PHOENIX THEATRE ‘ ’S WONDERFUL’
If you like jukebox musicals, you’ll love the Gershwin-powered “’S Wonderful” at Phoenix Theatre, because it’s five jukebox musicals in one.
Of course, nobody really is a fan of jukebox musicals per se. Instead, folks are fans of Elvis or Frankie Valli or ’80s hair metal and turn out in droves to see such empty-calorie shows as “All Shook Up,” “Jersey Boys” and “Rock of Ages.”
Jukebox musicals are comfort-food theater — not that there’s anything wrong with that. But it does raise the bar for “’S Wonderful,” first produced in 2010, because there already are plenty of Gershwin revues to choose from, not to mention George and Ira’s original jazz-age tuners.
Phoenix Theatre’s production is helmed by associate artistic director Robert Kolby Harper and stars four local standouts — Jenny Hintze, Kaitlynn Kleinman, Jenn Taber Reviewed Dec. 15. Continues through Sunday, Jan. 6. Phoenix Theatre, 100 E. McDowell Road. $25-$70. 602-254-2151, phoenixtheatre.com. and Toby Yatso — and one out-of-town ringer, Kyle Erickson Hewitt, who makes an impressively tuneful debut with the company.
After an overture featuring a few bars of George Gershwin’s symphonic masterpiece “Rhapsody in Blue,” the show launches into its first musical short story, “Nice Work.” Set in 1924 New York, it’s a silly romantic farce, in the style of that era, with the 6-foot-4 Yatso playing a wannabe investigative reporter trailing a pretty, young flapper. He’s hoping to land his first big scoop or his one true love, depending on whether the girl happens to be the notorious Chic Thief, a criminal mastermind with a taste for high fashion.
This part features a jaunty office scene, set to “I Got Rhythm,” that looks suspiciously like the one in “Thoroughly Modern Millie.” It ends with a slapstick kick line with actors in handcuffs. It’s hammy in the extreme, but Yatso is a fine ham, and Kleinman shines with ingenue charm.
Next we move to 1957 New Orleans, where Taber, cinched up in sparkles as a blues diva, finds her inner Billie Holiday in “The Man I Love” and then tops herself in a gorgeous rendition of “Summertime.” As for the love-triangle plot? Meh.
Add another meh for the paint-by-numbers romance in “An American in Paris,” about an American sailor and a French waitress in a whirlwind courtship set to “Fascinating Rhythm,” “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off” and “Love Is Here to Stay.” Kleinman and Hewitt do all they can to flesh out their paper-doll characters — the former singing in a refreshing- ly underdone French accent — but it’s only the latter’s Gene Kelly grace in dancing shoes that keeps attentions from wandering.
Do we detect a theme here? While the arrangements by Rick Hip-Flores are fresh, Ray Roderick’s book is stale, stale, stale.
After intermission, Hintze finally takes the spotlight in “Funny Face,” about a makeup artist in 1948 Hollywood who dreams of getting her big break in a screen-test kiss with a matinee idol. Literally dreams, as in dream sequence, the ultimate in lazy storytelling devices. Hintze, like her castmates, sings well, but it’s the weakest of the vignettes.
The final section isn’t actually a jukebox musical but a mini-revue (the distinction being it makes no pretense of telling a story). Here the cast serves up solid harmonies on “Someone to Watch Over Me,” “They Can’t Take That Away From Me” and “Embraceable You.”
For better or for worse, we also are treated to a rendition of “Swanee” with high kicks and jazz hands and Yatso doubling down on the hamminess while singing about his “mammy.”
At least he doesn’t do it in blackface.