I respect Seth's theater saavy a great deal, so here you go....
Warning: here be spoilers, both of the plot and staging varieties. Be ye warned.
I did my regular trip up to Goodspeed today and saw both shows. Sure, Very Good Eddie is a frothy, silly delight (an incredibly silly show, but that’s what it’s supposed to be; I liked Me and My Girl more, though), but all eyes are on Camille Claudel, aren’t they? :)
Camille Claudel has a lot of gorgeous music, some awfully good lyrics, a book that’s problematic but hardly unfixable, a mostly great cast, and an astounding physical production.
All of that is why I’m going to start with the good things.
Most of the music is great – it’s easily Wildhorn’s best work yet, overall. Thanks to the limitations of the venue, he’s limited his score to only five musicians, all playing acoustic instruments (orchestrated by Jonathan Tunick with his usual superlative skill, with arrangements by Constantine Kitsopoulos) – piano, percussion, bass, cello, and reeds. This gives the score a sound unlike any of Wildhorn’s other works – out with the overly popped-up arrangements, heavy drums, period-inaccurate electric guitars; in with a more sensitive sound reminiscent of a small-scale chamber musical (which Camille is, in a way). The weakest song, to me, was “Gold,” the big ballad that ends the show – to be frank, (not Frank), it just sounds too “Wildhorn” to me, i.e. too redolent of other, more memorable big ballads he’s written for the leading ladies of his other shows (my mom specifically mentioned “In His Eyes” from Jekyll & Hyde).
Nan Knighton has provided a set of lyrics better than the one she wrote for The Scarlet Pimpernel. Although she occasionally lapses into a mode where her writing is more clever than good (sacrificing meaning and intelligence for a string of rhymes – the same occurred at moments of Pimpernel), generally she’s struck a strong balance between the two. Her book, while not as strong as the lyrics, is substantially better than a lot of musical books with which I’ve become acquainted (I’ll deal with the problems in it a little later on). She is, I’m fairly certain, the best of the writers with whom Wildhorn has worked, light years ahead of Leslie Bricusse, Hampton and Black, and the guys from The Civil War.
The staging and design are, in a word (to repeat the word I used at the top), astounding. For his set, Walt Spangler has ripped down what is normal the stage right wall of the stage and expanded to the outside wall, eliminating the wing space that’s usually there. The set itself is a large, white, brick-walled space, filled with moving platforms, a turntable at what’s usually center stage, a curtain that extends across the space, a set of doors on the stage left wall, and a floating skylight. The name of costume designer Constance Hoffman was previously unfamiliar to me; looking at her bio, that’s because I’ve never seen anything she’s done, but I hope to see more. Howell Binkley’s lighting is, as always, effective, and Acme Sound Partners are to be commended.
And the staging. My god, the staging. I’m a big fan of Gabriel Barre’s work – he directed two of my all-time favorites, Summer of ‘42 and the Andrew Lippa version of The Wild Party - and he’s come close to outdoing himself here. There are some stunning touches, although with some of them (such as having the many statues be portrayed by members of the chorus), I don’t know if they came from Barre or were written into the script by Knighton. It’s a pleasure to see Mark Dendy return to theatrical choreography after the few years he’s taken off since The Wild Party (during which he’s authored the book of a musical with a score by Stephen Trask, so I’m not complaining), and he’s in fine form. The show is threaded throughout with choreographic movement, and the dancing is centered on a couple based on Claudel’s sculpture “The Waltz,” portrayed by the fairly recognizable Mayumi Miguel and the heretofore unknown (to me, at least) Timothy W Bish, and they do the work justice. I’m now looking more forward than ever to seeing what Dendy does with the dances for Taboo. Like with The Wild Party, all of the physical/visual elements flow together beautifully, which is a distinct skill of Barre’s.
The cast is, almost to a person, terrific. Michael Nouri, above all, is phenomenal as Rodin. His is an imposing presence, a powerful voice, a terrific performance all totaled – why is it that he’s done so little musical theatre? Matt Bogart is just right as Camille’s self-righteous, religious younger brother, although it’s a shame that he doesn’t get to sing more (he has one song in Act II, the lovely “Field of Angels,” and parts of other songs, but that’s it). Rita Gardner and Milo O’Shea, although underused as Camille’s parents, lend an air of extra theatrical legitimacy to the proceedings by their very presence. Gardner, although trapped in an unlikable character, sings as beautifully as she ever has, so it’s a pity that her one solo has been cut from the show (the songlist in the playbill listed an Act I number entitled “Lost in the World,” which wasn’t on the inserted list, nor was it performed), and O’Shea offers as sweet, sensitive portrayal of Camille’s encouraging father. Of the eight-person chorus (discounting the two lead dancers), special commendations go to John Paul Almon, Natalie Hill, and Shonn Wiley, all of whom bring a little something extra to their various roles.
It is probably clear by now that I’ve avoided talking about something. That something is the big black hole at the center of Camille Claudel, warding it away from greatness. As it would happen, the big black hole is also the entire show’s raison d’etre: Linda Eder.
I have never been much of a fan of Eder’s but I was walked into the Norma Terris with a completely open mind. I’d heard that she’s been spending time boning up on her acting skills, pulling back on her usually grandiose singing, and just generally trying to get better. Unfortunately, she hasn’t done anything remotely resembling a good job. The fact of the matter is that she simply cannot act. She couldn’t in Jekyll & Hyde and she can’t here. Granted, she looks great, but good looks are merely a fraction of what is needed for a role of this caliber. There’s no nuance to her portrayal, nothing going on beneath the surface, and not a hell of a lot going on AT the surface.
The same goes for her singing, as I’ve always felt. Her vocals are powerful, but nothing more, and here not even that, as she has indeed managed to pull back and not blast the roof off the theatre. I’ve always found that everything that she sings just sounds very much the same to me; I know that there are people who’ll disagree with me, but I’m the one writing this review.
The best thing that can be done for Camille Claudel is the one thing that will never be done, which is the replacement of Eder. Throughout the show and on the drive home, I found myself throwing out names and thinking about the wonders that they could do with this material. Think of what Julia Murney could bring to it. Think of the possibility of Sara Ramirez. What could Sherie Scott do with it? Alice Ripley? Any of these ladies – and many more who haven’t come to mind yet – would be a vast improvement on Eder, and perhaps brilliant in the role; it’s unfortunate that we’ll never find out.
As far as the text goes, there are some problems as well. There are two devices that are used, but not used enough. The first is the presence of a young girl (Antonia Kitsopoulos) who plays Camille as a child. She is barely present, and the character should either be eliminated entirely (which would be my suggestion – she doesn’t really add much) or expanded. The second is having the company act as a Greek chorus and talk directly to the audience. There are times when this technique is very effective, but about a third of the time, it just feels like bad exposition. This idea works, but the problematic parts need an overhaul.
The opening of the show is very weak – there’s some underscored dialogue, and then the show launches into the first (of five) “big songs for Linda.” “In The Stone” is a terrific song, but not a good opening number. There needs to be a better establishing song, perhaps for Camille and her family, and maybe even getting Rodin in there somehow (as it is now, he doesn’t appear until about ten minutes into the show). The ending is effective, although not optimal; after Camille is committed to an insane asylum, the company takes over narrating, explaining that she died thirty years later, then rattling off the names of her most prominent surviving pieces (if I remember the numbers correctly, of the eighty works she is known to have made, she destroyed twenty) as slides of the actual works are projected on the back wall and members of the chorus contort themselves into representations of the pieces. This is followed by Camille entering and singing “Gold.” While this sequence is certainly effective, I don’t think that it’s quite as effective as it could be, although I’m not sure of what to do with it. Other than those mentioned moments, the material is generally very good.
I applaud Wildhorn and Knighton for doing Camille Claudel at Goodspeed – it leads me to believe that perhaps Wildhorn is trying to establish more legitimate theatrical credit, and this can only help that case. Ditto their willingness to do rewrites – they’ve clearly made substantial changes (at least in the show’s tunestack) since the beginning of the run, and they haven’t stopped yet – there was a scene/songlist printed in the playbill and a separate one inserted on a sheet of paper, and neither one was completely accurate.
In short: good effort, great score, superb production, not-bad book, good cast, bad Linda Eder. I’m afraid that the big problem won’t get fixed – but I can hope, right?
Seth, off to sleep
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BWW regional writer "Philadelphia/South Jersey"
to quote Carson Kresley :: "What does she have that I don't... besides a vagina"
