Reviews
“South Pacific”: The Return of the Real Thing
NEW YORK -- There is nothing like a dame, or like a vintage Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. And there has not been anything like Bartlett Sher’s delightfully satisfying production of “South Pacific” on the New York music-theater scene for a long time. Deft, lightly tough and spunky – in the spirit of Nellie Forbush – it recaptures the period flavor of the piece without merely creating a wistful throwback. Inevitably, fans of the Mary Martin-Ezio Pinza recording are going to draw comparisons, but this show has plenty of vitality of its own, from the moment when a wave of Seabees breaks in over a dune at the back of the stage, the sailors launching their bodies aloft with a Jerome Robbins-like suspension of gravity, leaping headlong into a bygone world.
The show, which opened Thursday at Lincoln Center’s Vivian Beaumont Theater, is a snapshot of a place and time. There is no attempt to make Bloody Mary politically correct, or to integrate the Seabees (the three African-American members of the chorus stick together). The action is set off by the framing device of a typescript facsimile, projected on a screen as the audience enters, of the opening words of Michener’s “Tales from the South Pacific.” (The evening concludes with the same book’s prescient close, forecasting a time when the battles of World War II will seem distant, returning the viewer to the present day.) But the show is also a recreation of a bygone era on Broadway, from the fresh-faced eagerness of its performers to the original orchestrations and – a throwback indeed – a 30-piece orchestra.
Of course, it doesn’t sound quite the same. Amplification, that now-obligatory component of the musical theater experience, functions here like the aural equivalent of museums’ too-thorough cleanings and restorations of Renaissance paintings, stripping away not only the patina of age, but of some of the layers of color as well. There is a bright thinness to the quality of sound. The overture sounded downright anachronistic, as if jazzed up for the 21st century. (The distancing effect of the microphone was symbolized by the orchestra’s placement beneath the floor of the stage; though the floor occasionally slid back, freeing the sound.) And the conception of singing has changed: voices aimed at a microphone, their every aspiration and fricative broadcast into the audience, need only stay on the surface of the music.
This is not a criticism of the performers, who brought a lot to the table, starting with the outstanding choruses – the exuberant Seabees in particular. Kelli O’Hara, as Nellie, veered between trying to channel Mary Martin, singing in her chest voice with all the belt she could muster, and adding a contemporary intimacy, her Southern accent wavering but generally audible, her presence sprightly and engaging (a little manic in “I’m in Love with a Wonderful Guy,” perfectly pitched in “Honey Bun”). Paulo Szot, a baritone who has appeared several times at City Opera, stole the show as an Emile de Becque as hunky and romantic as anyone could wish for; after this, he may never want to go back to opera again. Danny Burstein as Luther Billis, the Seabee entrepreneur with a heart of gold, offered lots of attitude and mercifully little shtick in a very shtick-y part. And Matthew Morrison (who sang opposite O’Hara in Sher’s staging of “Light in the Piazza” here three years ago) was sensitive and high-strung as Lieutenant Cable, with a lovely voice.
But he didn’t really know how to use that voice; in his songs, he reverted to what one might call Croon-Gesang. This was a sign of the real musical disparity between then and now: the voices have gotten smaller, and are informed by the way recordings sound. Loretta Ables Sayre, though warm as a Bloody Mary in full pidgin-English flower, sang “Bali Hai” like a nightclub song, not an esoteric force of nature. O’Hara sang at the limits of her power, and still threw in recording-studio inflections. And it was notable that Szot, who has not bowled me over when I’ve heard him on the opera stage, made such a huge impact (with, among other things, a gorgeous falsetto), even though he had to scale back his voice for the microphones. The original reason to have an opera singer in the role was to create a contrast with a Broadway-style belter, both of whom were singing full-out in an unamplified house; so it was funny to hear Szot, whose voice is not particularly large by opera standards, having to hold back. (It was also clear that he was a baritone singing a role written for a bass; he had a great lower extension, but “This Nearly Was Mine” concluded right at the center of his passaggio, in an area that is very difficult to project – not that there was any need to quibble with the result.)
All this is mere observation. The really good news is that the show holds up so well. A recent glimpse of the awful movie with Mitzi Gaynor had led me to fear another hackneyed production; happily, this is not the case. Indeed, it seems far sturdier and less dated even than recent “Oklahoma!” or “Carousel” revivals. This is in part because of the level of musical inspiration: the score offers a seemingly unending stream of fantastic songs, one classic after another.
But it is also in part because of Sher’s touch. Michael Yeargan’s sets are light and portable, with rattan shades and shadows interspersed with military paraphernalia. Sher keeps the action quick and telling. Cable’s romance with Liat, which can easily descend into soupy sentiment, is swift, credible and bittersweet (he does, after all, leave her); the second act, far slighter and less song-full than the first, becomes a crisp denouement. At the close, after Emile’s return, when the ear, trained on the original-cast recording, expects the lovers to leap into a reprise of “Some Enchanted Evening,” it is a bracing surprise to have them follow the original script, which calls for an understated reunion at the family dinner table, eyes locked. There is no better summation of the kind of fidelity to the original, and the lack of mawkishness, that helps make this show truly a throwback to the good old days and a virtually unmitigated delight.
The show, which opened Thursday at Lincoln Center’s Vivian Beaumont Theater, is a snapshot of a place and time. There is no attempt to make Bloody Mary politically correct, or to integrate the Seabees (the three African-American members of the chorus stick together). The action is set off by the framing device of a typescript facsimile, projected on a screen as the audience enters, of the opening words of Michener’s “Tales from the South Pacific.” (The evening concludes with the same book’s prescient close, forecasting a time when the battles of World War II will seem distant, returning the viewer to the present day.) But the show is also a recreation of a bygone era on Broadway, from the fresh-faced eagerness of its performers to the original orchestrations and – a throwback indeed – a 30-piece orchestra.
Of course, it doesn’t sound quite the same. Amplification, that now-obligatory component of the musical theater experience, functions here like the aural equivalent of museums’ too-thorough cleanings and restorations of Renaissance paintings, stripping away not only the patina of age, but of some of the layers of color as well. There is a bright thinness to the quality of sound. The overture sounded downright anachronistic, as if jazzed up for the 21st century. (The distancing effect of the microphone was symbolized by the orchestra’s placement beneath the floor of the stage; though the floor occasionally slid back, freeing the sound.) And the conception of singing has changed: voices aimed at a microphone, their every aspiration and fricative broadcast into the audience, need only stay on the surface of the music.
This is not a criticism of the performers, who brought a lot to the table, starting with the outstanding choruses – the exuberant Seabees in particular. Kelli O’Hara, as Nellie, veered between trying to channel Mary Martin, singing in her chest voice with all the belt she could muster, and adding a contemporary intimacy, her Southern accent wavering but generally audible, her presence sprightly and engaging (a little manic in “I’m in Love with a Wonderful Guy,” perfectly pitched in “Honey Bun”). Paulo Szot, a baritone who has appeared several times at City Opera, stole the show as an Emile de Becque as hunky and romantic as anyone could wish for; after this, he may never want to go back to opera again. Danny Burstein as Luther Billis, the Seabee entrepreneur with a heart of gold, offered lots of attitude and mercifully little shtick in a very shtick-y part. And Matthew Morrison (who sang opposite O’Hara in Sher’s staging of “Light in the Piazza” here three years ago) was sensitive and high-strung as Lieutenant Cable, with a lovely voice.
But he didn’t really know how to use that voice; in his songs, he reverted to what one might call Croon-Gesang. This was a sign of the real musical disparity between then and now: the voices have gotten smaller, and are informed by the way recordings sound. Loretta Ables Sayre, though warm as a Bloody Mary in full pidgin-English flower, sang “Bali Hai” like a nightclub song, not an esoteric force of nature. O’Hara sang at the limits of her power, and still threw in recording-studio inflections. And it was notable that Szot, who has not bowled me over when I’ve heard him on the opera stage, made such a huge impact (with, among other things, a gorgeous falsetto), even though he had to scale back his voice for the microphones. The original reason to have an opera singer in the role was to create a contrast with a Broadway-style belter, both of whom were singing full-out in an unamplified house; so it was funny to hear Szot, whose voice is not particularly large by opera standards, having to hold back. (It was also clear that he was a baritone singing a role written for a bass; he had a great lower extension, but “This Nearly Was Mine” concluded right at the center of his passaggio, in an area that is very difficult to project – not that there was any need to quibble with the result.)
All this is mere observation. The really good news is that the show holds up so well. A recent glimpse of the awful movie with Mitzi Gaynor had led me to fear another hackneyed production; happily, this is not the case. Indeed, it seems far sturdier and less dated even than recent “Oklahoma!” or “Carousel” revivals. This is in part because of the level of musical inspiration: the score offers a seemingly unending stream of fantastic songs, one classic after another.
But it is also in part because of Sher’s touch. Michael Yeargan’s sets are light and portable, with rattan shades and shadows interspersed with military paraphernalia. Sher keeps the action quick and telling. Cable’s romance with Liat, which can easily descend into soupy sentiment, is swift, credible and bittersweet (he does, after all, leave her); the second act, far slighter and less song-full than the first, becomes a crisp denouement. At the close, after Emile’s return, when the ear, trained on the original-cast recording, expects the lovers to leap into a reprise of “Some Enchanted Evening,” it is a bracing surprise to have them follow the original script, which calls for an understated reunion at the family dinner table, eyes locked. There is no better summation of the kind of fidelity to the original, and the lack of mawkishness, that helps make this show truly a throwback to the good old days and a virtually unmitigated delight.
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