundays
August 3 - September 16, 2007
(Bob Simpson as George; photo courtesy Doug Catiller)

Fed up with recent unusually unfavorable reviews, famed musical composer Stephen Sondheim declared a break from theatre in order to write mystery novels. He quickly changed his mind however, after being newly inspired by an intense discussion on a particular work of art and an artist he could readily identify with. He soon opened "Sunday in the Park with George" on Broadway in 1984, in collaboration with James Lapine. It garnered a slew of Tony nominations, the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and most impressively, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and it remains one of Sondheim's most brilliant and lyrically beautiful musicals to date.

The George in the title refers to the neo-impressionist French painter Georges Seurat (1859-1891), whose new "Pointillism” technique* was initially ill received and created much critical controversy. He approached his art scientifically, carefully studying all different classes of people to put into his paintings, using color to balance emotional harmony, much the way a composer might create musical harmony. Small wonder that Sondheim was so drawn to his story; art is harmony, after all, and Sondheim is expert at blending seeming discordance into surprising harmony.

Seurat's most famous oil painting, “Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte,” (an agonizing two-year project), is literally the set piece for the musical. The show takes place in two eras, that of the 1800's when George first creates his masterpiece and that of the 1980's, which involves speculations on possible Seurat descendants and the timeless effect of the painting's legacy.

In the Chance Theater's production, Bob Simpson is the definite highlight of the show. He is a sincere and contemplative George Seurat, obsessively focused on minute details like "Finishing the Hat" in his grand work of art, to the exclusion of all else around him, including the woman he claims to love, Dot (warmly portrayed by Lowe Taylor). The show is completely about George, from his unique perspective, which explains why only those closest to him have any real character resonance, rather than just one-dimensional characters in a painting.

Dot (yes, like a dot of paint) represents the mysterious woman appearing so prominently in many of Seurat's pieces, a possible mistress he tried to keep secret until after his death (apparently Madeleine Knobloch, mother to his child). She starts out a spunky illiterate woman of feeling, fancying simple pleasures like going to the Follies, who, under George's manic and worldly influence, transforms into a quieter, more mature woman in charge of her own life. Inevitably, she finally leaves George ("We Do Not Belong Together"/"Move On") in the end, child and all. Taylor has a real immediacy and accessible stage presence.

Simpson and Taylor have many lovely strongly emotional scenes together, and while Taylor is the stronger singer, Simpson absolutely holds his own. He has a fun turn imitating two different types of dogs happily yipping and yapping at one point, as well as maintaining a quiet tortured intensity when attempting normal social interaction, so alien and uncomfortable for such an internal artist. And both of them transition well into the second act, when Simpson plays the frazzled modern artist supposedly descended from Seurat, who presents his laser marvel Chromolume #7 (taken from Seurat's language of using lines and color intensity called Chromoluminarism.) Taylor is his endearing grandmother Marie, who cautions us that life is about more than connecting dots of paint, that we must connect with people too ("Children and Art").

But for the most part, the rest of the ensemble is a bit weaker, unfortunately, and some of them are not quite up to the demands of the complicated musical score (Jonathon Lamer was fine as Jules, George's rival and friend). Also, with such a stylized script, the actors might want to clarify emotion in the simplest ways and not indicate as much (granted, presentational style is always tricky). The production itself appears a little over-ambitious for the small space and might suffer from the producers need to be original. For instance, Set Designer John Robinson inexplicably uses spackled paint, which jars with the projected beauty of the Seurat paintings. And while it may be a more convenient and clever device to use reverse cutouts sliding from the wings, the actual colorful cutouts used so sparingly go better with the back projection, artistically speaking. The general projected effects are O.K. in general, although they might work better viewed from afar. Cassandra L. Stone's costuming was nice, and in keeping with both periods and Musical Director Bill Strongin and his musicians did a fine job as well.

Director Oanh Nguyen might have given the audience a longer time at the end of the first act to drink in the effect of the actors sliding into position and creating an actual living painting ("Sunday"). Again, in such a small space the effect would be much more enhanced had the audience been seated further back, in order to appreciate the overall stage composition. The lights did come down a tad early. The crowd's cacophony leading up to George's frustrated shout of "Order!" works up to a point. Nguyen stages everything fine, balancing movement with stillness, but his company is just not up to the demands of the production. Since his actors comprise manifestations of characters from the painting, except for Seurat himself, the quintessential and imaginative observer, the whole cumulative effect works visually, more or less, just not theatrically. Ensemble pieces such as "The Day Off" and "It's Hot Up Here" are general crowd pleasers though.

The modern second act is a good follow-up, delving into financing art, a necessary skill of which Sondheim is probably all too painfully aware ("Putting It Together"). Seurat never learns to deal with real people's emotions, yet profoundly moves everyone around him and gives us insight into a brand new perspective. The classic misunderstood artist, dead by age 32, never having sold a single painting. In the show, he comes to understand his surroundings only through the next generation. Nguyen tries to be sensitive to this conflict in the artist in his staging which is really the key to mounting this show. It is most important to be true to the integrity of the story, that of balancing color, light and harmony with the struggle of humanity within the artist. And of course the musical score is sublime, and Sondheim's best.


*Refers to breaking up the surface of the painting, by painting pure dots of color on the canvas to create pure color. Viewed at a distance, the dots appear to fuse together, creating brilliant color. The human eye blends the colors instinctively. The "Sunday in the Park" painting is currently in the permanent collection of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Get the original Broadway score:
Sunday in the Park with George (1984 Original Broadway Cast)

Read more about it:
The Science of Art: Optical Themes in Western Art from Brunelleschi to Seurat Read more!

A Little Night Music

A Little Night Music
a kate west review
music & lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by Hugh Wheeler
directed by Scott Ellis
at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion, 135 N. Grand Avenue, L.A. 90012
July 7 – July 31, 2004; Contact (213) 972-8001 or www.losangelesopera.com

Stephen Sondheim, the preeminent voice of the sophisticated musical, is so prolific that it is impossible to list all of his beloved works of musical art. “A Little Night Music,” one of his best-loved and familiar musicals, first appeared in the late 1980’s and may be classified as an operetta (like “Sweeney Todd,” another Sondheim masterpiece). Known for his ability to take on complicated projects, Sondheim understood that it is not easy to deconstruct an Ingmar Bergman film (in this case “Smiles of a Summer Night”) and turn it into an audience-accessible musical. But if anyone can do it, Sondheim can. The current production at the Los Angeles Opera does fine justice to the stylish piece. Starring such Broadway luminaries as Zoe Caldwell, Victor Garber and Judith Ivey, Sondheim’s tale of lost love touches a cord, even while couched in the moral ambiguity of adultery.

Fredrik Egerman (the irresistibly suave and debonair Victor Garber), has married again, this time to the young virgin Anne (Laura Benanti) and his brooding son Henrik (Danny Gurwin) is quite obsessed with her. Meanwhile, Fredrik’s old love, the prominent stage actress Desirée Armfeldt (the dynamic Judith Ivey), has taken a lover, the married Count Carl-Magnus Malcolm (booming Marc Kudisch), but is unhappy with her dim-witted catch. She is secretly pining away for real love and feeling guilty about her fatherless daughter Fredrika (Ashley Rose Orr on certain evenings). Her grandmother, Madame Armfeldt (the immeasurable Zoe Caldwell), hovers in the background, commenting on the foolishness of youth, disapproving especially of Desirée’s nomadic lifestyle while raising Fredrika as her own.

Count Malcolm has problems as well, oblivious of his jealous long-suffering wife, Countess Charlotte Malcolm (Michele Pawk), who plots with Anne to get revenge against the husband-stealing actress Desirée. He only wants Desirée as a trophy, having no real feelings for anyone other than himself. He is furious that Fredrik, after seeing Desirée in a play, has gone back to her, partly frustrated by not consummating his new marriage and partly because he cannot seem to stop thinking about her. Fredrik’s home life torments him. His young wife Anne does not appreciate her older husband and his intellectually tortured son does not appreciate his own youth.

“A Little Night Music” is essentially a story about losing your only love, not appreciating what you have right in front of you and denying growing older (as evidenced by Fredrik’s falling for an 18-year old while still in love with Desirée). The only healthy, normal, vibrant character of the piece with no neurosis or hang ups is the servant girl Petra (Jessica Boevers) illustrated best when she sings the beautiful “The Miller’s Son.” She meets a man she likes, having enjoyed many men along the way, pursues him and they end up together without any agonizing discussions, a shining example to the rest of the wealthier phobic group that it is possible to find uncomplicated happiness. Countess Malcolm makes a half-hearted attempt at subterfuge, but as all the characters soon learn, it is not that much fun and not what they really want. Rather than pursuing what they do not need and running away from the truth, they are better off shedding the pretense and just following their hearts. After a climactic duel, most of the characters recognize how to be happy and there are even some surprising love matches.


Director Scott Ellis has assembled a fine cast, wonderfully integrated into the musical brilliance of the Sondheim score. From the famous “Send in the Clowns” to the upbeat “The Glamorous Life” and the tongue-in-cheek “You Must Meet My Wife,” the production showcases the best in theatrical talent. The three leads are a special treat but the rest of the cast is delightful as well and everyone involved from the Choreographer Susan Stroman to the Costume Designer Lindsay W. Davis maintains an operatic and just perfection. This production offers not only great entertainment but also a strong message of love and life. It may force you to think but it is well worth exercising a few extra brain cells in order to fully appreciate the evening’s outcome. Kudos to the Los Angeles Opera.

A Little Night Music (1973 Original Broadway Cast) Read more!

Passion

“Passion” by Stephen Sondheim
a kate west review
at the East West Players, David Henry Hwang Theater
120 Judge John Iso Street, Los Angeles 90012, (213) 625-7000
Running September 10 – October 5, 2003

Most Sondheim musicals are difficult to stage, given the complexity of the music as well as the emotional depth each character exhibits. The East West Players do a fine job in their recent show “Passion.” From the fascinatingly dark set design (Victoria Petrovich) to the particular and economical directing by Tim Dang (also Artistic Director), this production certainly does justice to one of Sondheim’s best later works.

This achingly powerful and passionate story shows us the obsessive lengths to which someone in love will go. Handsome soldier Giorgio, aptly portrayed by Michael Dalager, is stationed in a strange, far-off barracks. There he befriends the host, Colonel Ricci (Orville Mendoza), brother to the odd, house-bound, invalid Fosca, exquisitely played by Jacqueline Kim. Fosca becomes immediately enamored of Giorgio and her passion for him initially repulses him and drives him away but he gradually sees that he cannot get her out of his mind and ultimately succumbs to her chronic seduction. At first he believes that he is in love with Clara (Linda Igarashi) who is a married mother. She refuses to leave her husband and that inspires Giorgio to see that Fosca’s twisted love for him is the only true passion in his life. From beginning to end, each character undergoes profoundly painful change in realizing the potential for deep passion. The climax of the play is a dramatic duel between Colonel Ricci and Giorgio, over the honor of Fosca.

While Michael Dalager (Giorgio) demonstrates the wonderful emotional resonance of a tortured lover, it is Jacqueline Kim as Fosca who steals the show. She perfects the consumptive’s sickly cough and the awkwardness of a deeply shy and backward woman who finds the strength to become her own woman, through the fierce love she has for Giorgio. Her characterization is inspired and her stage presence magnificently compelling. Orville Mendoza as the Colonel and Michael Hagiwara as Doctor Tambourri are among the minor characters who are not as strong in the ensemble but the main characters are well up to the task of creating magic.

Scott Nagatani does a fine job as Musical Director, not an easy feat with a Sondheim musical. The dark music is slightly discordant which serves to remind us that love does not follow normal paths in life and that there is never one true definition. Overall, the production is very strong musically and the dramatic conflicts well played out. It is well worth checking out this intensely odd and poignant piece.

Passion (1994 Original Broadway Cast) Read more!

Sunday in the Park with George

Sunday in the Park with George
a kate west review
Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, Book by James Lapine
Director: Calvin Remsberg, Musical Director: Allen Everman II, Artistic Director: Les Hanson
West Coast Ensemble, 522 N. La Brea Avenue, Los Angeles (323) 525-0022
March 14 through May 4, 2003


Stephen Sondheim’s Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning musical masterpiece, “Sunday in the Park with George” comes to vibrant life in the West Coast Ensemble’s delightful new production. Having seen their spectacular production of “Cabaret” a few years ago I was anticipating wonderful things. Most of my expectations were met from the clever set design (a blank white canvas eventually turned into a gorgeous work of art) and lovely costumes to the well-defined ensemble cast and outstanding directing by Calvin Remsberg.

The George in the title refers to French painter Georges Seurat (1859-1891), whose most famous piece, “Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte,” is literally the set piece for this musical. Stef Tovar is a wonderfully sensitive and haunted George, depicting Seurat’s artistic obsession (in the brilliantly written songs “Color and Light” and “Finishing the Hat”) as the necessary element to achieve greatness, but causing him to fail at human relationships. He is at least partially redeemed in the second half, when his descendent and modern counterpart, also named George, becomes frustrated with the art world (“Putting It Together”) and with the help of his grandmother Marie (Dana Reynolds), realizes that it is family that holds people together.

Less strong is Dana Reynolds’ weary lover, Dot, who cannot hold on to Seurat, as she finally realizes in the songs “We Do Not Belong Together” and “Move On.” The rest of the cast performs well, most of them portraying characters from the painting in the first act as well as modern art aficionados in Act Two. Some standouts include Steven Connor’s Jules, a rival of Seurat and Jan Sheldrick as Seurat’s mother.

The two best moments in the musical occur when we see the fruition of Seurat’s hard work come to life as the actors actually become the famous painting and then start complaining about being stuck there (“Sunday” and “It’s Hot Up Here”). The other is the finale when the same characters return to serenade the modern George with another rendition of “Sunday,” defining the moment where family history and the nature of art come together. There are many such enchanting moments which completely absorb the audience into a magical musical Sondheim world. James Lapine’s story also superbly conveys the complexities of life vs. art.

This is not to say the production was completely flawless, however. Musical Director Allen Everman II needs to have a stern word with his brass section as they were often tentative and even slightly off-key. Aside from that, this production is as poignant, charming, sincere and well-executed as the original Broadway version. And as musicals are finally coming back into vogue, I recommend treating yourself to a good Sondheim musical.

Sunday in the Park with George (1984 Original Broadway Cast) Read more!