Hock-a-doo!

Memphis

Hock-a-doo!

The Ruth Page Center for the Arts will be rockin’ and shakin’ for the next couple of months with the pulsating beat of 1950’s era rock ‘n roll, rhythm and blues. Joe DiPietro and David Bryan’s head-bobbing, hand-clapping, foot tapping 2010 four-time Tony Award-winning musical has finally arrived in a local Chicago production, bringing with it an evening of unbridled joy to usher in the Spring. Electrified by Daryl Brooks’ inspired and artistically perfect direction, this production is as moving as it is exciting. It features an onstage bandstand of polished accompaniment by Musical Director Jermaine Hill, along with over two hours of spirited, period-perfect choreography, magnificently crafted by Christopher Carter, who also assisted Mr. Brooks in staging this story. Mr. Carter is assisted in choreographing by Reneisha Jenkins.

The show is loosely based on real life Memphis disc jockey, Dewey Phillips, who was a pioneer in bringing so much effervescent, bubbling black music to white radio audiences and record-buyers. The somewhat predictable story tells of fictional Huey Calhoun, a young, white man from the other side of the tracks, who wanders one night into Delray’s, an African American Beale Street club. He’s drawn by his love for the infectious, soulful music, as well as the voice and beauty of the club’s phenomenal female vocalist, Felicia. This story, with its unabashed examination of the racial tension that raged during the early Civil Rights Movement, offers a score of R&B, rock, gospel and New Orleans blues.

As Felicia, Aeriel Williams is honest and natural, yet extraordinarily powerful and poignant, as the African American songstress with a dream of becoming a recording star. She stops the show with her powerhouse voice while moving the audience with genuinely touching moments of anguish, vulnerability and strength. Liam Quealy, every bit as charismatic as Broadway’s Chad Kimball (who created the role), is a bundle of energy. This gifted young man is so likable, as well as being a supremely talented actor/singer/dancer, in his own right. His hilarious exclamations of “Hock-a-doo,” his earnest love and devotion of Felicia and his rendition of such songs as “The Music of My Soul” and “Memphis Lives in Me” are impassioned and inspiring.

Chicago’s own Lorenzo Rush, Jr. brings his magnificently glorious voice and domineering presence to the role of Felcia’s brother, Delray, stopping the show cold with his passionately sung, “She’s My Sister.” As Bobby, the always outstanding James Earl Jones II, so terrific with his breakout hit song, “Big Love,” is a bottled up dynamo just waiting to bust loose. He plays this affable custodian turned singer with grit and honesty. And boyishly handsome Gilbert Domally eventually overcomes a terrible childhood trauma to find his own voice and strength through friendship, in “Say a Prayer.” The 50’s have never sounded more joyful.

Mr. Brooks’ spectacularly gifted ensemble, all of whom sing, dance and portray multiple supporting characters, is simply brilliant. Jacob Voigt is particularly excellent as Huey’s employer and reluctant supporter, Mr. Simmons. Nancy Wagner manages to make Huey’s racially opinionated mother, Gladys Calhoun, lovable. Her breakout song in Act II, “Change Don’t Come Easy,” is like the explosive burst of a bottle rocket. Both Ryan Dooley, opening the show as a drawling DJ at an all-white radio station, along with several other roles, and Isaiah Silva-Chandley, very funny as Buck Wiley and Martin Holton, are ensemble standouts. In fact, every singer and dancer in this musical could be the star of his or her own musical. There are no weak links in this chain! 

Porchlight Music Theatre has become another “Broadway in Chicago” with their latest production. It features a fluid scenic design by Jacqueline and Richard Penrod and stunning array of period costumes by Bill Morey. Beautifully acted, sung and danced by some of the city’s most skilled talent, directed with spirit by Daryl Brooks, masterfully accompanied by Musical Director Jermaine Hill and creatively choreographed by Christopher Carter—this is one of the finest productions by an excellent theatre company. It’s phenomenally performed, majestically produced and, quite simply: Hock-a-doo not miss this production!

Highly Recommended

Reviewed by Colin Douglas

Presented April 24-June 16 by Porchlight Music Theatre at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn Pkwy, Chicago.

Tickets are available at the box office, by calling 312-337-6453 or by going to www.porchlightmusictheatre.org.

Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.

A Comedy That’s For the Birds

Birds of a Feather

A Comedy That’s For the Birds

Finding your soul mate is never a simple matter, whether you’re a heterosexual male and female, two men or a couple of women. But just imagine the difficulties incurred by a pair of same-sex birds, especially when they’re in captivity. Two male penguins in New York’s Central Park Zoo became world-famous celebrities when, together, they became a bonded pair, and then incubated, hatched and raised an abandoned chick. What’s surprising is that Roy and Silo were a same-sex couple. 

The story of these two chinstrap penguins was the subject of a 2005 children’s picture book, And Tango Makes Three, co-written by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson and illustrated by Henry Cole. While it won numerous awards and citations, the book became the center of controversy and figured in numerous cases of censorship. Its strong themes of family, love, acceptance and adoption were overlooked by conservative parents who objected to their children reading about homosexuality.

Writer and playwright Marc Acito, author of How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship and Musical Theater, adapted the children’s book into a two-act comedy, with serious overtones. Acito meshed the story of Roy and Silo with the tale of another pair of very real wild birds, Pale Male and Lola. These two real-life red-tailed hawks became nationally famous when they were discovered nesting on the ledge of a New York condo.The birds’ high-rise home was torn down but they continued to rebuild their nest and raise their young in the skies of the Big Apple. Add to the stories, one pair of birds in captivity, one pair of birds who were free, a couple of subplots about human beings. They also experience their own problems with coupling. Acito demonstrates through his play that whether a couple is straight, gay, animal or human, finding your mate and maintaining a solid relationship is never easy.

In this Chicago debut, directed with obvious love and care by Jacob Harvey, all of the characters are portrayed by a cast of four talented and very likable young actors. Marika Mashburn, always a treat in no matter what role she undertakes at the House Theatre, is delightful as a lonely Manhattan Zookeeper. She also opens the play as Paula Zahn, in a spot-on impersonation of a bitter, professional woman. Abu Ansari, another talented veteran of several House Theatre productions, is very funny as a nerdy Birder, as well as real-life millionaire, Richard Cohen.

But this production truly belongs to the two youngest actors who lovingly play both pair of birds. Paul Michael Thomson, seen in CST’s “Shakespeare in Love,” Brown Paper Box’s “The Baltimore Waltz” and The Greenhouse’s excellent “Machinal,” is terrific as both Roy and the Pale Male red-tailed hawk. He has a romp with a few other characters, as well, demonstrating his dramatic and comic versatility. His two birds couldn’t be more different as he shape-shifts into each role with ease. Handsome Aaron Kirby has performed at Drury Lane, Indiana Rep, The House, the Goodman and Redtwist Theatre (where he was twice nominated for a Jeff Award). Kirby plays Roy’s caring partner, Silo, as well as their grown daughter chick, Tango. He also dons a curly wig to portray Lola, the red-tailed hawk who’s Pale Male’s current mate. Both actors seamlessly morph in and out of each role with ease and their chemistry together onstage is always caring and considerate.

Christina Leinicke has fashioned a wardrobe of creative costumes that help delineate each character that this gifted quartet undertakes. She does an especially good job with the two pairs of adult birds, as well as with Roy and Silo’s grown daughter. Thanks to Ms. Leinicke, the actors can easily switch from one costume to the next in the shadows, created by Lighting Designer Will Coeur. Mr. Coeur is also responsible for creating the panoramic projections of various Manhattan locales, viewed upon Joe Schermoly’s semicircular backdrop, which is a big part of his scenic design that morphs from the zoo’s penguin house to the top of a high rise building. And Jeffrey Levin has amassed an array of realistic sounds and original music that enhance Mr. Harvey’s well-directed production.

This play isn’t perfect, but the production is. It has a few scenes that clutter up the main plot and add unnecessary bulk to the story. But it’s always entertaining, very funny and raises questions about several issues concerning gender and sexuality. Although the human episodes, especially those of the Birder and the Zookeeper, offer a nice contrast to the avian stories, they could easily be eliminated so that the play could be a single, feather-lined one-act. Marc Acito’s comedy is at its best when devoting its attention to Pale Male and Lola and, particularly, to Roy and Silo. It’s a pleasure to say that this play is, after all, for the birds.

Recommended

Reviewed by Colin Douglas             

Presented April 27-June 17 by the Greenhouse Theater Center,  2257 N. Lincoln Ave., Chicago.

Tickets are available at the box office, by calling 773-404-7336 or by going to www.greenhousetheater.org.

Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.

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Hock-a-doo!

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