"Cabaret"
still an intense, chilling lesson about how ordinary people deal with
evil
"Cabaret"
Book
by Joe Masteroff, music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb. Directed
by Sam Mendes.
Based on the play "I Am a Camera" by John Van Druten, based
on stories by Christopher Isherwood.
Studio 54, 254 West 54th Street (between 7th & 8th Avenues), New
York City.
212-719-1300. http://cabaretmusical.com/
Opened April 24, 2014; closes March 2015.
Reviewed by Lucy Komisar May 2, 2014
Take a trip back to Berlin circa 1930. Inside a cabaret, red lamps
light round black tables, a waiter brings wine and food for you, and
scantily clad musicians play jazzy music. It's a charming evening
for a sophisticated audience – or is it?
 |
| Alan
Cumming as the emcee with the Kit Kat Klub dancers, photo Joan
Marcus. |
The decadence is represented by the master of ceremonies
(Alan Cumming), who is in-your-face crude, sexual, raunchy, almost
elegantly so with his white face, glinty eyes and red lips, white
suspenders pulled over a nude chest and twisted around his crotch,
nipples colored red. He has a German accent. Cumming is excellent
and chilling in the role, which he created in 1998 and which is smartly
directed by Sam Mendes. The memorable songs were written by John Kander
(music) and Fred Ebb (lyrics). Orchestra seats set up as cabaret tables
pull you into the drama. If you see one musical these days, make it
this one.
Dancers sing Wilkommen (welcome). And everyone is. Into the cabaret
comes Clifford Bradshaw (Bill Hecht), an American arriving in Berlin
to work on a novel. At the Berlin train station, he had met Ernst
Ludwig, a German who offered him to way to make some money. He just
has to deliver a briefcase. Ludwig is a Nazi. He referred Bradshaw
to Fräulein Schneider's boarding house.
 |
| Michelle
Williams as Sally and Alan Cumming as the emcee, photo Joan Marcus. |
At the club for diversion, Bradshaw meets Sally Bowles
(Michelle Williams), 19, an American singer who is not very sure of
herself or her future, and is sleeping with the club owner who can
help her career.
 |
| Bill
Hecht, as Cliff, Michelle Williams as Sally, Danny Burstein as
Herr Shultz, Linda Edmond as Fraulein Schneider, photo Joan Marcus. |
As Bradshaw appears to be bi-sexual (as was Isherwood,
who wrote the stories on which this is based), he turns out to be
more than a good friend to Sally when she needs a place to stay. Hecht
is fine as the cool American. Williams' voice is rich and sexy, but
she is rather bland and too wholesomely blonde as Sally. She makes
you wish for Liza Minnelli, who did the movie role.
Fräulein Schneider (a very good Linda Edmond) is
keeping company with Herr Shultz (the excellent Danny Burstein), a
Jewish fruit vendor. Also at her boarding house is the prostitute
Fräulein Kost (Gayle Rankin), who does business with visiting
sailors. When Schneider catches her at it and warns her, Kost gets
revenge by telling Ludwig that Schultz is a Jew.
A Kit Kat Klub waiter starts to sing a patriotic song that turns into
the unnerving Nazi theme, "Tomorrow Belongs to Me." Can
Fräulein Schneider marry a Jew. Shultz tells her, "It is
not always good to settle for the lowest apple on the tree, climb
a little. I will catch you." Then a brick is thrown threw his
shop window. And Fräulein Schneider is singing a Nazi song.
The most stunning number shows emcee/Cumming and an actor in a gorilla
suit.
I know what you're thinking:
You wonder why I chose her
Out of all the ladies in the world.
That's just a first impression,
What good's a first impression?
If you knew her like I do
It would change your point of view.
If you could see her through my eyes,
You wouldn't wonder at all.
If you could see her through my eyes
I guarantee you would fall (like I did)
When we're in public together
I hear society moan.
But if they could see her through my eyes
Maybe they'd leave us alone.
How can I speak of her virtues?
I don't know where to begin
She's clever, she's smart, she reads music
She doesn't smoke or drink gin (like I do)
Yet, when we're walking together
They sneer if I'm holding her hand,
But if they could see her through my eyes
Maybe they'd all understand.
I understand your objection,
I grant you the problem's not small.
But if you could see her through my eyes…
She wouldn't look Jewish at all.
 |
| Alan
Cumming as the emcee, photo Joan Marcus. |
Earlier productions excised the word "Jewish."
(I couldn't find a production photo for this scene; maybe it's still
too controversial.)
The collapse of the personal connections in the play trails the collapse
of German society. Cliff wants Sally to come with him to the U.S.
She ignores what is happening around her. She'll hang onto the glamor
of the Kit Kat Klub.
At the end — also not in earlier versions — the emcee
pulls open his black leather coat to show a striped shirt of the kind
worn by camp inmates with the yellow star for Jews and pink for homosexuals.
The darker version belongs.
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http://thekomisarscoop.com |
