Musicals have the ability
for those willing to listen to infect your ears with lyrical worms usually left
for the three minute pop songs on top forty stations. At any given moment you
could be belting out the delightful but filthy lines from The Book of Mormon.
You could even go traditionalist on your springtime walks with Oklahoma. I
believe a show has to have an even level of relevance in their songs for the
characters and the story, each song presenting something new in song, dance,
comedy or tragedy. When a show has ever other song crash like a plane on
takeoff, you know your in-flight entertainment is going to be a bumpy ride.
This past Sunday night
Ally and I took up Broadway in Chicago ticket offers of buy one, get one free
to see the limited run of Catch Me if You Can, adapted into a stage musical
from the 2002 charming Steven Spielberg film that reminded us what it was like
for that filmmaker to have fun again. Though the film runs a bit long at the
beginning and end (not uncommon for Spielberg), the performances of Leonardo
DiCaprio and Tom Hanks were dynamite in the true tale of Frank Abignale, Jr,
who by his 22nd birthday in the late 1960’s impersonated a Pam Am
pilot, E.R Doctor and Lawyer, forging enough checks to warrant the F.B.I to
hunt him down for the over two million he stole.
Now, one wonders, as I was
throughout the show, how the heck can you adapt this for the Broadway stage –
you can’t, unless the story changes dramatically. Usually the first act curtain
of a show should have set up everything required to ride itself out for the
rest of the show. Some of the numbers just drag and frankly kind of stink, (Butter
out of Cream, Don’t be a Stranger), making me wonder if the producer’s said to
themselves “Shit, we’ve already committed to this musical and the film story
really doesn’t work as one…just stuff it with songs and get it on stage!”
Catch Me if You Can at the
Cadillac Palace was still setting up circumstances for Frank about four songs
into the second act. Problem is with such a long story, and each of those
impersonation sections of Frank’s life necessary is that you end up rushing the
show to get to the climax of the story where he leaves the Louisiana lawyer’s
daughter. Then, you further root those dancing shoes into the stage with songs
that are better left for nails in coffins. Characters that didn’t deserve as
much time on stage, such as the Italian-stallion mook performance for Frank Sr,
were not nearly as boring as Frank Jr’s ex-fiance belting out a tune that has
little relevance to the show, considering that she’s such a minor character
singing the main climatic number.
Those infectious songs in
Catch Me if You Can by the performances of Frank Jr (Stephen Anthony) and F.B.I
agent Carl Hanratty (Merritt David Janes) were the boards holding back the
water in that sinking ship. The show kicks off what promises to be the story
through Frank Jr’s vision, as if he is on a celebrity T.V with his name, the
dancers living out his life tongue-in-cheek style, video screens broadcasting
Bond-girl like cut-outs to the audience of women and planes in stark 60’s color
patterns. Life in Living Color, sung
by Frank Jr, personifies this airway vision. Stephen Anthony and Merritt David
Janes had great comic timing, eliciting laughs from myself and many audience
members in the unfulfilled seating of the massive Palace. Catch Me if You Can
was certainly a bumpy ride that though had delightful numbers it probably
should have been left as film or taken time to develop the music and lyrics
with what is a great composer in Marc Shaiman.
In my final thoughts I
have to reserve disdain for fellow audience members all around Ally and I. The whiny, high-pitched voices of the men behind us, laughed one does when someone
feels the need to scream for a brief second. The man to Ally’s right fidgeted
by leaning forward and back so many times I thought there was a six foot five
child next to her. Two ass-hats took the open seats in front of us in the
second act, the one guy’s massive Jupiter head blocking Ally’s view. Behind me
and to the left a few seats, two caddy women were drinking copious amounts of
over-priced chardonnay and talking as loud as two friends would in a club before
some of us shushed them into silence. People, for the love of God, leave your
rude and ill-advised choices for your home cinema and let the rest of us who
know how to respect our fellow theater goers enjoy the show! If you can't tell I'm already developing curmudgeon sensibilities at 31 years old.
No comments:
Post a Comment