Patti LuPone
and Christine Ebersole Match Wits in “War Paint”
War Paint
Nederlander Theatre
208 West 41 Street
Opened April 6, 2017
Reviewed by Paulanne Simmons April 14, 2017
Two giants in business and cosmetics
like Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubinstein should be portrayed by
two giants in theater. Clearly Patti LuPone and Christine Ebersole
fit the bill.
Doug Wright’s book for the new musical, “War Paint,”
is based on Lindy Woodhead's dual biography, “War Paint: Madame
Helena Rubinstein and Miss Elizabeth Arden: Their Lives, Their Times,
Their Rivalry” and the 2007 documentary film “The Powder
& the Glory” by Ann Carol Grossman and Arnie ReismanIt.
The musical presents the life of the two women as parallel stories.
“War Paint” is a study in contrasts. Arden (Ebersole),
né Florence Nightingale Graham, was a farm girl from Ontario
who dropped out of nursing school. Rubinstein was a European Jew
whose father kept a shop in Krakow. Arden reinvented herself as
an American blue-blood. Rubinstein turned herself into European
royalty.
 |
| War Paint : Jennifer Rias, Steffanie Leigh,
Christine Ebersole, Mary Claire King, Stephanie Jae Park. Photo
by Joan Marcus |
However, both Rubinstein and Arden realized there was great marketing
potential in convincing women they could make themselves beautiful,
or at least a lot better looking, with the right kind of care and
cosmetics. If they were willing to spend the money.
Of course, “War Paint” takes considerable license with
the facts. Although Arden and Rubinstein were business rivals, there
is no evidence they ever met or had any personal animosity toward
each other. Not so in this inventive musical.
In “War Paint,” we see Arden and Rubinstein vying to
dominate not only the market but also the men in their lives. In
fact, they make these men so miserable Arden’s husband Tommy
Lewis (John Dossett) defects to Rubinstein, and Rubinstein’s
marketing maven, Harry Fleming (Douglas Sills) abandons her business
for Arden’s. The men eventually have their say in “Dinosaurs.”
Scott Frankel (music) and Douglas Sills (lyrics) have created an
engaging score, and director Michael Greif keeps LuPone and Ebersole
holding the fort on their side of the stage when they each sing
their version of songs like “If I’d Been a Man,”
“Face to Face” and “Beauty in the World.”
Ensemble numbers “Behind the Red Door” and “My
Secret Weapon” highlight what made these women so different,
so dynamic and at times so difficult. They also set their careers
in the context of mid-20th century America, when middle-class women
were in the home and wealthy women were at tea.
And oh those hats! The inimitable Catherine Zuber has dressed these
women from head to toe with an elegance that will make many women
turn pale with envy. But the hats are the crowning glory and a delight
to behold.
Although Dossett and Sills are formidable veterans and do their
best to give their characters life, they are no match for Ebersole
and LuPone, just as their real life characters do not appear to
have been able to hold their own next to their powerful bosses.
Hopefully Dossett and Sills enjoy standing on the stage with Lupone
and Ebersole as much as the audience enjoys watching them from their
seats.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Patti
LuPone and Christine Ebersole in War Paint
A Double Display of Delicious
Divadom
War Paint
Playwright: Doug Wright, Director: Michael Greif
Nederlander Theatre
208 West 41 Street, New York City
www.warpaintmusical.com, Phone: 877-250-2929
Opened April 6, 2017, Open End Run
Reviewed by Edward Rubin
It is no surprise that Patti LuPone and Christine Ebersole two
of Broadway’s most beloved Tony-winning performers, each with
their own cadre of diehard followers, are filling the seats at Broadway’s
Nederlander Theater. It is equally unsurprising that the audience
goes over the moon after each Scott Frankel (music) and Michael
Korie (lyrics) War Paint song that they sing. And there are some
twenty of them. They must realize that this is History in the Making,
heaven-sent if you will, for having two knock ‘em dead Broadway
stars singing their hearts out for the price of one, is a treat
of great and rare proportion.
Add to this two talented, albeit underused, male leads, John Dossett
and Douglas Sills, who play the much needed foils to these two wonder
women, a thicket of beautiful leggy Elizabeth Arden sales girls,
Helena Rubinstein’s beauty technicians, and cosmetic customers
who inhabit War Paint’s minor roles. Backing up the actors
are a slew of surprisingly inventive and ever-changing confection
of colorful sets (David Korins), costumes (Catherine Zuber), and
lighting (Kenneth Posner) – pink and red are the reigning
colors du jour – and you will quickly understand the verbal
wows emanating from the audience, as well as the riotous standing
ovation at curtain call.
War Paint, obviously written with two star-turn, glove-fitting
roles in mind by Doug Wright of Gray Gardens, The Little Mermaid,
Hands on a Hardbody, and I Am My Own Wife fame, the latter which
garnered him a Tony, Drama Desk, and Pulitzer (2004), covers the
lives of cosmetic titans Polish born Jewess Helena Rubinstein (1872-1965)
and Elizabeth Arden (1881-1966) the child of a Canadian farmer during
the years 1935–1964. For inspiration, as the program tells
us, Wright turned to Lindy Woodhead’s book War Paint and Carol
Grossman’s and Arnie Reisman’s documentary, The Powder
& The Glory. This said, scenes are fictionalized and dates rearranged
for dramatic purposes.
|
| War Paint : Jennifer Rias, Steffanie Leigh,
Christine Ebersole, Mary Claire King, Stephanie Jae Park. Photo
by Joan Marcus |
While the script as written does not dig deep, it does cover, in
sketch-like fashion, the major events in Rubinstein’s and
Arden’s parallel appearing lives. We see them at their beginnings,
watch their companies grow at breakneck speed, partake in their
decade’s long rivalry with each other, and meet the main men
in their lives, Arden’s philanderer and lush of a husband
Tommy Lewis (John Dossett), and Rubenstein’s gay business
manager Harry Fleming (Douglas Sills), both of who eventually switch
their allegiance to their bosses’ rival. We even get to sit
with the cosmetic goddesses as they make duel appearances before
the Food and Drug Administration to defend the ingredients in their
products.
As wonderful as soprano Christine Ebersole cum Arden is –
and the lady does have a couple of sensational show stoppers - it
is the in-your-face belter Patti LuPone’s Rubinstein who commands
the most on stage attention in this show, as Rubinstein did in her
every day life with her exotic wardrobe and jewelry, her thick European
accent, and fast-flying zingers. “There are no ugly women,
only lazy ones,” is one of her more famous quotes. As far
as the cool and collected Arden, who is just as conniving and underhanded
in business as Rubinstein, Ebersole effectively channels this quintessential
Wasp, society accent and all, with great emotional delicacy.
The shows most annoying weakness is its structure which appears
to bend over backwards in equalizing the amount of stage time and
the number of songs that each actress is allotted. So we get LuPone
followed by Ebersole who is followed by LuPone who is followed by
Ebersole ad infinitum. There are a couple of welcome breaks in this
back and forth routine; the most exciting being a chance meeting
at The King Cole Bar at the St. Regis Hotel between Tommy Lewis
and Harry Fleming.
Recently discarded by their bosses Dossett and Sills finally get
to show their considerable chops in a dramatically satisfying song
aptly titled Dinosaurs. Lamenting the fact that they are no longer
relevant, they sing about being replaced by Charles Revson “a
two bit carnival barker in an Italian suit whose products are found
in drug stores right next to chocolate bars and Bromo Seltzer.”
We were “once behemoths with an appetite for blood”
they sing, and now we are “lapping up prune juice like puddles
in the mud, ruthless but as toothless as their roar.”
Another break from these seesawing scenes actually shows a young
and highly energetic Revson (Erik Liberman) the founder of Revlon,
trying to interest Arden and Rubinstein in his many shades of lipstick
and nail polish. Being conservative and loath to change their path
he is readily dismissed by both women. Unlike Revson, who jumped
at the opportunity, they also turned down turned down an offer to
advertise their products on TV. The Program, The $64,000 Dollar
Question. For them the very thought was vulgar. As fate was to have
it, Revlon eventually acquired the Elizabeth Arden Company for a
$419.3 million in 2016.
Obviously, what excitement exists resides in this Michael Greif
directed production is in watching LuPone and Ebersole, across many
story-telling scenes and songs have a go at each other. Along the
way we see and hear, out of the mouths of These Dueling Divas, about
the complexities of the cosmetic industry, the beauteous wonders
it bestows on women, and the challenges these two legends face on
being a woman alone, a CEO no less, in a man’s world. Towards
the end of the play, late in the lives of both Rubinstein and Arden,
a bit of sadness creeps in as both women look back on what they
accomplished or perhaps did not accomplish in their life.
Ebersole’s most moving number is Pink, poignantly delivered
after hearing that her Board of Directors is looking to find her
successor, someone younger and in touch with the trends at the soda
shops and drive-ins. They want to license the name Elizabeth Arden
along with the color pink, the signature color of all of her products,
driving Arden to question how she will be remembered in the future.
“In years to come” she asks, “will I be thought
of as a legend or some ageing erstwhile juvenile in pink. Will pink
be my one accomplishment to last, when I am put out to pasture.”
Forever Beautiful, delivered during a business meeting concerning
a foundation that Rubinstein wants to set up is LuPone’s knockout
number, helped along in part by numerous portraits that famous artists
such as Dali, Dufy, Picasso, Laurencin, and Tchelitchew, to name
but a few, painted of her. Advised to sell them, one by one, as
each painting descends from on high, balking at the very thought,
Rubinstein explains in song why she will never sell any of these
works. “These portraits, they will never age. They will live
forever...Look at them all. Their light will never dim! If death
should come for me, they bar the door on him. Though flesh may fade,
canvas lives immortally! And there I’ll hang for all eternity.”
In the scene, coming just before the finale, the playwright has
Rubinstein and Arden, who if we are to believe history, not only
never met but assiduously avoided each other during the decades
of their reign meet by chance during a meeting of the American Women’s
Association at the Barclay Hotel. Unbeknownst to the other, each
has been invited to talk about beauty in changing times. Sequestered
in a waiting room they are forced to deal with each other. Though
this premise sounds corny, their meeting is funny, sad, wistful,
loving, and extremely poignant. It is the musical’s most moving
scene. Not being a whistle-blower, I dare not tell you more. For
more, you are going to have to get thee to the theater.
Theater: Nederlander Theater
Theater Address: 208 West 41st Street
Phone: 877-250-2929
Website: warpaintmusical.com
Running Time: 2 hrs, 30 min
Genre: Musical
Author: Book: Doug Wright. Music: Scott Frankel. Lyrics: Michael
Korie
Director: Michael Greif
Choreographer: Christopher Gatteli
Cast: Patti LuPone, Christine Ebersole, John Dossett, Douglas
Sills, Barbara Jo Bednarczuk, Patti Cohenour, Mary Ernster, Tom
Galantich, David Girolmo, Joanna Glushak, Chris Hoch, Mary Claire
King, Steffanie Leigh, Erik Liberman, Barbara Marineau, Donna Migliaccio,
Stephanie Jae Park, Jennifer Rias, Angel Reda, Tally Sessions
Technical:
Sets: David Korins, Costumes: Catherine Zuber, Lighting: Kenneth
Posner
Critic: Edward Rubin
Date Reviewed: April 2017
