during the course of thomas wolfe’s book, “you can’t go home again”, the title metamorphoses from the physical to the metaphysical. george webber, wolfe’s protagonist author, cannot return to where he grew up after he receives death threats and the like because he wrote falsely derogatory tales of the inhabitants of his home town. the story then crosses over into our realm; basically paraphrasing another cliche: “you can’t capture lightning in a bottle”. a moment in time is just that; a moment. it cannot be preserved indefinitely, like a photograph. in life, there is no “pause” button (unless you live in the “twilight zone”). i love cliches. the best thing about them is that they are usually based in fact. if you have ever gone to a high school reunion (i have not), you may find that lapsed relationships from long ago can be rekindled as though hours, not years, have passed, or that the people you spent the entirety of your formative years with are now complete strangers.
three decades and change ago, the musical “evita” was the toast of broadway. the much hyped and ballyhooed reunion of patty lupone and mandy patinkin, currently playing at the barrymore theater on 47th street played to a (way) less than full house and after seeing the show, i can see why. the reviews of the show questioned the material and they were pretty much correct. during the short first (40 minute) act, lupone does a servicable job of most of the songs, but shines in sondheim’s “not getting married today” from the musical, “company”. i couldn’t figure out when she breathed during that song. mandy, on the other hand, seemed as though he was trying to sing in a key that was either too low, perhaps so he and ms. lupone could sing together, or too high, where his voice lost much of its power, at times barely projecting more than a whisper. the first act ended with a bit of hilarity as they danced together while gliding around the stage on a pair of rolling chairs, singing a song i had never heard before: “april in fairbanks” from the completely (well evidently ALMOST completely) forgotten “new faces of 1956″.
the second act saw them change strengths. patty sung “evertything’s coming up roses” from the musical “gypsy”. ana and i saw what must have been the 624th revival of this show a few years ago, and even though patty lupone is one of our favorite chanteuses, she did not come within a country mile of the late, great ethel merman. ethel went to school right here in queens, graduating as ethel zimmerman from bryant high school in long island city. the woman had what must have been the most phenominal (not to mention, powerful) voice EVER. she simply did not need a microphone. when she belted out a song, it wasn’t a skinny little leather belt, it was an industrial strength, 12 ply, woven steel and aramid fiber job. her voice was so strong, you could have probably heard her in the next time zone.
they both did great on (naturally) the two songs from “evita”, but the lack of costumes and scenery led to feeling of
disingenuousness, as though they were performing on a late night talk show. i was kind of surprised that they did not sing more songs by sir andrew lloyd weber, until ana reminded me about the famous pissing match that lupone and weber got into after he recast the role of norma desmond in “sunset boulevard” when it moved from the east end to broadway. at least for that one brief, shining moment, the duo sounded like the way they SHOULD sound. over the decades, your brain has been programmed to believe that songs are supposed to sound like the way that you are accustomed to hearing them, and that brings up an interesting point. once you get used to the way something sounds, can any other version top it? can a revival EVER be better than the original? is it possible that a new version can come along and become the new “standard” by which all others are compared? is jose feliciano’s ‘light my fire” better than the original by jim morrison and the doors, or is it SO different that it, in effect, became a new song altogether? we saw patty lupone in “anything goes” a while back. we sat in the second row, and got spit on by the star, while watching her lips warble and her throat vibrate on the sustained notes. it was fantastic! “evita” was one of the first shows we saw together back in the stone age (or so it seemed). we have tickets to see the revivals of “anything goes” with sutton foster, and “evita” with ricky martin. do they stand a chance of surpassing the originals, or are they destined to wind up in the pile entitled “they were ok, but nuthin’ like the real thing, baby.”
Tags: "ain't nuthin' like the real thing", "anything goes", "april in fairbanks", "company", "everything's coming up roses", "evita", "gypsy", "light my fire", "new faces of 1956", "not getting married today", "sunset boulevard", "twilight zone", "you can't capture lightning in a bottle", "you can't go home again", barrymore theater, bryant high school, ethel merman, george webber, jim morrison, jose feliciano, long island city, mandy patinkin, norma desmond, patty lupone, ricky martin, sir andrew lloyd weber, stephen sondheim, sutton foster, the doors, thomas wolfe
