| Whatever the merits of the source material are, and they're considerable, this revival undermines them at every turn. The design is ugly with conspicuous "squares" in the drops, the book scenes are rushed, the choreography is energetic but doesn't grow naturally out of the songs (which, in the original, emerege elegantly from the book scenes), the staging is flat, the humor is forced, and the two leads, to my disappointment, have substituted "fake crack-ups" instead of earning the laughs, which I haven't seen since Ann Miller and Mickey Rooney in Sugar Babies. Of course, the audience loves fake crack-ups, feeling like they're in on something, but it smacks of desperation. The entire production is mechanical, without a genuinely felt moment. |
