Color and light

Sunday in the Park with George, Roundabout Theater Company, 4/5/08.

I really love Sondheim, and wasn't about to miss this first Broadway revival of one of his most important and rarely-produced shows, particularly as it came very highly recommended from a friend who saw the original run in London. The academic obligations have been brutal recently, so I didn't have time to write this up until now. As for future opera, well, nothing very soon, which has more to do with my personal proclivities than an acute shortage of time (don't like Glass much, no desire to see another Bohème).

Sunday is one of the most Sondheim-y of Sondheim shows, meaning that it is full of the tricky, angular melodies, odd subject matter, and outwardly highly analytic, unsentimentalized storytelling singled out by both fans and detractors. It doesn't have many of the triumphant paeans to inspiration of most art about art, but the ones it has are, well, pretty spectacular. While I'm not as allergic to Act II as some people, my main worry is that for a show that touches on so many interesting complexities, its last 15 minutes somehow feel altogether mundane and generic. "Move on" is too close to today's ubiquitous, meaningless "move forward."

But this production must be seen to be believed. I've seen lots of projection scenery used before. Most of the unsubtle efforts have been unsuccessful (the Wiener Staatsoper's Moses und Aron) and the understated ones much more successful (the Met's War and Peace, the only Tsypin production I like). This production uses more projections than most of these others combined (and very little else) and it is almost faultless. Things that had been painted drops in the original production are projections, but unlike painted drops, projections can move. The set, an elegant set of pure white walls, becomes George's canvas. As he imagines things added or subtracted, they appear and disappear. There's some gimmickry, mostly in some projected dogs and a very silent soldier in Act I, but it's a revelation. The trapdoors between George's painting and the dialogue of the characters are suddenly a visual reality. It all works seamlessly. And it's gorgeous.

Musically, I was less happy. I may have unrealistic standards for musical theater, but, honestly, if you're miking your sound and putting it through a computer you have no excuse if the balance is off. For one thing, the orchestra was far too small, as was the chorus, for the Act I finale to make anywhere near the impression it does on the recording (which probably had more musicians than the original stage production did, recordings are usually augmented). The electronics in Act II had been updated, but were still kind of cheesy. I guess that's the point, at least some of the time. But I think the score lost a good amount of potential grandeur.

I found the acting mostly very good. Neither Daniel Evans nor Jenna Russell have the star power or zing of the original cast, but this didn't seem at all a bad thing. Evans's George is less manic energy and more self-contained and awkward, his voice somewhat nasal and precise rather than melodious. Russell's Dot generous and wise, as is her Marie (in a different way, of course). Her voice does not sound ideal for the role; she sounds more like a soprano than a belter and doesn't always have the chest voice oomph to give Dot's music the punch it demands, but this fits with her more restrained interpretation. The supporting character are similarly sympathetic and uncarictatured, which minimizes the show's occasional tendencies towards brutal satire (with the exception of the Americans in Act I, who are as ugly as ever).

While for me musical reservations are no small matter, I can highly recommend this show on almost every other count. Go see it, God knows when you'll get the chance again.