Legit Theatre: Adding Machine Profits From Sharp Music, Direction, Staging and Acting

Joel Hatch and Amy Warren

Adding Machine, now playing off-Broadway in the wonderfully intimate Minetta Lane Theatre, is a new musical based on Elmer Rice's classic play The Adding Machine. Rice's original, which took in the dehumanization of man in the face of corporatism and mechanization way back in the 1920s still feels fresh. A story about a man who is fired after years of service and the revenge he takes on his boss is as trenchant as can in these times of looming recession. The adaptation by Next Theatre Company artistic director Jason Loewith and Joshua Schmidt (who doubled on both libretto and music) plays to the original's many strengths while totally revamping the play as a musical with a great deal of the dialogue now sung.

What helps cement this together is the fresh and inventive staging -- Director David Cromer and Scenic Designer Takeshi Kata make brilliant use of the compact stage and the arrangement of the performers in each given scene. We open for instance on Mr. and Mrs. Zero in bed, only the bed is standing on end so that we are looking down upon their supine forms. Later we see Zero's workplace with it's regimented darkly lit row of desks stretching downstage.

The inventiveness of the staging is mirrored by the musical arrangements -- at times dissonant but never tryingly so -- they resolve into bold choruses and break down into mechanistic rhythms.

Joel Hatch plays Mr. Zero with gruffness and bullheaded devotion to numbers. He's unapologetically warts and all. Just as we begin to sympathize with him we are reminded of his close-mindedness and his self-denial. His voice is strong and his look is perfect, his blunt bald head and bulldog stance pounded down by the weight of his own prejudices and the strictures of society.

Cyrilla Baer plays the tricky role of Mrs. Zero, her voice swooping and diving as she alternately gossips and henpecks her husband. It's the most cliched role in both versions of this play and requires the actress to find some humanity within, which Ms. Baer ably does.

The audience's sympathies mostly go to the character of Daisy -- not a number like so many others in Adding Machine but a beautiful blooming flower in love with her boss and trampled down by the world. Amy Warren is terrific at expressing her inner thoughts and tough outer shell, and she gets a great show stopper of a tune in the solo "I'd Rather Watch You", a period 20's style ballad.

The second half of the play has always been the flattest for me -- taking place as it does in the afterlife removes it from the grit of all that has come before. This is the best staging of it I've seen, opened up by the clever set and songs. Joe Farrell's Shrdlu, a self-confessed sinner who is bummed to find no punishment awaiting him also adds considerably to this section.

Adding Machine challenges without being strident and is appropriately faithful to its source without being slavish. I have a hunch this may be Broadway bound so see it while you still can in the intimate confines of The Minetta Lane Theatre.

Xanadu on Broadway: Singing with Tongue in Cheek

My wife and I settled in to watch a preview performance of the new musical Xanadu on Broadway at the Helen Hayes theatre. Yes you really did read that. As the first song unfurled I wasn't quite sure where they were going to take this. Dancers flouncing about in ridiculous Solid Gold-esque costumes, ELO's so cheesy it's wonderful songs and lots of emoting -- this was either going to be po-faced homage or snarky send-up. Neither option really sounded appetizing. Then Kerry Butler, who stars as Greek muse-come-to-life Kira takes center stage and sets the tone for a madcap Mad Magazine style take on musicals, the kitschy 1980 film the musical is based on, celebrity culture, gay culture, Greek mythology, and anything else that strays into writer Douglas "The Little Dog Laughed" Carter Beane's sights. Butler is a star. Even if Xanadu closes after two weeks she should be assured of a bright future on Broadway and beyond. Can she rollerskate? No problem. Sing like Olivia Newton-John (star of Xanadu the film)? Yes, and she takes it one step further by using her considerable range and comic chops to find the humor in the phrasing and breathiness of Newton-John's original performances. Did I say comic chops? Butler is sharp and funny throughout, chewing on Kira's adopted faux-Aussie accent with aplomb. Her physicality is astounding, even on roller skates. You can feel the fun she's having with this challenging and unusual part.

This isn't to slight the rest of a talented cast by any means. James Carpinello plays sweet simple artist Sonny with a touch of earnestness and a dollop of Welcome Back Kotter - era Travoltaness. He also has a rich and clear voice and his wide-eyed line readings mark him out as the shows ingenue. Mary Testa and Jackie Hoffman as two scheming muses nearly steal the show. Their performance of ELO's "Evil Woman" is a major highlight.

The great Tony Roberts is always deserving of his own paragraph -- and here it is. Beane's book takes the Danny Maguire character in an edgier direction than Gene Kelly's portrayal in the film and Roberts finds all the humor and some of the pathos within. His singing is wonderfully characterful and he delivers his lines with the timing of a master. He has even more fun in his dual role as uptight Zeus, and the cast singing of Newton-John chestnut "Have You Never Been Mellow" complete with centaur and cyclops to loosen him up nearly overshadows the actual climax.

Other than the two songs I mentioned previously all of the other music is from the movie score by Newton-John Svengali John Farrar and ELO mastermind/least-famous Wilbury Jeff Lynn. For anyone who grew up in the late 70's and early 80's and had a working radio that means a great big sugary nostalgia rush from songs like "Magic", "Suddenly" and the theme song.

The plot you ask? A muse inspires a mortal to create the apogee of the arts in 1980 Venice California: a roller disco. They fall in love, which is forbidden. This is played for all the ridiculousness inherent in the premise. The only hitch is an ending that, at least in previews, doesn't quite deliver the showstopping umpph required. Some of this may be due to the intimacy of the Helen Hayes theatre, which doesn't allow for much trickery or ga ga sets. The stage is further constrained by the now in-vogue group of seats on the stage itself. While the lack of a giant unfolding Victorian house or an onstage downpour or all the other gimmickry foisted on theatre-goers over the last several years is refreshing Xanadu is by it's nature gimmicky and tacky. As much as I loved seeing the delicious Ms. Butler downstage and singing vampily as a stagehand rose from the audience with a room fan to make her blow around, a little extra spectacle could make the singing of Xanadu - the theme song to the musical of the film, just as cathartically hilarious as "Have You Never Been Mellow" is a few scenes back.

Still this is a real treat. 4 out of five disco balls