Let’s simplify things and just say that the world is divided into two groups: Those who love musicals, and those who don’t. By that logic, the former will laugh themselves senseless during the new show at freeFall Theater. The latter will have a great time too, although they won’t understand half the references.
It's The Musical of Musicals (The Musical!), and it's a sendup of some of the most popular names in theatrical song-and-dance of the last 100 years. From Rodgers and Hammerstein and Jerry Herman through Stephen Sondheim and Andrew Lloyd Webber, the gang’s all here. All their pretentions, all their idiosyncrasies, all their quirky little trademarks are on full display.
Yet none of the music in this show is actually theirs. Writers Eric Rockwell and Joanne Bogart have skillfully crafted a musical comedy parody of the great composers’ works — with music that dramatically mirrors theirs to a t, and comedy that inadvertently oozes from every clichéd character, lyric and line of dialogue.
Here’s the deal: Four friends, gathered in a living room that just happens to include a grand piano (and a pretty grand pianist, too) are playing a parlor game: Act out the corny old “I can’t pay the rent!” “You must pay the rent!” storyline, in the style of a composer, chosen at random out of a hat.
Can they do it? Hell yes, they can.
In the Sondheim segment, the characters talk/sing at a speedy clip, with melodies that crash together like cymbals, odd time signatures that pop up and then disappear, dissonance married to harmony, sweet pop ballads that become music-hall tunes, jokey patter songs and thundery operatic arias, sometimes all within the same line.
It’s Into the Woods, Sweeney Todd, Company, A Little Night Music and more, maddeningly familiar yet not close enough for a lawsuit.
The Lloyd Webber parody is perhaps the best of the bunch. Eva Peron, Che, the Phantom of the Opera, Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard and assorted furry cast members from Cats cavort and engage melodramatically — singing hilarious lyrics that sound like they came directly from Lord Andy’s big, blowzy shows. But, of course, they didn’t.
The Jerry Herman sendup serves as a reminder that Hello, Dolly! and Mame really aren’t about much of anything except big entrances and fabulous gowns (a recurring song is called “Hey Look, it’s Abby!”). Rodgers and Hammerstein are lampooned with an inspirational number that marries “Climb Ev’ry Mountain” with “Bali Hai” (sung by a nun, of course) and a “highly symbolic dream ballet” straight out of Oklahoma!
None of this would be as high an elephant’s eye, as it were, without a capable and engaging cast. I wish my friends — and my party guests — were as quick-witted and funny as Jennifer Byrne, Matthew McGee, Ann Morrison and Robert Teasdale. They’re all wonderful singers with the ability to find — and exploit — all the weird little nuances in the well-worn Broadway source material. And they work extremely well together.
With the versatile and always hilarious McGee as the Kit Kat Club MC, the Kander and Ebb segment, which closes the show, is an uproarious mashup of Cabaret and Chicago, with a lot of skimpy black costumes and slinky, stylized Bob Fosse-esque dancing. Nein, Sally Bowles can’t pay ze rent!
Musical director Michael Raabe is the onstage piano player — and like the cast, he’s never idle. The Musical of Musicals (The Musical!) is high-energy hoot from the overture to the curtain calls.
Want to delve deeper into what makes this show work? freeFall has post-show talkbacks with the cast and artistic director Friday nights after the show, and on July 8 and 15 they have pre-show discussions with the company’s resident dramaturg, Timothy Sanders. freeFall creates these sessions with the “curious, cultured or confused.”