Theatre in Review: Pippin (Music Box Theatre)

	Andrea Martin and Matthew James Thomas Photo: Joan Marcus

Some actors steal a show; Andrea Martin takes over Pippin the way Sherman took Georgia -- with ruthless efficiency and brooking no opposition. She turns up about halfway through the first act as Berthe, the supposedly ancient grandmother of the title character, a medieval princeling in search of the meaning of life. As a retired empress, notorious for her past amorous adventures, Martin treats each so-so old-lady wisecrack like a comic gem, landing big laughs seemingly without effort. Then she launches into the number, "No Time at All," a feisty-grandma frolic that is an engraved invitation to engage in audience-pandering tricks.

But not for Andrea Martin -- not by a long shot. Armed with impeccable diction, enormous warmth, and the kind of comic timing that money can't buy, she turns the Music Box into her living room, coaxing the audience into a sing-along -- and reminding them, with just a touch of the imperious, that the verse is hers alone. It's all good fun, hands down the highlight of the evening so far. And then the acrobatics commence.

I can't describe what happens next, partly because you wouldn't believe it, and partly because the surprise is the thing. I will say that it involves aerial acrobatics and that I began to wonder if Andrea Martin hadn't sold her soul to the devil. How else to explain that this fine performer -- a woman of certain years -- was so boldly defying time, gravity, common sense? I was not alone in such thoughts because, for the first time since Jennifer Holliday's showstopper in Dreamgirls, I saw a performer get a standing ovation in the middle of the show.

If Martin provides Pippin with its greatest star turn, it is hardly the only one; Pippin thrives on -- indeed, requires -- outsized personalities to put it over. Bob Fosse's original staging was, in effect, an act of theatre criticism: Appalled by the sentimentality of Roger O. Hirson's libretto about an eighth-century flower child's search for personal fulfillment, Fosse all but shooed it off the stage, replacing it with plenty of sinister razzle-dazzle and appending a scorching dance routine to each of Stephen Schwartz's heartfelt folk-pop ballads. It was the ultimate sleight-of-hand staging, and it got Pippin a four-and-a-half- year run.

Perhaps for these reasons, Pippin has resisted being revived: It has popularly -- and not really incorrectly -- been seen as a mass of baby-boomer clichés desperately in need of a touch of all that jazz. And, despite the popularity of Chicago, with its school-of-Fosse staging, there were no doubt serious concerns that a revival of the original product might come off as a dated display of jazz hands. (A good chunk of Pippin was cannibalized for Fosse, the hit 1999 dance revue.)

Cleverly, Diane Paulus' production adds a full complement of 21st-century thrills paying tribute to the Fosse tradition. Pippin's band-of-strolling-players concept has been changed to a circus motif, allowing Gypsy Snider, a Cirque du Soleil veteran, and illusionist Paul Kieve to fill the stage with astonishments: Contortionists twist their bodies into parallelograms; characters appear, disappear, and float in midair; a topless pair of legs crosses the stage, pushing a little cart. At the same time, Chet Walker, a member of Pippin's original cast, has brought his deep knowledge of Fosse technique to bear on the dances -- every sloped shoulder, spread-fingered salute, and rolling pelvis is a salute to the master. Walker has some most amusing ideas of his own, as well, especially the number "Extraordinary," one of Pippin's many laments, here turned into a witty barnyard rumpus filled with an antic cast of animals. The opening, "Magic to Do," has also been rethought, with Leading Player, our host for the evening, seen first as a silhouette then appearing through a slit in the curtain, followed by the other principals and climaxing with a kabuki curtain effect that reveals the entire company performing a battery of circus tricks.

And Paulus has found a cast of personalities that can carry this slightly rickety vehicle even when we aren't being distracted by the hocus-pocus. Terrence Mann plays Charles, the hero's despotic father, in an agreeably hammy turn that suggests Orson Welles in one of his late-career film cameos as a pope or emperor. Mann races through his big solo, "War is a Science," which is no great loss, since it is the show's weakest number, and he applies his best aging matinee idol voice to the business of getting laughs out of the lowest gags. ("Sometimes I wonder if the fornicating I'm getting is worth the fornicating I'm getting.") As his scheming second wife, Fastrada, Charlotte d'Amboise, smiles, tosses her red curls, flaunts her triple-extra-long eyelashes, and vamps her way through an uplifting little ditty called "Spread a Little Sunshine," while plotting all sorts of mayhem. ("I'm just an ordinary housewife and mother -- just like all you housewives and mothers out there," she says, opening her arms to everyone in the auditorium.) Even though she shows up in the long second-act stretch in which Pippin's travails begin to grow tedious, Rachel Bay Jones charms with eccentric and funny line readings as Catherine, the widow who would like Pippin to stick around and manage her estate. She is blithely amusing when advertising her virtues in "Kind of Woman," and brings a lovely rueful, thoughtful quality to "I Guess I'll Miss the Man."

The role of Pippin, who has little to do except take on and discard one enthusiasm after another, all while complaining how empty and vacant he feels, can be a trap for actors, but Matthew James Thomas has plenty of assets -- good looks, a big voice, an affable manner -- that go a long way toward keeping us interested in his problems. He has little trouble making "Corner of the Sky," his big "I want" song and "Extraordinary" into the showstoppers they must be if the show is going to succeed. He also shines in the finale, in which he asserts himself against Leading Player, who, backed by the rest of the company, urges him to flame out in an allegedly glorious act of suicide.

I haven't addressed the issue of Leading Player because the currently starring Patina Miller was out at the performance I attended. Fortunately, her understudy, Stephanie Pope, has plenty to offer. One of the few real Fosse dancers left -- she appeared in Big Deal, the choreographer's last new show -- she assumes command of the stage, poised for action as she fixes us with a glare that could cut through steel, a sneer lurking on the outskirts of her smile. Even in a company of acrobats and contortionists, she distinguishes herself as astonishingly lithe, creeping into the dance numbers with the slyness of a cat about to pounce.

In a production where style is virtually everything, the production design does not disappoint. Scott Pask's classic circus tent design extends into the house and executes a vanishing act of its own during the climax. Kenneth Posner is usually the master of subtlety, but here he provides the highly theatrical lighting approach the show demands, including saturated color washes (especially red), ballyhoos, big crossbeam effects, and shadows. Dominique Lemieux's stunning costumes cling to every sensuous curve of the performers' bodies. Jonathan Deans and Garth Helm's sound design is unusually processed-sounding for a theatre as small as the Music Box, but this may be why the voices sit so comfortably on top of the music. Other contributions are made by Chic Silber (fire effects) and ZFX (flying).

Watching Pippin, it is clear that Paulus has subjected every moment to her critical eye, looking to squeeze the maximum entertainment value out of it. She has also supplied a new ending, which is clever and extremely theatrical -- and yet is not really any better than the original. Then again, there is no finding the core of Pippin; at its heart it remains a dull fable about a wandering youth who finally realizes that real life is better than his ill-formed dreams. But as Bob Fosse and now Diane Paulus have demonstrated, it can still be the occasion for plenty of flash, dazzle, and fun. Pippin was never a good musical, but it can make for a hell of a show.--David Barbour