Actors Kick Over Shortcomings in ‘Chorus Line’

I didn’t expect to start forming any opinions at the ticket window, and I might have felt a little guilty about doing it, if others in the lobby hadn’t been vocalizing the same.

According to the top of my ticket stub, Nick A. Noyer ’09 and Peter C. Shields ’09 presented “A Chorus Line,” which will run through Nov. 4, at the Agassiz Theatre on Friday night. If they had any new, daring artistic vision to justify the extra attention (an ordinary program credit just won’t do anymore?), I didn’t see it.

When “A Chorus Line” works—and it does frequently work—it is not thanks to Noyer and Shields’ direction or production. It is thanks to individual cast members overcoming unremarkable choreography, boring staging, and a really awful pit orchestra by sheer force of personality. There are really great moments in what is generally a mess.

“A Chorus Line,” with music by Marvin Hamlisch and a book by James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante, originally opened on Broadway in 1975. The show takes place over the course of a dance audition for a Broadway show, and it is founded on a neat bit of irony: the dancers on-stage are playing themselves. They actually had to go through a Broadway audition so that they could pretend to be going through a Broadway audition.

Take the show out of Broadway, and you take the cool, meta-theatrical knick-knacks out of the show.

This loss of irony killed the last quarter of Friday’s production. The extended, on-stage discussion about the state of dance, theater, Broadway, etc. fell entirely flat.

I might care to hear professional dancers talk about struggles that are actually theirs, but when Katie W. Johnson ’07, as Cassie, says “I need a job” with tears in her eyes, it rings false.

This cast has the unenviable task of making a postmodern, self-aware show work as just a regular show. When they get the emotional connections right, the results are exhilarating.

Barry A. Shafrin ’09 is a clear stand-out. As Paul, a shy, worried dancer with a troubled past, Shafrin gives the audience—and “giving” is exactly what it is, an act of deep artistic generosity—a stunning monologue.

Where the show is elsewhere furiously paced, Shafrin’s emotional crescendo is understated and graceful. He lets his words circle back on themselves, he pauses to think about his phrasing, and he times a series of gently nervous twitches and stutters perfectly.

Shrafin’s is the only character who reminded me of someone I might actually meet in the theater world.

That isn’t necessarily a bad thing. “A Chorus Line” trades heavily in stereotypes, the performance of Michael L. Vinson ’07 as a flamboyant homosexual who disdains his small-town origins (“committing suicide in Buffalo would be redundant”) to Emerson senior Anna Haas’ cold, over-sexed valium user.

These caricatures are too endearing to be offensive, though, and they’re frequently fun. In a few instances, cast members transcend their own roles to great comic effect.

Kevin Barlowski, a senior at Emerson, is one of these cast members. There is a big difference between telling a funny joke and being funny, being a source of humor rather than a conduit for it.

As Richie, Barlowski’s humor came straight from the spleen (the funniest internal organ I can think of).

As a result, “Hello Twelve, Hello Thirteen, Hello Love”—a strange song that is mostly about puberty (disclaimer: I have no idea what this song is actually about)—is the show’s most joyful moment.

It is also the production’s musical high point. On Friday, the pit orchestra frequently suffered from problems of balance, volume, and precision, but pulled itself together for this number. The singers, who only occasionally had difficulty with intonation under the musical direction of Rachel M. Williams ’07, were unified and excited.

Ben M. Cuddon a GSAS first-year student in Middle Eastern studies, Nelson T. Greaves ’10, and Kristina A. Dominguez ’10 also get big laughs.

But sometimes caricature backfires. Emerson senior Sara Collins’ Val, the clear-eyed, self-indulgent cynic, sings “Dance: Ten, Looks: Three,” an ode to career advancement via plastic surgery. The more honest title for the song would be “Tits and Ass,” a phrase Collins sings over and over again with annoying self-satisfaction.

There were other, similar missteps, when cast members seem too proud of the joke they had thought up to bother making it funny.

Other opportunities for humor or emotional exposition are left unexploited by unimaginative direction. The show’s opening 20 minutes comprise a series of one-on-one conversations, during which the cast’s other 17 members stand blankly on stage.

I found myself wishing for some kind of background interaction, some unheard whisper or small gesture. Instead, the cast turned itself into a set piece.

I was also surprised that the choreography (by Mimi B. Owusu ’07, Chrissy M. Fitzgerald ’07, and Megan M. Powell ’08) is so muted. “A Chorus Line” is, after all, a show about a dance audition. The cast’s technical abilities are clearly impressive–Katie Johnson’s in particular–but are largely wasted on a lack of imagination.

“At the Ballet” is particularly disappointing. The dreamlike, nostalgic sequence screams out for a wistful, airy choreography to match. Instead, the song’s three dancers walk around each other in circles.

The climactic audition sequence, exciting in its forceful precision, is an exception and the kickline is still awesome.

“A Chorus Line” has its stumbles, but it is a show that should be seen if only for its unknowing spontaneity. After all, nobody wants to watch a production that knows too much about itself, and when this cast succeeded, they did so in ways that seemed to surprise themselves as much as the audience.

—Reviewer Richard S. Beck can be reached at rbeck@fas.harvard.edu.