REVIEWS
2008
'Souvenir' hits high note in Hudson
Bob Goepfert, The Record
08/06/2008
HUDSON - Anyone who has ever sung in the shower will
appreciate the sentiments of "Souvenir" playing at Stageworks in
Hudson through Aug. 17. It is a play about hearing (or seeing) yourself
in a way no one else can recognize.
Florence Foster Jenkins was a real person who thought
herself a brilliant interpreter of classical music. A wealthy woman,
she held annual concerts at New York City's Ritz Carlton Hotel which
drew sold-out audiences and raised a lot of money for charity.
The reality of the situation was that Foster Jenkins
was a terrible singer and the crowds came to her concerts for much
the same reason we want to see plays that close on opening night.
There are times when something is so bad it becomes good.
Clearly, the problem with telling Foster Jenkin's
story is to avoid mocking the woman. If the play is to work, the
audience has to appreciate the woman's love of music and transcend
her non-existent talent. The play should not be delusions. It should
be about the beauty of the music that exists in our heads. Thank
you director Marc Geller for recognizing this.
The device that makes this clear is the role of Cosme
Moon, Foster Jenkins loyal accompanist. We meet him as a man in
his sixties, who remembers working with Jenkins Foster throughout
his thirties. The arrangement starts as an exploitive gig. He will
tell the woman what she needs to hear in order to earn a paycheck.
During their twelve-year partnership, there is a shift in the relationship
as he grows protective of the inept singer about whom he become
very fond.
When the play works as well as it does at Stageworks,
the audience makes the same journey. Director Geller recognizes
Stephen Temperley's two-person play as a memory play - and he wisely
makes Mc Moon an important partner in the production.
Played by John FitzGibbon, McMoon is a New York smart
guy who has comical and a cynical attitude towards life. He is able
to con Foster Jenkins while convincing himself as long as the concerts
remain private functions attended by friends and supporters, no
harm is done. When Foster Jenkins subjects herself to ridicule by
booking Carnegie Hall, the stakes are raised and he becomes her
protector. FitzGibbon's maturity and flip-style of delivering a
line makes him the perfect foil to Foster Jenkins' very serious
approach to music and life.
The play survives or falls on the audience's affection
for Foster Jenkins. At Stageworks, Deborah Jean Templin wisely avoids
all opportunities to spoof the woman and, because she respects the
character, the audience cares about her too. Templin nicely under
plays the role so that we see the woman's dreams as much as we see
the woman. This makes the touching ending a near-uplifting moment.
"Souvenir" is not one of those plays that tries to
make you feel better about being average. Instead, it's a work that
says everyone is special and success is all in your head - right
next to all that beautiful music.
‘Souvenir’ a
beautifully written gem
featuring humor and compassion
By Carol King
Friday, August 8, 2008
With its current production, Stageworks/Hudson is
doing what it does best — presenting a gem of a play, finely
acted on an imaginative, low-gloss set. “Souvenir; A Fantasia
on the Life of Florence Foster Jenkins,” beautifully written
by Stephen Temperley and sensitively directed by Marc Geller, is
a most engaging comedy that combines heart and passion with a steady
flow of gentle humor.
Based on a true story, it chronicles the career of
Florence Foster Jenkins (Deborah Jean Templin), an eccentric New
York City socialite who believes she is the greatest opera diva
of all time. Trouble is, she can’t carry a tune. Her story
is told through the eyes of her long-time accompanist, Cosme McMoon
(John FitzGibbon).
We first meet McMoon in a fashionable supper club,
where he is playing the piano and singing a popular tune. He begins
his narration by explaining that tonight is the 20th anniversary
of Jenkins’ passing. FitzGibbon is a gifted musician, storyteller
and stand-up comic and so the play engages right away. And then
we meet the lady. In the music room of her suite at the Ritz-Carlton
Hotel, she details her reason for hiring McMoon; she hopes to give
a small recital in the hotel’s ballroom and donate the proceeds
to her charities. Once McMoon hears her sing in her unbearable soprano,
he balks. But he reluctantly takes the gig to pay the rent.
Captivating performance
Templin is a truly captivating performer. She acts
Jenkins, a lady of refined sensibilities, with heart-whole, and
sometimes heart-breaking, sincerity and all the confidence of someone
who believes everything she says about herself; she calls herself
“the true coloratura.” The audience is rooting for her
from the start. And her career does somehow take off.
Much to McMoon’s surprise, her little recitals
turn into an invitation to play Town Hall, where she hopes to perform
“The Queen of the Night” aria from Mozart’s “The
Magic Flute.” He discourages her and finally convinces her
that she will strain her voice by singing in “that barn.”
But he cannot stop the juggernaut of her popularity. She is invited
to make a record, which sells thousands of copies, and to ultimately
play a concert at Carnegie Hall.
FitzGibbon’s comically underplayed bewilderment
is priceless, as he wonders if he has been wrong and that the lady
is a genius who has invented a new form. Her audiences, of course,
see her as a laughable oddity, but she hears the laughter as cheers.
The most touching moment of the show — and there
are many — comes when Jenkins questions the reaction of her
Carnegie Hall audience. The affection McMoon feels for the lady
he has come to refer to as “Madame Flo” is never more
in evidence. And her gratitude is tender and true.
Costumes by Dennis Ballard are creative and often
witty and lighting by Frank Den Danto III captures the mood of each
of the play’s various locations.
Souvenir provokes tears and
laughter
By CHARLES KONDEK
08/08/2008
A COMMONLY HELD belief is
that opposites attract. One can currently find proof-positive of
the notion at Stageworks in Hudson, where the second offering of
the 2008 season is no doubt moving patrons to a stirring mix of
tears and laughter with a beautifully nuanced production of Souvenir.
The play is subtitled A Fantasia on the Life of Florence
Foster Jenkins. The author is actor/playwright Stephen Temperley,
who appeared as Rev. Sam in last season's Berkshire Theater Festival's
production of Mrs. Warren's Profession, and the events portrayed
are suggested by real-life happenings of the self-proclaimed coloratura
diva, nicknamed "the first lady of the sliding scale"
in her time.
With this deceptively simple production, Laura Margolis
and staff are once again asserting the words "playing it safe"
are not in their vocabulary.
There are numerous recordings, programs from annual
recitals at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in New York, and a program from
the sold-out 1944 Carnegie Hall concert attesting to Foster Jenkins'
genuineness and, if one must, her eccentricities. Souvenir is a
love story, a love story as deeply felt and as honest and intense
as anything by Charlotte Bronte or her sisters, despite the fact
that there are no bodice-ripping, breathless confessions or heated
confrontations. It is a decidedly must-see love story, and an important
addition to your summer theater experience. If you miss it, I am
positive you'll be doing yourself a huge disservice.
Florence Foster Jenkins, in a mesmerizing portrayal
by Deborah Jean Templin sure to be on every critic's year-end "best
actor" list, is a New York socialite living off an enormous
trust fund. (It was left to her by her father, who disapproved of
her musical aspirations.) Foster Jenkins loved singing, and her
head was abuzz with music 24 hours a day.
She was particularly fond of the vocal works of a
Mr. Mozart, and she considered him a friend. Being a generous person,
Foster Jenkins decides one day to share what she hears with others.
And to facilitate her scheme of offering a series of concerts and
recitals, she enlists the help of first-rate pianist/third-rate
composer Cosme McMoon, played and performed here expertly, and with
considerable facility, by actor/musician John Fitzgibbon.
Despairing of his new situation, which he took solely
to pay his rent, McMoon quickly learns that Foster Jenkins cannot
sing any two consecutive notes in tune. Or any one note, for that
matter. Yet something forces him to continue his employment for
12 years, their relationship deepening right on through, until Fosters'
untimely death from heart failure in a 5th Avenue music store, while
selecting music for her second Carnegie Hall go-round.
As McMoon, Fitzgibbon plays well, stylistically correct
in accompanying Foster Jenkins whether it is a blues standard, a
current '40s pop tune, an aria by Verdi or the Bell Song from Lakme.
Templin does a wonderfully inventive comic turn in
the second act, playing a number of historic opera leading ladies
with amazingly quick dressing and comic timing. She makes it easy
to see what the real Foster Jenkins must have been all about, to
get a sense of what the original was like.
Her eventual distress at not being able to distinguish
laughter from applause and her eventual realization that McMoon
has lied to her is palpable; and Templin carries it off with considerable
aplomb, restraint and dignity. It is an effective sequence in a
performance that should be seen and savored.
Director Marc Geller wisely eschews a go-for-the-laughs,
mean-spirited, camp style. He concentrates instead on the simple
reality of the situation; namely, two people who are nothing to
each other except affectionate and respectful colleagues, both of
whom live in and for music.
Aaron Mastin has designed an understated, practical
set, and the lighting design by Frank DenDanto III could very well
be the best I've seen at Stageworks. The costumes by Dennis Ballard,
especially for the above-mentioned parade of leading ladies, are
quite effective.
This stylish production at the Max & Lillian
Katzman Theater on Cross Street in Hudson will unashamedly tickle
your fancy as it subtly and thoroughly warms your heart.
Musical satire keeps the laughs
coming at Stageworks
By Paul Lamar
Monday, June 16, 2008
HUDSON — “Gutenberg!
The Musical!” is fabulous! You must see it!
Oh, the power of the exclamation point. Sparingly
used, it speaks volumes. Overused, it highlights the emptiness of
the ideas it desperately wants to celebrate.
Broadway wannabes Doug Simmons (Billy Kimmel) and
Bud Davenport (David Tass Rodriguez) punctuate their enthusiasm
for a new musical they’ve co-written with wide eyes, joyous
grins, sweet self-satisfaction at their creative genius, and earnest
hope that we — potential financial backers — will embrace
their show about the inventor of the printing press, Johann Gutenberg.
In fact, they assure us, the strangers sitting next
to us are probably producers looking for the next smash!
So begins the uproarious regional premiere of Scott
Brown & Anthony King’s affectionate take on dreams and
ego. Book writer Doug and composer Bud are 30-somethings who believe
they have an important contribution to make to musical theater.
They’ve jettisoned one idea of writing a show about ALL of
Stephen King’s works in favor of this story of Gutenberg.
The beauty part is that, because he’s from a different time,
they can spice up the history, about which they know little, with
fiction.
Plus, it’s a story with serious themes like
the Holocaust, reading, and following your dreams! In fact, the
show’s finale is a sing-along called “We Eat Dreams.”
To pitch their show, Doug and Bud play all of the
characters (including a wicked Monk and Helvetica, Gutenberg’s
love interest), sing all of the songs, dance (at one point Doug
concludes a number with a split!), and share important personal
back stories (Doug is gay; Bud is a virgin!).
The play’s unending humor comes from the disconnect
between what they’re doing and what they think they’re
doing. For example, early on they suggest that Broadway musicals
follow formulas. There’s the prologue, the “I want”
song, the rap song, the charm song and the big rock finale of Act
I. Of course, they’re partially right about formulas, and
when they open Act II with an indictment of the second acts of famous
musicals, the comments are both funny — and accurate.
Kimmel and Rodriguez are clown princes who never condescend.
Their Doug & Bud sing the various roles with passion, overact
the drama, out-Fosse Fosse, and all with a sweet and daffy sincerity.
Brilliant performances.
The actors are deliciously abetted in their mania
by pianist Jesse Chandler; tech crew Deena Pewtherer, Phil Elman,
and Jennifer Schilanksy; and director Laura Margolis, who must reluctantly,
but rightly, have had to crack the whip on occasion.
Margolis has cleverly exploited the contrast in size
between Kimmel and Rodriguez, by the way, and one can’t imagine
a different kind of pairing.
So, in this day of high fuel prices, make a whole
day of it in Hudson: a walking tour of the town/river, a meal, and
a visit to Stageworks. You’ll be glad you did!
Stageworks takes a rare romp
into musical comedy
By: Charles Kondek 06/20/2008
LAURA MARGOLIS, the founder and artistic director
of Stageworks/Hudson, has been saying for years she knows nothing
about musicals. But by the looks of the current production, Gutenberg!
The Musical! the first offering of the 2008 Stageworks/Hudson season,
Margolis must have taken a very serious, in-depth crash course in
how to direct a musical. The end result is a neat, nifty spiffy
show, which is just about perfect.
This regional premiere production is currently on
view at the Max and Lillian Katzman Theater at 41 Cross Street in
Hudson, where it will remain until June 28. It's the place to be
on a balmy summer evening.
Under Margolis' leadership Stageworks/Hudson has always
been on the cutting edge of theater in Columbia County, presenting
the new, the different, the unusual. Wth Gutenberg! The Musical!
the company is perhaps going down yet another new path. Whatever
the ramifications will be for future seasons, right now the show
is a sugar coated pill that swallows easily and makes you feel so
much better for having taken it. It is an unabashed delight. A real
treat.
In this two-person musical, a pair of aspiring writers
enacts all the parts and sing all the songs of their latest creative
collaboration, sometime wearing three or four hats at once (to help
identify characters). Just the thought of making sure the labeled
hats are stacked in the right order is mind boggling.
The authors, Doug and Bud, are giving a backer's audition
to raise production money, with the Stageworks/Hudson audience in
this case serving as potential producers/donors.
Doug and Bud's new project is a big, splashy treatment,
however tasteless and tacky, about the life and times of the inventor
of the printing press, Johann Gutenberg; the beautiful, dirndl-wearing,
pig-tailed blonde who loves him, and the evil monk who sets out
to destroy them both. (You see if Gutenberg prints words, the people
will learn to read and then those in power would lose control, especially
the Church.)
Bud and Doug give it their all, fully realizing that
the show could make then famous. The result is a rollicking, raucous,
hilarious romp, a clever conceit, a show within a show within a
show.
Gutenberg! The Musical! received three New York Theater
Festival awards and was nominated for two Drama Desk awards. Two
veteran comedy writers, cabaret performers, and satiric improvisers,
Anthony King and Scott Brown, wrote it. Brown originated the part
of Bud in both the New York and London premiere productions of the
show.
Billy Kimmel and David Tass Rodriguez here play the
fame-obsessed authors, Doug and Bud, with uncommon zest and zeal.
Both are area Equity actors with Kimmel having had a few stints
on Broadway.
Kimmel has just returned from a national tour of Annie,
and Rodriguez was last seen as General Santa Anna in the New Plays
Festival at Proctor's Theater, and as Joe in William Saroyan's The
Time of Your Life at The Center for Performing Arts in Rhinebeck.
From their performances, one could easily get the
impression both men have known each other all their lives and have
been performing Gutenberg! The Musical! together for years.
Each complements the other to an extraordinary degree.
They seem to genuinely like and respect each other. Their timing
is impeccable, and the pacing never misses a beat, and it is great
fun to watch them bounce off each other, literally and figuratively.
Both, but Rodriguez especially, have silly-putty faces,
which neither hesitates to twist into a dozen or so shape and sizes
of any gender. Both men also have typical musical comedy singing
voices, strong, effortless and in tune.
Jesse Chandler is the very fine musical director/pianist,
handling the more than pleasant soft rock score with considerable
style. Philip Elman (set and costume design) and Deena Pewtherer
(lighting) deliver their usual solid, professional work.
If you like things fast and funny and molto furioso,
and would like a glimpse of a new facet of Margolis' talent, see
Gutenberg! The Musical! It's a back-stage story the likes of which
you've never seen before. It won't haunt you, keep you awake at
night or ask philosophical questions you're unable to answer, but
it will keep you laughing for two and a half hours, and what's wrong
with that?
Woodstock Times - Theater 6/26/2008
Stageworks's hilarious Gutenberg!
by Violet Snow
If you want to have fun at the theater, go see Gutenberg!
The Musical! in its last performances at Stageworks in Hudson, June
26-29. This two-man show (plus piano player) is a spoof on musicals
and probably the only play ever written about the inventor of the
printing press.
A pair of actor/playwrights, Bud Davenport and Doug
Simon (played by David Tass Rodriguez and Billy Kimmel), present
their musical at a backers' audition, explaining the piece with
nervous exuberance as they play all the parts, using twenty-odd
baseball caps labeled with characters' names, from Helvetica, the
love interest ("They named a font after her!"), to the
evil, power-mad Monk. The townspeople of Schlimmer (including the
Bootblack and the Beef Fat Trimmer) are downtrodden because they
can't read, and Gutenberg plans to become their savior by converting
his wine press into a printing press. The Satan-owned Monk is determined
to stop him from making Bibles and educating the people. Between
scenes, the playwrights express their fervent desire for a big Broadway
producer to take on their show, they then return to singing, dancing,
and acting out the clich?s of modern Broadway, taken to the max.
They are hilarious.
The play was developed in 2003 at the Upright Citizens
Brigade Theater in Manhattan, an improv venue that comes out of
Chicago's ground-breaking Second City troupe. As a one-act, the
piece went on to the 2005 New York Musical Theatre Festival, where
the authors, Scott Brown and Anthony King, played Bud and Doug.
They also appeared in the world premiere of the two-act version
in London. In 2006, a different cast was featured at an Off-Broadway
theater, 59E59, where I saw the show and laughed till it hurt.
Aside from a March 2008 run in Washington, D.C., Stageworks
appears to be the first regional theater to stage the musical, which
is also scheduled for a Chicago production starting at the end of
this month. All praise to Stageworks for its daring in taking on
new, up-and-coming plays.
Having seen the Off-Broadway show, I cannot resist
making comparisons, and I am pleased to report that Kimmel and Rodriguez
(both locally based Actors' Equity members) are every bit as professional
as the Manhattan cast. Pianist and musical director Jesse Chandler,
with his subtle touch and intelligent exploration, brings a higher
level of sophistication to the loopy songs than did the 59th Street
pianist. Both actors have gorgeous voices, Rodriguez projecting
a big, warm baritone that complements Kimmel's tenor, which packs
a surprising belt.
The lyrics, of course, remain absurd, as when the
townspeople sing, "Gutenberg / darn tootin'-berg / he's the
best chap around sure as shootin'-berg." The Schlimmer Beef
Fat Trimmer greets the dawn with "The sun it rises in the east
/ I smell bread rising with the yeast."
If there's anything to criticize, it's that the acting
in the performance layer is too good for these bumbling playwrights.
The actors so skillfully embody the characters of Gutenberg, Helvetica,
the Bootblack, the Anti-Semitic Flower Girl, the two Drunks, the
young and old Monks, and all the other personae of the play-within-a-play,
that they tend to obscure the personalities of Bud and Doug. In
the Manhattan show, the playwrights were more clearly bad actors,
and I have to admit, it was funnier.
Not that you can possibly fail to laugh in Hudson.
("What's foreshadowing?" asks Bud. "I'll tell you
later," Doug replies.) Director Laura Margolis has subtly developed
the relationship between the two men - one gay, one straight - to
an extent not done in the previous production, adding an extra and
stimulating level to audience reaction. Another twist is that Rodriguez
is part Puerto Rican, and he exploits racial stereotypes that make
his characters funny but often disturbing.
Margolis also adds atmospheric touches such as sidestage
scrims that heighten dramatic effect. Luckily, neither she nor the
actors had ever seen other productions of the play, so they were
free to interpret the piece in their own way.
If you care about the printing press, or even if you
don't, Gutenberg! The Musical! is grand entertainment.
REVIEWS
2007
Stageworks
named twice in the first ever "Best Of" list by The Independent
theater critics!
Metroland
Magazine names Stageworks/Hudson "Best Theater Company"
in 2007!
Metroland
ranks Stageworks 2007 production among the "Best"!
Daily
Gazette hails Stageworks 2007 production among the "Top Ten"
PRESS
RELEASES
Available
Press Releases
(Click
on the title for the full article)
STAGEWORKS/HUDSON
MAINSTAGE SEASON
GUTENBERG!
THE MUSICAL!
SOUVENIR
FALLING:
A WAKE
|
by
Scott Brown and Anthony King
by Stephen Temperley
