#1
Posted: 11/4/06 at 11:49pm
By Jim Farber
THEATER CRITIC
DailyBreeze.com
It's hard to believe that "The Light in the Piazza," which opened Wednesday at the Ahmanson Theatre, won six Tony Awards in 2005; it must not have been a very good year. But then the show didn't walk away with honors for best musical, best book, best actor, best actress or best director.
Adam Guetell did win for best score (and lyrics). But the competition was from Monty Python's "Spamalot" (which won for best musical) and "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee." Most of the show's awards were for technical achievement: the sets by Michael Yeargan, the costumes of Catherine Zuber, and the lighting by Christopher Akerlind (all of which pale in comparison to Los Angeles Opera's snazzy recent update of "Manon.")
"The Light in the Piazza" is based on a 1960 novella by Elizabeth Spencer that became the 1962 film starring Olivia de Havilland, George Hamilton and Yvette Mimieux. Like "The Innocents Abroad," "A Room With a View" and "Summer Time," it deals with tourists taking the grand tour, guidebooks in hand, gawking their way through Italy.
The time is 1953 -- when the country was still emerging from the devastation of World War II. Cinematically, it's the period between the stark neo-realism of De Sica's "The Bicycle Thief," and the sophisticated excess of Fellini's "La Dolce Vita." In this case, the unsophisticated Americans abroad are Margaret Johnson (Christine Andreas), a prim and proper lady of the South, and her wide-eyed daughter, Clara (Elena Shaddow).
Awestruck by one church after another, they find themselves standing in the Piazza della Signoria when a gust of wind lifts Clara's hat into the air. It lands in the hands of a handsome young Italian named Fabrizio (David Burnham). Their eyes meet. It's love at first sight. No questions asked.
The fact they have practically nothing in common and can barely communicate does not matter. It's a match made in heaven. In heaven all things are possible.
Clara's overprotective mother, however, has less faith in miracles. She knows something about Clara that her Italian beau and his family do not -- she is "special," (developmentally challenged following a kick in the head from a pony).
Can this would-be Juliet from Winston-Salem find happiness in the arms of her Florentine Romeo? Will their parents agree to such an improbable (though potentially lucrative) union? Will love conquer all, including Clara's case of arrested development? If "The Light in the Piazza" had been written by Tennessee Williams, these conflicts might produce real drama. They might even provide groundwork for a complex musical.
But in the present case, the adaptation by Craig Lucas (at least in the hands of this cast) is far too simplified. Everything is black or white, which leaves the characters and their conflict without a hint of chiaroscuro -- a guiding principle of Renaissance art.
Burnham (who has an impressive voice) offers the most ardent performance. But after a while his heart-on-sleeve protestations (in Italian and faltering English) become tiresome. What he sees in Clara, beyond her deer-in-the-headlights gaze and propensity for quirky outbursts, is hard to fathom.
In the film, casting Mimieux as Clara made perfect sense -- no one ever communicated vacuous innocence better. In comparison, Shaddow's Clara is a powerhouse, despite a few moments of mental core melt down (oddly symbolized by flights of operatic coloratura); she is spunky, assertive, self-aware, and seemingly anxious to get out from under her mother's overprotective wing. She also has a ringing voice. Too bad she isn't given anything noteworthy to sing.
If Clara is mentally challenged, Andreas' performance is vocally schizophrenic. She speaks with a broad southern accent. But when she sings her perfect English diction sounds more like Julie Andrews. Her transition from smothering mother hen to matchmaking Friar Lawrence also is hard to believe.
Guettel's music might have won the Tony, but there is very little in it that's worth rewarding. It's a bon-bon, a tiramisu, a whipped cream confection of air and sugar. Vacuous is the word that comes to mind.
(It did win for Best Actress...)
THEATER CRITIC
DailyBreeze.com
It's hard to believe that "The Light in the Piazza," which opened Wednesday at the Ahmanson Theatre, won six Tony Awards in 2005; it must not have been a very good year. But then the show didn't walk away with honors for best musical, best book, best actor, best actress or best director.
Adam Guetell did win for best score (and lyrics). But the competition was from Monty Python's "Spamalot" (which won for best musical) and "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee." Most of the show's awards were for technical achievement: the sets by Michael Yeargan, the costumes of Catherine Zuber, and the lighting by Christopher Akerlind (all of which pale in comparison to Los Angeles Opera's snazzy recent update of "Manon.")
"The Light in the Piazza" is based on a 1960 novella by Elizabeth Spencer that became the 1962 film starring Olivia de Havilland, George Hamilton and Yvette Mimieux. Like "The Innocents Abroad," "A Room With a View" and "Summer Time," it deals with tourists taking the grand tour, guidebooks in hand, gawking their way through Italy.
The time is 1953 -- when the country was still emerging from the devastation of World War II. Cinematically, it's the period between the stark neo-realism of De Sica's "The Bicycle Thief," and the sophisticated excess of Fellini's "La Dolce Vita." In this case, the unsophisticated Americans abroad are Margaret Johnson (Christine Andreas), a prim and proper lady of the South, and her wide-eyed daughter, Clara (Elena Shaddow).
Awestruck by one church after another, they find themselves standing in the Piazza della Signoria when a gust of wind lifts Clara's hat into the air. It lands in the hands of a handsome young Italian named Fabrizio (David Burnham). Their eyes meet. It's love at first sight. No questions asked.
The fact they have practically nothing in common and can barely communicate does not matter. It's a match made in heaven. In heaven all things are possible.
Clara's overprotective mother, however, has less faith in miracles. She knows something about Clara that her Italian beau and his family do not -- she is "special," (developmentally challenged following a kick in the head from a pony).
Can this would-be Juliet from Winston-Salem find happiness in the arms of her Florentine Romeo? Will their parents agree to such an improbable (though potentially lucrative) union? Will love conquer all, including Clara's case of arrested development? If "The Light in the Piazza" had been written by Tennessee Williams, these conflicts might produce real drama. They might even provide groundwork for a complex musical.
But in the present case, the adaptation by Craig Lucas (at least in the hands of this cast) is far too simplified. Everything is black or white, which leaves the characters and their conflict without a hint of chiaroscuro -- a guiding principle of Renaissance art.
Burnham (who has an impressive voice) offers the most ardent performance. But after a while his heart-on-sleeve protestations (in Italian and faltering English) become tiresome. What he sees in Clara, beyond her deer-in-the-headlights gaze and propensity for quirky outbursts, is hard to fathom.
In the film, casting Mimieux as Clara made perfect sense -- no one ever communicated vacuous innocence better. In comparison, Shaddow's Clara is a powerhouse, despite a few moments of mental core melt down (oddly symbolized by flights of operatic coloratura); she is spunky, assertive, self-aware, and seemingly anxious to get out from under her mother's overprotective wing. She also has a ringing voice. Too bad she isn't given anything noteworthy to sing.
If Clara is mentally challenged, Andreas' performance is vocally schizophrenic. She speaks with a broad southern accent. But when she sings her perfect English diction sounds more like Julie Andrews. Her transition from smothering mother hen to matchmaking Friar Lawrence also is hard to believe.
Guettel's music might have won the Tony, but there is very little in it that's worth rewarding. It's a bon-bon, a tiramisu, a whipped cream confection of air and sugar. Vacuous is the word that comes to mind.
(It did win for Best Actress...)
