“That Elusive Brass Ring”
Although carousels that allow passengers to try grabbing a
brass ring as they ride around on their sculpted animals are now rather rare,
we still refer to grabbing that ring as a sign of success. The current Broadway
revival at the Imperial Theatre of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic 1945 musical
Carousel sometimes comes close to that
prize but when the ride stops turning the ring has escaped its grasp.  |
| Company of Carousel. Photo: Julieta Cervantes. |
Many will, of course, disagree, but at least two who were
there when I was will not immediately be able to register their opinions. In
the first instance, the show was only minutes into the substantial “Carousel
Waltz” ballet that opens the program, prettily choreographed by Justin Peck of
the New York City Ballet, when a commotion in the orchestra forced the show to
stop. The stage manager made an announcement over the sound system about a sick
theatregoer and we waited patiently for the stricken person to be carried out before
the dancing could resume.
This being a first for me in over 70 years of Broadway theatergoing,
I leaned over to ask a friend, a well-known theatre critic and scholar, if he’d
ever seen something like it. He said he had, only once, and could still recall
his amazement that an EMS team was able to remove the person in just three
minutes. It took a little longer than three minutes, however, before Carousel began spinning again. Then, as
the audience applauded, the ballet picked up from a few moments before it had
halted.
The show turned smoothly until the second act but, at the
moment when the hero, Billy Bigelow, has slit his throat and his wife, Julie,
rushes to his side, yet another ruckus arose in the orchestra. Once again, a patron
had collapsed. The stage manager’s amplified apology for the disturbance was
heard, a group of men once more lifted and carried someone—who appeared to be
unconscious—out, and the valiant cast, which had left the stage, returned. Then,
as if the show were a video being rewound, Billy lay down to die, Julie knelt
at his side, the action moved backward a few moments, and, as Billy passed
away, Carousel came back to life.
After the show, I asked the guy at the assisted listening
device booth what had happened and he smilingly dismissed the events, saying
vaguely there was nothing to worry about. At which point I wish to apologize for
this disturbance as we return to my report.
As I sometimes do when writing about the revival of a major
work covered in my multivolume Encyclopedia
of the New York Stage, I’d like to provide some background on Carousel edited and abbreviated from its
entry in the 1940-1950 volume. I’m putting it in red so you can skip it, if you
wish, and jump right to my brief reactions to the current production. The plot
summary gives both the original actors and those in the revival.
As before, Rodgers and Hammerstein
based their work on a play, in this case the Hungarian drama Liliom, which had had its American
premiere in 1921, had been revived as recently as 1940, and previously had been
considered for musicalization by both Puccini and Gershwin. Author Ferenc
Molnàr, however, was not interested in seeing it transformed, and only a view
of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! was
able to convince him to allow the Theatre Guild to do the job with R&H. The
composer and lyricist had their doubts about the Hungarian background, though,
and were not convinced that they could do the show until Rodgers came up with the
idea of moving the story to a New England fishing village in 1873. The original
character names were suitably revised. When Molnàr viewed a dress rehearsal,
he, like many of the staff members watching, cried copiously; this led the
Guild’s Lawrence Langner (see his The
Magic Curtain) to worry for the $180,000 invested, as he thought that a
Broadway audience might not relish so sad a show.
More worries were piled on during
the out-of-town tryout when the show ran into second-act problems and had to
undergo numerous revisions and repositioning of the numbers. With suggestions from
Molnàr and the director, the show was greatly strengthened…. One major change
occurred when the Boston audiences would not accept a heaven—to which Billy on
his death—depicted too literally as an austere New England parlor, with a stern
Yankee character called He playing the harmonium, while his wife, called She,
sat primly by. Rodgers, aware of the audience’s unrest, told Hammerstein, “We’ve
got to get God out of that parlor!” Asked where to put him, the composer said, “Put
him on a ladder, for all I care! Just get him out of that parlor!” The
librettist did just that, scrapping the parlor and rewriting the entire scene,
with the deity presented as the Starkeeper, standing on a backyard ladder and
polishing the stars hanging on lines. When the show finally opened in New York,
Rodgers had to watch it from the wings propped up on a stretcher because of an
accident to his back.
The amusement park carousel of the
title is the one at which the loutish braggart Billy Bigelow (John Raitt, in
his Broadway debut; Joshua Henry in the revival) works as a barker. In an
opening ballet sequence Billy meets Julie Jordan (Jan Clayton, in her Broadway
bow; Jessie Mueller in the revival) and tries to date her, although the jealous
Mrs. Mullin (Jean Casto; Margaret Colin in the revival), who loves Billy, looks
on disapprovingly. Julie overcomes her hesitation, accepts, and soon after
tells the news to her friend Carrie Pipperidge (Jean Darling; Lindsay Mendez in
the revival), who is herself enamored of Mr. Snow (Eric Mattson; Alexander
Gemignani).
Billy turns out to be awkward and
inarticulate when alone with Julie, whom he eventually marries (in Liliom they are lovers, not husband and
wife). Julie becomes pregnant, to which Billy takes some getting accustomed.
Having been fired by Mr. Mullin and needing money for his coming baby, the
indigent Billy carries out a holdup with the rascally sailor Jigger Craigin
(Murvyn Vye; Amar Ramasar); when capture is imminent, he commits suicide.
Billy spends fifteen years in
purgatory, where the Starkeeper (Russell Collins; John Douglas Thompson in the
revival) finally allows him to visit earth to perform a good deed and to visit
his teenage daughter Louise (Bambi Linn; Brittany Pollack in the revival). He
discovers her to be unhappy because of the shadow of his reputation. He offers
her a star stolen from heaven, but when she refuses it, his rage erupts and he
slaps her, although she feels no pain (a mirror of what happened in life
between him and Julie).
He must then return to purgatory,
although he does watch Louise graduate from school. She cannot hear or see him
but he somehow inspires her to join in the singing of “You’ll Never Walk Alone,”
earlier introduced by Julie’s cousin, Nettie Fowler (Christine Johnson; Renée
Fleming in the revival).
Elevating the show into the musical
stratosphere was the enormously rich and varied score, of which many songs
became standards. Among them were “Carousel Waltz,” “You’re a Queer One, Julie
Jordan,” “When I Marry Mr. Snow,” “If I Loved You,” “June is Bustin’ Out All
Over,” “When the Children Are Asleep,” “Soliloquy,” “What’s the Use of Wond’rin,”
“Blow High, Blow Low,” “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” “This Was a Real Nice Clambake”
(a reject from Oklahoma!, where it
was “This Was a Real Nice Hayride”), and “The Highest Judge of All.”
Carousel also benefitted
from exceptionally lovely sets and costumes, brilliant choreography, direction
that individualized the chorus members and wove them into the action, and
memorable performances from a cast with first-rate singing and acting
abilities. None of the performers was a star, most of them being completely
unknown. None became as popular as the handsome, powerfully built Raitt, former
University of Southern California athlete. Raitt was back as Billy when the
show enjoyed a lauded revival in 1965, 20 years after the original.
Herewith, a few notes on the current production:
The most recent prior New York revival of Carousel was the highly lauded one at
Lincoln Center in 1994, with Michael Hayden as Billy, Sally Murphy as Julie,
and Audra McDonald as Carrie. The current one, directed by Jack O’Brien,
elevates the role of Nettie to top billing because it’s played by popular opera
star Renée Fleming, who uses her famous soprano in only a handful of songs,
notably “You’ll Never Walk Alone.” Justin Peck, has choreographed an abundance of balletic dancing
(Agnes DeMille was responsible for the original), some of his own ABT dancers—like Ramasar and Pollack—being involved.
 |
| Amar Ramasar (second from right) and company. Photo: Julieta Cervantes. |
It’s a postcard-pretty production, with designs by Broadway
greats Santo Loquasto (sets) and Ann Roth (costumes), supplemented by lovely
lighting by Brian MacDevitt, that sticks close to conventional expectations. (The
Rodgers and Hammerstein estates likely deplore any radical interpretations in
the design, staging, or music.) Audiences will ooh and ahh early on at the
descending carousel’s crown, which opens like an antique toy, and at the fairytale-like
depiction of the afterlife. There are few other surprises in store.
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| Lindsay Mendez, Alexander Gemignani. Photo: Julieta Cervantes. |
As mentioned in my background notes, Carousel’s original out-of-town version created a bit of controversy
because of its depiction of heaven. That vision’s replacement brings to mind
Marc Connelly’s 1930 play Green Pastures,
a resemblance made even more resonant by casting African-American actor John
Douglas Thompson, one of our foremost classical actors, as the God-like Starmaker,
and by dressing him in white like Morgan Freeman in Bruce Almighty. Thompson brings his distinguished bearing and
presence to the role but one wishes the part were meatier to take advantage of
his rhetorical skills.
 |
| Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry. Photo: Julieta Cervantes. |
One might argue that casting baritone Joshua Henry, who is
black, as Billy is also controversial, since it jars with historical probability.
And then there’s the small matter about Billy hitting women. I’ve heard a number of
theatregoer acquaintances raise the connection between these issues but very few
critics have connected the problematic dots. There’s no question that Henry is the most impressive
thing in this production, his explosive rendition of “Soliloquy” alone justifying
his presence. The issue is fraught, and can be argued pro and con, but I’d like
to quote Michael Bracken’s review on the “Theater Pizzazz” website, where,
before praising Henry's potentially Tony-winning performance, he wonders about:
the questionable wisdom of putting on a show in 2018 which involves a man who hits his wife and daughter. Furthermore, that issue—perhaps the ultimate hot-button topic in the #metoo age—is made infinitely more complicated by the fact that Henry . . . is African-American. Indeed, one wonders throughout the show if O’Brien thinks that Henry’s race (and possible mistreatment by the surrounding white community) is meant to be a mitigating factor for this behavior, since it’s hard to tell from the production if this is merely color-blind casting or a social statement.
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| Joshua Henry. Photo: Julieta Cervantes. |
And, in this context, is one permitted to wonder why Billy
and Julie’s daughter, Louise, though exquisitely danced by Brittany Pollack,
looks neither biracial nor anywhere near 15?
In the 1945 production, there were two young children, Bessie (Mimi Strongin), and Jessie (Jimsey Somers), who ran around at the carnival. Since Mimi is a close friend, I was hoping to
see those characters depicted so I could imagine her as she might have been 68 years ago. Thus was I disappointed to discover that there were no kids in this production. Eliminating them is probably common practice.
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| Renee Fleming, Jessie Mueller. Photo: Julieta Cervantes. |
I realize I haven’t gone into critical detail but there are dozens
of other commentaries available (see below) and I’ve already overstayed my welcome. I’ll say simply that this Carousel
grabs a few brass rings but not the big one. It often drags as drama (which isn’t
helped by the long ballets) and frequently seems dated; its leading female
character (though well performed) lacks luster and its hero’s violence and her
weak response are troubling; and its sentimental fantasy about the dead returning
now seems not only precious but childishly naïve; it’s also easier to accept in
Our Town.
That all sounds rough, I guess but there are those other
rings: its score remains one of the best in Broadway history, its singing is
glorious, it’s pleasant to look at, Joshua Henry is sensational, and it still
has the power to moisten your eyes. Enough, I admit, to take a ride on this
Broadway carousel.
OTHER VIEWPOINTS:
Imperial Theatre
249 W. 45th St., NYC
Open run