David Hurst takes a look at The Beast in the Jungle:
As she did with John Weidman in Contact at Lincoln Center in 2000, director and choreographer Susan Stroman is breaking the musical theatre form again with The Beast in the Jungle at The Vineyard, though any other comparisons, I'm sorry to say, end there. Inspired by the 1903 novella of the same name by Henry James, widely considered one of the greatest narratives ever written, Stroman's new show, labeled "A Dance Play," finds her collaborating again with two of the three men who helped launch her career: composer John Kander and book writer David Thompson. Together, along with the late, great lyricist Fred Ebb, this quartet of artists created And the World Goes Round in 1994, Steel Pier in 1997 and, most recently, the critically heralded The Scottsboro Boys in 2010. (Thompson also collaborated with Stroman on Harry Connick's ill-fated Thou Shall Not in 2001, but we'll let that sit on the back-burner for the time being.) . . . |
