The Theatre Guild of Hampden
Presents
GYPSY
A MUSICAL VAUDEVIULLE
March 17-19 and 24-26, 2011
Book by Arthur Laurents
Music by Jule Styne
Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim
Based on the Memoir of
Gypsy Rose Lee
Directed by Mark Giza
REVIEWED BY DONNA BAILEY-THOMPSON
This Gypsy Hits All The Bases
Mark Giza’s production of Gypsy brushes all the corners of this always timely drama-with-music. The attention to the details may be because that’s Giza’s work ethic combined with the fact Gypsy is Giza’s “favorite musical of all time . . . The music, the book, and those wonderful, colorful characters just cannot be beat.”
Beginning with its Broadway debut (1959), Gypsy has received dazzling accolades. Former NYTimes theater critic Frank Rich called it “the American musical theatre’s answer to King Lear.” Another NYTimes critic, Clive Barnes, described the lead character, Rose, as “one of the few truly complex characters in the American musical.”
When Rose is played by an acceptable run-of-the-mill actor, the play cannot reach its full potential. The Theatre Guild of Hampden’s Rose (Debi Salli) is a barn burner. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen Gypsy (stage and screen) but it is the first time I could see Rose not as a single-minded tyrant but as a conflicted woman beset with many issues. Salli’s Rose is multi-layered. The most obvious: her own dreams were thwarted years ago, therefore, she’s living through her kids by shoe-horning her ambitions into their psyches when what they want most of all is their mother’s love and approval for who they are. They might as well pray for water to run upstream.
Debi Salli’s Rose is driven by her own accumulated demons and an ego that fosters bullheadedness. Her outrageousness is both selfish and understandable. When broke, she serves dog food to her family. When irritated (often), she lets invectives fly: “How dare you answer that phone when I’m yelling at you!” When she reminds the young women touring with Rose’s daughters it is bedtime, she sends them off with, “Don’t forget to write to your mothers – for money!” Instead of leaving used silverware on dirty plates, she stuffs the place settings into her purse which she justifies by stating, “We need new silverware.” Her conscience is on hiatus.
Convinced that success can be attained by becoming a show business star, Rose pushes Baby June (Ally Reardon) until she elopes. Without missing a beat, Rose switches to grooming the older daughter, Louise (Kiernan Rushford) whom she’s ignored for years.
Salli’s bravura performance – both drama and clear, multi-expressive singing voice – Rose is an actor’s dream role – honors the parameters of the script, hence the cast is not intimidated but inspired. There’s not a clunker in the cast of 33 plus (some play more than one character).
The faithful swain, Herbie (Brad Shepard), is a schlemiel who turns Rose’s callousness into building blocks that help him to man up. As older daughter Louise, Kiernan Rushford exists in the shadows, compliant, stoical, giving a measured performance. Watching her bloom into the famed Gypsy Rose Lee is a satisfying metamorphosis – for her and her witnesses.
There are scenes of hilarity: a song and dance routine by June and her backup “farm boys” gets to whirling so fast it’s a wonder they don’t turn into melted butter. The lusty strippers (Tina Dora, Michele Lussier, Jeanne Sysocki) come close to stopping the show.
Costuming by Mindy Meeker and Louise Gaito, Musical Directing by Tom Slowick, and Choreography by Kathleen Delaney all add significantly to the enjoyment of this first-rate show. The responsibility of bringing Gypsy to new, vibrant life is a director’s responsibility: Mark Giza’s sense and sensibility prevail.
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