1960s musical worth spending time with
A musical from 1966 as performed by college students in 2014 shouldn’t look and sound as good as this one does.
The Otterbein University production of Sweet Charity pulls off a minor miracle, hitting almost every note — literally and figuratively.
The fresh, fun creation is more redolent of the 1960s than any episode of Mad Men.
The show follows young Charity Hope Valentine (Madison Tinder), “a Girl . . . Who Wanted To Be . . . Loved” — as the groovy-lettered words say on the stage backdrop.
Charity makes her living as a taxi dancer at the Fandango Ballroom in New York.
Even though her job is slightly disreputable, and many of her fellow dancers do more than just dance with their “big spender” customers, Charity is so pure of heart that she wears hers on her sleeve — or, rather, as a tattoo on her left arm.
When we first see her, she is swooning over a boyfriend in Central Park. But the lout pushes her into the lake and runs off with her money.
One would think she would be wary after such experiences, but Charity is a sucker for anyone with a sob story or a handsome face.
“You rent your heart like a hotel,” one of her co-workers scoffs.
By chance — “the fickle finger of fate,” she says — Charity bumps into Italian film star Vittorio Vidal (Jordan Matthew Donica) and, astonished at her luck in meeting the romantic star, breaks into If My Friends Could See Me Now.
Later, she has a “meetcute” with Oscar Lindquist (Alex Huffman) — and, of course, the course of true love doesn’t run smooth.
As Charity, Tinder — a fine singer and dancer — is lively and vulnerable. Her interactions with Huffman’s nerdy Oscar demonstrate their superb chemistry.
As older, wiser fellow dancers Nickie and Helene, Mason Smajstrla and Alison Schiller have the singing and acting chops needed for the blowzy blonde and beaten-down brunette.
Although Donica is perhaps too young and vigorous for his character, he is an effective singer and dancer.
Under the direction of Christina Kirk, the cast captures the era.
And choreographer Stella Hiatt Kane has her charges dipping their shoulders, wagging their hips, stamping their feet and slinking across the stage as they channel the familiar Bob Fosse style.