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By
CLIVE BARNES |
Once in a while, you come across a show
that puts an idiot grin of pleasure on your face, and you nip out of the theater
practically hip-hopping into a taxi with the joy of living. So, here is a genuine surprise -- a hip-hop-into-a-taxi surprise. Here is a truly charming and meaningful new American musical: "Violet." It has music by Jeanine Tesori and book and lyrics by Brian Crawley; it's directed by Susan H. Schulman; and it stars Lauren Ward, Michael McElroy and Michael Park -- and eight other brilliant actors. "Violet" opened, unshrinkingly, at Playwrights Horizons last night, and I only hope that it soon moves to a more permanent billet. I could be wrong, but I do not expect New York to acquire a more engaging musical this season. Violet and her tale -- developed from a short story by Doris Betts -- are placed in the American South. The time is 1964, a period of civil rights and an inexorably escalating war in Vietnam. As an adolescent, Violet (Amanda Posner) has been horribly scarred by her father (Stephen Lee Anderson), who accidentally wounded her with an ax. Now, in the belief that a TV revivalist and healer can give her back her lost looks, the adult Violet (Lauren Ward) takes her savings and journeys by bus to Tulsa, Okla., where the Preacher (Robert Westenberg) has his mission. On the way, she meets up with two soldiers: a serious and kindly black sergeant, Flick (Michael McElroy), and his buddy, a womanizing, white enlisted man, Monty (Michael Park). It's a kind of "road" musical, but Violet's journey to fulfillment, understanding and a perhaps sentimental but wonderfully satisfying happy ending is most adroitly threaded through with episodes from her earlier life in North Carolina. Crawley's lyrics and, perhaps particularly, his wise and funny book never put a foot wrong, nor does the tune-happy music by Tesori, which sprints a cheerfully convincing gamut from country to gospel, from show-biz to rhythm and blues, yet musically maintains its own tone and voice. Aided and abetted throughout by Derek McLane's brilliantly utilitarian settings, the apt costumes and choreography by Catherine Zuber and Kathleen Marshall, respectively, and the eloquent lighting by Peter Kaczorowski, Schulman's staging fits the musical like a glove with gossamer grace but calico strength. This is the kind of challenging work and, for that matter, the kind of staging that bring out the best in performers. The score and the book are right on target, but the slightest error in aim on the part of the actors could make the show's essential sweetness into something stickily saccharine, and its all-American honesty into all-American tackiness. Yet, guided by Schulman and Marshall, the cast works wonders. Ward's Violet (the scarring, by the way, is indicated just by a wisp of hair) is funny and altogether adorable, and her GI boyfriends, the exuberant Park and the sincere McElroy, have the feel of life to them. All the rest of the cast deserve their individual bouquets, from Westenberg's hellfire, snake-oil preacher to Anderson's ornery but decent Father, but the rest -- Posner, Kirk McDonald, Michael Madeiros, Cass Morgan, Paula New-some and Roz Ryan -- must accept the tribute none the less profound for being wrapped in a blanket. I just tumbled into love with "Violet." See it! ------------------ Playwrights Horizons, 416 W. 42nd St., (212) 279-4200. |
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