December 31, 2002
Section: Lifestyles
Page: 1E
Everyone pitches in to make `Dolly' top-notch
By DREW STERWALD dsterwald@news-press.com
Elizabeth Murff channels Carol Channing in the Naples Dinner Theatre's "Hello, Dolly!"
She's got the husky voice, the playful touch and the mature sensuality that actresses often lack (see Barbra Streisand in the movie) in playing the lead in Jerry Herman's nostalgic musical.
Playing Dolly Levi, the widowed New York matchmaker who finally snags her own good catch (an understated Barry Marcus), Murff creates a strong foundation for the show. Building on that are some very fine supporting performances, solid musical direction by Jeremy Randall and dazzling dance numbers.
That is, after the lackluster opening number, "I Put My Hand In." The staging here seems stiff and underdeveloped it feels like there are too many people on stage with very little to do.
Fortunately, the second song, "It Takes a Woman," jump-starts the show.
Although the book revolves around the title character's machinations, the side plot involving young Yonkers merchants running amok in 1890s Manhattan is actually more entertaining, at least in this incarnation.
That's largely due to Steven Lane's and Henrique Romas' antic performances as Cornelius and Barnaby, the inexperienced, lovestruck clerks who set off to meet women. The pair fully exploit the physical comedy inherent in the parts, and they also harmonize beautifully on songs like "Put on Your Sunday Clothes."
Jodi Lynne Sylvester also brings considerable charm to the role of Irene Malloy, the milliner Cornelius meets and falls for. Her classically trained soprano sweetens songs like "Ribbons Down My Back" she could easily carry a show.
The rest of the large cast provides solid support, especially the ensemble that performs Chrissy Wright's tricky choreography in the restaurant scene. Dancing with trays and towels, they leap and spin in perfect unison.
The costumes by Susie Hartman nicely evoke the time period, and Tim Baumgartner's set makes good use of the stage. I especially liked the hat shop, with its simple suggestion of structure and its expressionistic cityscape backdrop.
This 'Hello Dolly' shines like an angel
by Maxine Ginsberg
Saturday, December 21, 2002
It was pure pleasure to watch a woman beyond teenybopper age carry a show with a faultless dramatic performance and a winsome, throaty, Carol Channing-esque voice.
While local fun lovers await the arrival of the red-clad fat man and' his sackful of treats, a svelte red-clad lady strolled into the Naples Dinner Theatre on Thursday night and beat him to the punch with a purse full of theatrical delights.
"Hello, Dolly!" is almost as much of an institution as the white-bearded gift-giver, but the musical's ability to please is less constant than the famous sleigh driver's. Anyone unfortunate enough to have seen Betty Grable's zombielike Las Vegas version in the late 1960s would never seek to revisit, and the movie version, with Barbra Streisand, was overproduced and silly.
So how could a local troupe possibly hope to capture the magic of Carol Charming and the original, long-running Broadway production?
Maybe they borrowed a few North Pole elves, or maybe they just hired the talent and mounted a production to give Dolly the luster she deserves.
Elizabeth Murff shines in the title role like an angel on top of a Christmas tree. While she is manipulating the lives of "Half-
millionaire Horace Vandergeld-er," his niece and her fiance, Vandergelder"s two clerks, a hat shop proprietress and her assistant, Murff s Dolly is always genteel and charming and believable. When she sings, "Before the Parade Passes By," .it's not a militant chant by a determined heroine, but the plaint of a lonely widow. It was pure pleasure to watch a woman beyond teenybopper age carry a show with a faultless dramatic performance and a winsome, throaty, Channing-esque voice.
Barry Marcus, a longtime donor of stellar performances, has a field day playing Horace, the grumpy merchant who blusters and bristles through the story in a cloud of bile and be-fuddlement. While he delivers the sly, "It Takes a Woman" with impish glee early in the program, his comical curmudgeon is a major plus throughout the show. With two strong lead characters, it might have been tempting to just cast the rest of die show with likeable, but that is
not the course the Naples Dinner Theatre chose. Jodi Lynne Sylvester creates Mrs. Malloy with the care and quality the fictional milliner would have lavished on her hats. Possessed of a powerful voice and grace with a line, Sylvester's shopkeeper is more than just a foil for Dolly's machinations.
Steven Lane was up to the task of delivering Cornelius as a likable naif, rather than a duffs. That was due in part to a clever blend of dignity and fun in the acting and a take-no-prisoners voice that was especially appealing in "It Only Takes a Moment" (Michael Crawford was the film version's Cornelius, and he didn't do so badly later on).
OK, so once the four main characters were cast it would have been easy to fill the bill with competents. Not so in this production. Jenny Lee Stern is a riot as Ermengarde, and all she has to do is bawl throughout the play. The head waiter, the judge,, the blind date all play small roles with class.
Director Michael Wainstein wisely softened the clownish edges of the characters so that the audience laughs with them, not-at them. And the pace is as brisk as the stage train that takes Dolly from Yonkers to New York City
That eye-popping locomotive and the Harmonia Gardens Restaurant are the stand-outs in a visually pleasjng array of scenery that includes a hat shop and a. feed store.
The costumes? Sensational. Dolly is magnificently draped in elegantly detailed brocades and feathers, and every cast member has been outfitted equally unstintingly. And speaking of generous, as many as 20 singers and dancers wowed the opening night audience with excellent voices and the energetic execution of Chrissy Wright's imaginative choreography.
A buffet dinner of fried chicken and roast beef precedes this thoroughly enjoyable production of. "Hello, Dolly!" If the man in the red suit drops off a little cash, a ticket to "Dolly" would be money well spent.
"Hello, Dolly!" runs through Jan. 26 at the Naples Dinner Theatre, 1025 Piper Blvd. For information, call 514-7827 or toll-free (877) 519-7827. Prices run from $37.50 to $45.
Section: Lifestyles
Page: 1E
Everyone pitches in to make `Dolly' top-notch
By DREW STERWALD dsterwald@news-press.com
Elizabeth Murff channels Carol Channing in the Naples Dinner Theatre's "Hello, Dolly!"
She's got the husky voice, the playful touch and the mature sensuality that actresses often lack (see Barbra Streisand in the movie) in playing the lead in Jerry Herman's nostalgic musical.
Playing Dolly Levi, the widowed New York matchmaker who finally snags her own good catch (an understated Barry Marcus), Murff creates a strong foundation for the show. Building on that are some very fine supporting performances, solid musical direction by Jeremy Randall and dazzling dance numbers.
That is, after the lackluster opening number, "I Put My Hand In." The staging here seems stiff and underdeveloped it feels like there are too many people on stage with very little to do.
Fortunately, the second song, "It Takes a Woman," jump-starts the show.
Although the book revolves around the title character's machinations, the side plot involving young Yonkers merchants running amok in 1890s Manhattan is actually more entertaining, at least in this incarnation.
That's largely due to Steven Lane's and Henrique Romas' antic performances as Cornelius and Barnaby, the inexperienced, lovestruck clerks who set off to meet women. The pair fully exploit the physical comedy inherent in the parts, and they also harmonize beautifully on songs like "Put on Your Sunday Clothes."
Jodi Lynne Sylvester also brings considerable charm to the role of Irene Malloy, the milliner Cornelius meets and falls for. Her classically trained soprano sweetens songs like "Ribbons Down My Back" she could easily carry a show.
The rest of the large cast provides solid support, especially the ensemble that performs Chrissy Wright's tricky choreography in the restaurant scene. Dancing with trays and towels, they leap and spin in perfect unison.
The costumes by Susie Hartman nicely evoke the time period, and Tim Baumgartner's set makes good use of the stage. I especially liked the hat shop, with its simple suggestion of structure and its expressionistic cityscape backdrop.
This 'Hello Dolly' shines like an angel
by Maxine Ginsberg
Saturday, December 21, 2002
It was pure pleasure to watch a woman beyond teenybopper age carry a show with a faultless dramatic performance and a winsome, throaty, Carol Channing-esque voice.
While local fun lovers await the arrival of the red-clad fat man and' his sackful of treats, a svelte red-clad lady strolled into the Naples Dinner Theatre on Thursday night and beat him to the punch with a purse full of theatrical delights.
"Hello, Dolly!" is almost as much of an institution as the white-bearded gift-giver, but the musical's ability to please is less constant than the famous sleigh driver's. Anyone unfortunate enough to have seen Betty Grable's zombielike Las Vegas version in the late 1960s would never seek to revisit, and the movie version, with Barbra Streisand, was overproduced and silly.
So how could a local troupe possibly hope to capture the magic of Carol Charming and the original, long-running Broadway production?
Maybe they borrowed a few North Pole elves, or maybe they just hired the talent and mounted a production to give Dolly the luster she deserves.
Elizabeth Murff shines in the title role like an angel on top of a Christmas tree. While she is manipulating the lives of "Half-
millionaire Horace Vandergeld-er," his niece and her fiance, Vandergelder"s two clerks, a hat shop proprietress and her assistant, Murff s Dolly is always genteel and charming and believable. When she sings, "Before the Parade Passes By," .it's not a militant chant by a determined heroine, but the plaint of a lonely widow. It was pure pleasure to watch a woman beyond teenybopper age carry a show with a faultless dramatic performance and a winsome, throaty, Channing-esque voice.
Barry Marcus, a longtime donor of stellar performances, has a field day playing Horace, the grumpy merchant who blusters and bristles through the story in a cloud of bile and be-fuddlement. While he delivers the sly, "It Takes a Woman" with impish glee early in the program, his comical curmudgeon is a major plus throughout the show. With two strong lead characters, it might have been tempting to just cast the rest of die show with likeable, but that is
not the course the Naples Dinner Theatre chose. Jodi Lynne Sylvester creates Mrs. Malloy with the care and quality the fictional milliner would have lavished on her hats. Possessed of a powerful voice and grace with a line, Sylvester's shopkeeper is more than just a foil for Dolly's machinations.
Steven Lane was up to the task of delivering Cornelius as a likable naif, rather than a duffs. That was due in part to a clever blend of dignity and fun in the acting and a take-no-prisoners voice that was especially appealing in "It Only Takes a Moment" (Michael Crawford was the film version's Cornelius, and he didn't do so badly later on).
OK, so once the four main characters were cast it would have been easy to fill the bill with competents. Not so in this production. Jenny Lee Stern is a riot as Ermengarde, and all she has to do is bawl throughout the play. The head waiter, the judge,, the blind date all play small roles with class.
Director Michael Wainstein wisely softened the clownish edges of the characters so that the audience laughs with them, not-at them. And the pace is as brisk as the stage train that takes Dolly from Yonkers to New York City
That eye-popping locomotive and the Harmonia Gardens Restaurant are the stand-outs in a visually pleasjng array of scenery that includes a hat shop and a. feed store.
The costumes? Sensational. Dolly is magnificently draped in elegantly detailed brocades and feathers, and every cast member has been outfitted equally unstintingly. And speaking of generous, as many as 20 singers and dancers wowed the opening night audience with excellent voices and the energetic execution of Chrissy Wright's imaginative choreography.
A buffet dinner of fried chicken and roast beef precedes this thoroughly enjoyable production of. "Hello, Dolly!" If the man in the red suit drops off a little cash, a ticket to "Dolly" would be money well spent.
"Hello, Dolly!" runs through Jan. 26 at the Naples Dinner Theatre, 1025 Piper Blvd. For information, call 514-7827 or toll-free (877) 519-7827. Prices run from $37.50 to $45.