My Fair Lady at HCTO

Last night I went to see My Fair Lady at HCTO and it was loverly!  Professor Henry Higgins (Ryan Shepherd) encounters a Cockney flower girl named Eliza Doolittle (Ashley Gardner Carlson) outside Covent Garden and boasts to his friend Colonel Pickering (Ben Parkes) that he could pass her off as a Duchess at the Embassy Ball within six months by teaching her to speak properly.  Even though Eliza is a success at the ball, she becomes a lady when she compels Higgins to treat her like one!  Every member of the cast is superb!  Shepherd is possibly the best Higgins I've ever seen and I really enjoyed his dynamic characterization and energy in the songs "I'm an Ordinary Man," "The Rain in Spain," and "A Hymn to Him."  I also really enjoyed his poignant rendition of "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face" and his delivery of the final line to Eliza because it kind of changes the vibe of the ending (in a good way).  Carlson is the perfect Eliza because she is so elegant and sings and dances beautifully.  Her versions of "Just You Wait," "Show Me," and "Without You" are incredibly feisty but "Wouldn't It Be Loverly" and "I Could Have Danced All Night" are filled with so much joy.  Parkes provides a lot of the comic relief as Pickering and I laughed out loud when he becomes overwrought before the ball.  Jordan Strong is delightful as Freddie Eynsford-Hill and the way he sings my favorite song in the show, "On the Street Where You Live," is so romantic!  Finally, I absolutely loved Daniel Hess as Alfred P. Doolittle because he has a glint in his eye and his performances in "With a Little Bit of Luck" and "Get Me to the Church" are so fun and exuberant!  Rather than an elaborate library, the set features the exterior of Henry Higgins' house on Wimpole Street (I loved the flowers, columns, and gas lights) and the props used for Higgins' study are cleverly moved on and off stage by members of the ensemble dressed as servants (they are also used to great effect in "Poor Professor Higgins").  The costumes are gorgeous, especially those worn at Ascot (the use of gray rather than the usual black and white is a fun twist) and at the Embassy Ball (Eliza's pink gown is stunning).  I don't think the smile left my face during the entire show and I highly recommend it because it is one that everyone will enjoy.  It runs through November 23 (go here for tickets).

Note:  I enjoyed this so much more than the Lincoln Center production I saw at the Eccles last year.

The Outrun

I liked but didn't love The Outrun when I saw it at Sundance so I was eager to see where I would land after a second viewing at the Broadway last night.  Rona (Saoirse Ronan) is a graduate student in biology living in London when her drinking becomes problematic.  She hits rock bottom when her boyfriend Daynin (Paapa Essiedu) leaves her and she is physically assaulted while on a bender.  After a 90-day stint in rehab she returns home to the Orkney Islands in Scotland but her relationships with her father Andrew (Stephen Dillane), who is struggling himself with bipolar disorder, and mother Annie (Saskia Reeves), who believes that prayer is the answer, are complicated and she relapses.  She eventually retreats to a remote island north of Orkney where she takes inspiration from nature to become sober.  The first time I saw this I really struggled with the nonlinear timeline (it was a late screening and I was tired) but this time around I thought it was an effective way to portray Rona's disorientation and it made a lot more sense to me.  It is definitely a slow burn as Rona makes connections between herself and the landscape but the sequences on the island are beautiful and I was riveted by them.  I especially loved the use of the corn crake (the endangered bird she searches for while working for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) as a symbol for her journey to sobriety, especially in the final shot.  Ronan is absolutely brilliant (it is one of my favorite performances from one of my favorite actresses) because she very credibly depicts so many different aspects of her character: wild and exuberant as a party girl in London, mean and combative when confronted by her behavior, tearful and apologetic when begging her lover not to leave her, and brooding and contemplative as she reconciles everything that has happened to her.  I loved the scene where she interacts with the waves crashing on the beach because it is surprisingly powerful and emotional.  I definitely appreciated this more than I did at Sundance and I highly recommend it for Ronan's stellar performance.

A Different Man

I had plans to see A Different Man at Sundance this year but I ended up seeing something else at the last minute and I kind of regret that decision.  Luckily it is now playing at the Broadway and I got to see it as part of a double feature last night.  I enjoyed this surreal black comedy even more than I was expecting.  Edward Lemuel (Sebastian Stan) is an actor with a facial deformity caused by neurofibromatosis who struggles to interact with other people, especially a playwright named Ingrid (Renate Reinsve) who lives next door, because of an extreme lack of confidence.  He volunteers for an experimental drug that could cure his condition and, when it works, he fakes his suicide and starts a new life as a handsome and successful real estate agent named Guy Moratz.  Several years later he discovers that Ingrid has written a play about Edward and he impulsively auditions using a mask of his old face.  Ingrid casts him, and begins a relationship with him, but struggles with the authenticity of her decision because, even though Guy embodies Edward's insecurities, he is not deformed.  Complications ensue when Oswald (Adam Pearson), a confident and charismatic man with neurofibromatosis, appears and replaces him in the play and in Ingrid's life.  The tone is all over the place with elements of body horror, dark comedy, science fiction, and romance but I love that it subverts expectations about identity and what makes someone a good person.  Stan, in some fantastic prosthetics during the first act, gives an incredibly nuanced performance as a man who gets what he thinks he wants and then comes undone when he realizes that it didn't change anything while Pearson, who has neurofibromatosis, is enchanting as his foil.  Not everything works (I'm still trying to figure out why so many things drop from the ceiling) but this is both thought-provoking and highly entertaining.

Sister Act at the Terrace Plaza Playhouse

Last night I went to see Sister Act (which is probably my favorite musical based on a popular movie) at the Terrace Plaza Playhouse and, unfortunately, the negative experience I had watching it marred an excellent production. When Deloris Van Cartier (Olivia Lusk) accidentally witnesses her gangster boyfriend Curtis (Jacob Draper) kill someone, Detective Eddie Souther (David Simon) decides to hide her in a convent to keep her safe until she can testify against him. She wreaks havoc on the peaceful life there so, in exasperation, the Mother Superior (Melinda Cole Welch) has her sing in the choir with unexpected results. However, the choir's notoriety puts both Deloris and the convent in danger. My favorite aspect of this production is the beautiful set featuring a backdrop with Gothic arches and stained glass windows and panels that rotate to become the police station and Souther's apartment. Set pieces on each side of the stage are used for the Mother Superior's office and the sanctuary of the church while large wooden bleachers are brought on stage for "Raise Your Voice" as the nuns learn how to sing and movable chain link fence panels add a lot of fun to the song "I Could Be That Guy." Lusk is an appealing Deloris because she is sassy but also sympathetic and I loved her renditions of "Fabulous, Baby" and "Sister Act." All of the nuns (Kaylee Wheeler, Jen Petersen, Carla Zarate, Holly Lowell, Cathrine Washburn, Erin Roring, Melissa Virgin, and the rest of the ensemble) do a really great job singing and dancing in "Take Me to Heaven," "Sunday Morning Fever," and "Spread the Love Around" and I loved seeing them maintain all of their quirky mannerisms in these big numbers. My favorite nuns were Zarate as Sister Mary Lazarus because her facial expressions are hilarious and Petersen as Sister Mary Patrick because she is so over the top (I laughed out loud when she twirled her rosary). John Lee Roring, Matt Ford, and Jordan Wheeler, who play Curtis's henchmen, steal the show in "When I Find My Baby" and "Lady in the Long Black Dress" with their leisure suits and disco moves (I laughed out loud again when Roring rolled around on the stage). Another shoutout goes to David Hales as Monsignor O'Hara because it seems like he is channeling Elvis as the emcee for all of the choir's performances. The costumes are a bit more subdued than I usually see in this show but the nun's habits and the monsignor's vestments do get bedazzled for the finale. I would have really enjoyed this production were it not for the inappropriate behavior of a large group of students in attendance who were running around (one student even walked across the stage during the show), talking loudly, filming, putting their feet up on the seats in front of them, and screaming at the top of their lungs (the couple next to me started plugging their ears at the end of every number because it was so loud). I have no problem with students attending live performances (I took students all of the time when I was teaching) but they need to be reminded about theatre etiquette and monitored by their chaperones.  The only reason I did not leave at intermission is because the show is really fun and I do recommend it (go here for tickets). There are performances on Mondays, Fridays, and Saturdays through November 16.

White Bird

After multiple delays White Bird is now finally in theaters and I was excited to see it last night.  It is an incredibly moving story about the power of kindness that, unfortunately, is very relevant today.  Julian Albans (Bryce Gheisar) is at a new school after being expelled for bullying a boy with a facial disfigurement.  When he witnesses the bullying of another student he does nothing to intervene because, as he tells his visiting grandmother Sara (Helen Mirren), he just wants to keep his head down so he can fit in.  This attitude worries Sara so she decides to tell him about her experiences as a Jewish girl in Nazi-occupied France during World War II in order to emphasize the need to take action against injustice.  This framing device (a reference to Wonder) connects to flashbacks of a young Sara (Ariella Glaser) and her classmate Julien Beaumier (Orlando Schwerdt) as he helps her escape from a Nazi roundup of Jewish children and hides her in his family's barn with the knowledge of his parents (Gillian Anderson and Jo Stone-Fewings) despite great personal risk.  I really love that Julien consciously makes the decision to be kind even though Sara and her friends ostracized him for having a crippled leg and that his kindness is an act of bravery with increasingly dangerous stakes because that is a very powerful message.  I also love how the relationship between Julien and Sara is developed because I really cared about their characters and was totally invested in their fate (I cried several times).  Helen Mirren and Gillian Anderson can always be relied upon to give outstanding performances but I was especially impressed by the two young leads.  The cinematography is beautiful, especially the scenes where Julien and Sara use their imagination to figuratively escape from the barn, and the score, particularly a song the characters sing throughout, is haunting.  I think everyone needs to see this movie to be inspired to be a light in a world of increasing darkness.