The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
In Sondheim’s ‘Company’
“It gives us a vantage point of reflecting and saying, ‘Ah! These are the things that haven’t changed.’ ” Madison Lyric Stage show at Deacon John Grave House
“Does anyone … still wear a hat?” While the above quote likely falls deaf on the ears of an average Kmart shopper, it strikes a clarion note with musical theater fans familiar with “Company,” the Stephen Sondheim-George Furth Broadway musical about busy-as-bees New Yorkers longing for spousal commitment as one strains for the gold ring on a relentlessly accelerating merry-goround.
Neva Small heard the call when she happened to read about auditions for Madison Lyric Stage’s production of the watershed 1970 musical. Small, who followed the call right into the role of the sardonic Joanne, will recite this familiar line and the iconic song that bears it, “The Ladies Who Lunch,” from Wednesday to July 22, and then July 25 to 29 at the group’s latest venue, the historic Deacon John Grave House in Madison.
“‘Company’ is one of the masterpieces of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth,” said Small, “and it’s a great part. I’m preceded by some great divas in the role, like Patti LuPone — even the great Carol Burnett has played the role.”
When “Company” opened at the Alvin Theatre in late April 1970, it was as new and fresh as Mayor John Lindsay’s smile. Most of the performers played principal
characters supporting the protagonist, Bobby, while serving as the ensemble as well. Furth’s book, which started as an evening of connected one-acts surrounding leading lady Ellen Hanley — before producerdirector Hal Prince paired Furth with Sondheim to create a musical — was non-linear in structure, a notable departure from the Rodgers and Hammerstein template established 27 years earlier with “Oklahoma!”
With its cynical view of marriage and its urbane characters, “Company” was the height of Broadway sophistication. It also started an intensely prodigious decade for Sondheim, who followed with “Follies” (1971), “A Little Night Music” (1973), “Pacific Overtures” (1976) and “Sweeney Todd” (1979).
“Company,” which features John Johmann as Bobby in Madison Lyric’s production, boasts some of Sondheim’s leggiest songs: “Another Hundred People,” “Getting Married Today,” “Being Alive” and, of course, “The Ladies Who Lunch.”
Much has changed since the musical’s striking premiere 48 years ago. “Woman’s Lib” had just started gaining traction, Roe v. Wade was three years away and AIDS was a dozen years from the headlines. If any one thing symbolized the show’s theme, it’s found in the opening, titular song in the form of a landline’s busy signal, something as foreign to the younger generation’s experience as a Virginia Slims commercial on TV.
Director Marc Deaton, who along with Johmann co-founded Madison Lyric Stage, sets the production in its original period to italicize the classic issues that the musical explores.
“We’re setting it in 1970, when it was written, because so much of the dialogue refers to issues of that time,” said Deaton. “What I think is interesting about it is ... that so many things resonate today from that time.
“On top of that,” he continued, “it gives us a vantage point of reflecting and saying, ‘Ah! These are the things that haven’t changed,’ and ‘Remember when women were thought of this way?’ It raises a lot of questions and a lot of debate, so that makes it quite fascinating to direct.”
Placing “Company” in 1970 also adds a fun bit of period flavor found in flared or bell-bottom trousers, Mod dresses, long hair, sideburns and go-go boots, Johmann said.
“We really wanted to embrace the late ’60s-early’70s look through everyone,” he said. “I think theater is fantasy. It’s interesting because there’s such debate in the world about — and I think this comes from television where actors so often play themselves . ... No one gives them a chance to play something different than the character we got used to them (playing).
“Because I come from opera, I like the idea that we become a different character not only internally, but externally,” he said. “I think that makes the character that much stronger; to have the hair, the costumes, the ‘magic,’ to quote Blanche Du Bois. I want the magic.”
Johmann believes that “Company,” stripped of its period accoutrements, speaks to theatergoers today about yearning for a loving commitment in words that anyone can understand, particularly in the show’s revelatory song, “Being Alive.”
“To me, what Bobby’s going through is universal,” he said. “It’s about being disconnected. His journey in that song is about making that decision. At the end of that song ... he’s changed. His heart is open.”
Johmann, born and raised in New York, said “I know what it’s like to be in your 20s and just be running from work to dinner to parties to friends, and always moving, moving, moving. That’s fine in your 20s. But when you’re in your 30s or 40s, that changes. You get tired of running. You find yourself having a life and not living a life. All the running is just camouflage. Bobby starts making choices and that really happens during ‘Being Alive.’ ”
Small, who appears under a Special Appearance Equity contract and is best known for her portrayal of Chava, the third of Tevye’s five daughters, in the 1971 film “Fiddler on the Roof,” will perform al fresco for the first time under a big top tent on the property of the historic Deacon John Grave House in Madison. The new venue is more spacious than the group’s previous few. Yet with a 125-person capacity, it retains the intimacy that Deaton and Johmann fervently desire.
The Grave House also affords early-comers the opportunity to visit a special preshow theatrical exhibit, curated by Ruthann McTyre, director of the Irving S. Gilmore Music Library at Yale University. The exhibit features artifacts from other theatrical companies that have called Madison home, including the Jitney Players. Additionally, Madison Lyric Stage costumes, photos and posters are on view.
While Small faces the challenge of performing outside with mosquitoes eager to bite her or fly into her mouth as she sings her money notes, the material is worth the effort — especially her chance to render “The Ladies Who Lunch.”
“It is still true today,” said Small of the song. “The ladies who lunch who don’t know what to do with themselves and have self-esteem issues. It’s an eleven o’clock number.”
Small, whose reference to her show-stopping song originated back in the days of Prohibition when Broadway curtain times were 8:30 p.m., suggested that finding the balance between her character’s hard-boiled exterior and internal vulnerability make portraying Joanne a challenge.
“It’s a complicated role,” she said, “and an ensemble piece about Bobby and his search for happiness and his friends, who are all married couples. And, of course, Joanne has been married ‘three or four times,’ as the lyric says.
“I’ve seen their previous productions and I’m their biggest fan,” Small said. “It’s been a privilege to perform with such a talented group on such wonderful material.”