[ssba]
Kiss Me, Kate
Reviewed by Bob Verini
Pasadena Playhouse
Through Oct. 12
Your typical Kiss Me, Kate features exactly one African-American. It’s Hattie the maid, who kicks off the proceedings with the lead vocals on “Another Op’nin’, Another Show” and thereafter recedes into the background during the Baltimore tryout of a musical version of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew. As dresser for theater vet, now movie star Lilli Vanessi, she’s there to accept the diva’s bouquets and pass along exposition while Lilli waltzes, feuds and finally reconciles with ex-lover and co-star Fred Graham. Oh, and Lilli’s menaced by gangsters, though Hattie’s on the sidelines there as well.
So it’s awfully satisfying, in Sheldon Epps’ revival of Cole Porter’s masterpiece at Pasadena Playhouse, that not just Hattie’s part but all the major roles are filled with people of color. (Only the gangsters, and the buffoonish Pentagon bigshot for whom Lilli is briefly thinking of jilting Fred, are Caucasians.) That the change is made with so little need of adjustment, to the text or in the audience’s mind, is a testament to how far we’ve come in our theatrical society. (Pasadena’s Fred can no longer proudly boast he’s “free, white and 21,” of course, but odds are that that odious line is always changed no matter what the racial makeup of the cast.)
This isn’t to say that the casting innovation makes much of a difference overall. In most respects this is a standard-issue Kiss Me, Kate: perhaps a little more compact than usual — ensemble-wise — but the same old switcheroos between Shrew scenes and backstage battles, and featuring the same glorious Porter score which is, was, and always will be the main reason to catch a production of the old war horse.
Therein, actually, lies the major disappointment. Pasadena’s In the program, and in Pasadena’s display area, the revival claims inspiration from the “rethought” African-American productions of a bygone day – Orson Welles’s Haitian Macbeth with the Federal Theater Project, and Bill “Bojangles” Robinson turning Gilbert & Sullivan into Hot Mikado in 1939. Not every one over the years has been felicitous (cf. the reappearance of Kismet as the unfortunate Timbuktu in the 70s). But there’s a legacy of major cultural events in which non-traditional casting doesn’t just populate, but reexamines and revitalizes familiar material. (I’m pretty sure Bojangles brought fresh sizzle to G&S, aren’t you?)
Given the transformational nature of those supposedly inspirational landmarks, one had reason to hope that Epps would seek and find new heat in Kiss Me, Kate. Jenelle Lynn Randall – the hottest Hattie this show has ever seen, I’ll bet – starts “Another Op’nin’” in a decidely innovative, bluesy style, promising reinvigorated orchestrations and exciting takes. But thereafter, again, things are standard-issue. “Wunderbar” is its usual Viennese schmaltz, and the actors all speak their Shakespeare snippets in the usual lightly-Anglified accents.
What could have been? Pasadena Playhouse’s program mentions a 1939 delicacy called Swingin’ the Dream, in which – get this – the likes of Louis Armstrong, Dorothy Dandridge, Maxine Sullivan, and Butterfly McQueen performed music by Count Basie and Benny Goodman. We’re told it “made the characters from A Midsummer Night’s Dream jitterbug and happy audiences swing in their seats.” Wouldn’t you kill to have seen that?
The notion of such tactics being applied to Kate was a thrilling one, but only in Act 2’s opener “Too Darn Hot” – excitingly choreographed by Jeffrey Polk and, unless my ears deceive me, re-orchestrated by Rahn Coleman – do you get the feeling that the potentialities of the ethnic choices were truly explored in Pasadena’s rehearsal process. The front cloth may proclaim this as an American Negro Theater production that’s Swingin’ the Shrew, but the swingin’ is fitful.
There are pleasures enough to be found here, though, starting with John Iacovelli’s modest but pleasing sets, offering a sharp contrast between colorful stage show and crummy backstage grime. There may never have been a funnier Lilli/Kate than the elegant, daunting Merle Dandridge, and with topbilled Wayne Brady on vocal rest at the performance attended, understudy Jay Donnell managed to stand up to her capably, which is saying something.
Every show has an MVP, and even had the wonderful Brady been there, I’m confident the one I’d remember from this Kate is Joanna A. Jonas as Lois, the sparkling, sexy ingenue. She absolutely kills on “Always True to You in My Fashion,” best rendition ever, and (by the way) it’s partly because of Epps. Lois is singing to jealous boyfriend Bill (Terrance Spencer), who usually runs out of exasperated reactions before the second verse of a very long song, so things usually get tedious. Epps says the hell with it, has Bill come in once or twice, and otherwise keeps him offstage so that Jonas can let ‘er rip. Man, does she. Smartest bit of staging in the show, and Jonas is one to watch in future.
There’s nothing wrong with any given Kiss Me, Kate’s being true to Porter in its fashion. But this time out did it have to be, pretty much, the same old fashion?
Pasadena Playhouse, 39 El Molino Ave., Pasadena; Tues.-Fri, 8 p.m.; Sat., 4 & 8 p.m.; Sun, 2 and 7 p.m.; through Oct. 12. (626) 365-7529. https://pasadenaplayhouse.secure.force.com/ticket#details_a0NE000000DFoA4MAL
