Here's a long review of "Forum". It's a little too long. I don't expect you to read it all. I didn't. But scroll down for more commentary by me.


For whatever reasons, the time seems ripe for a smart, cheeky, buoyant revival of "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum," and the spiffy new Jerry Zaks production, which opened Thursday night, is it.

This brazenly retro Broadway musical, inspired by Plautus, is almost as timeless as comedy itself. Here's a glorious, old-fashioned farce that, with its vintage Stephen Sondheim score and its breathless book by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart, celebrates everything that man holds least dear but can't deny himself: lust, greed, vanity, ambition; in short, all of those little failings that make man human.

Yet for all of its disguises, mistaken identities, pratfalls and leering jokes, "A Funny Thing" is as sophisticated as anything now on Broadway. In its own lunatic way, it's both wise and rigorously disciplined. Easy sentimentality is nowhere to be found here; in its place is the kind of organized chaos that leads to sheer, extremely contagious high spirits.

"A Funny Thing" should be around for a long time. Or, at least, for as long as the skyrocketing Nathan Lane, his name now in lights above the title, stays on to play the part that made a Broadway star of Zero Mostel in the first production, in 1962.

As Pseudolus, a subversive Roman slave, Lane triumphs, but not alone. He leads an ensemble assault on the manners and morals of ancient Rome (circa 200 B.C.), on today's political correctness and on what passes for good taste in an era when the boundaries between good taste and bad are virtually invisible.

Sondheim has been quoted as saying that he found this show, the first for which he wrote both the music and lyrics, "very experimental," in that it's "a direct antithesis of the Rodgers and Hammerstein school." "The songs," he said, "could be removed from the show, and it wouldn't make any difference," meaning that the book would still make uproarious, low-comedy sense.

That, thank heaven, is a fate we don't have to consider. Sondheim's score both serves the comedy and provides a sort of commentary on it. From "Comedy Tonight," the rousing anthem that opens the show and provides the finale, "A Funny Thing" is propelled as much by its witty, comically inane love songs and patter songs as by its book. It's only experimental in that farce, as George S. Kaufman once said of satire, "is something that closes on Saturday night." You don't often find it on Broadway anymore.

The Zaks production is big, but it gives the impression of being intimate, which is vital to the success of a farce in which each character is chin-deep in the tangled, misunderstood affairs of everyone else.

To the extent that the story can be synopsized, "A Funny Thing" is about the escalating complications that follow Pseudolus' attempt to win his freedom by arranging the elopement of his brainless, virginal young master, Hero, and the equally brainless, still virginal courtesan, Philia. She has been sold but not yet delivered to the army captain Miles (pronounced MEE-less) Gloriosus.

When Miles shows up to claim his bride, Pseudolus' plans to stall the captain are interrupted by the arrival of, first, Hero's lecherous father, Senex, whom Philia mistakes for Miles, then Hero's battle-ax mother, Domina, and finally Erronius, a cheerfully muddled old man who has been off searching for his son and daughter, stolen 20 years before by pirates.

Add to these characters: Hysterium, a fearful slave blackmailed by Pseudolus into acting as his accomplice, and Lycus, the pimp who lives next door with Philia and the other courtesans.

In what seems to be no time at all, Pseudolus is masquerading as Lycus, there's a funeral featuring a corpse not really dead and three different Philias are tearing around the stage more or less at the same time. At one point, four separate stories are hanging in the balance, including that of old Erronius. For reasons I can't go into, he has been advised by a soothsayer (Pseudolus) to walk around Rome's seven hills seven times, which he does with game resolve.

All the action takes place in a Roman street in front of three houses through which entrances and exits are made with split-second timing. The set, designed by Tony Walton, sees ancient Rome as it might be visualized in a comic book: everything is slightly bent, like the motives of the people inhabiting the space.

Though Lane is the focus of the production, he is surrounded by some very good clowns: Lewis J. Stadlen (Senex), Mark Linn-Baker (Hysterium), Ernie Sabella (Lycus) and Mary Testa (Domina, a lovesick cross between Margaret Dumont and Xantippe). Jim Stanek (Hero) and Jessica Boevers (Philia) aren't exactly clowns, but they sing beautifully and remain comically dim throughout.

Sondheim is being too modest when he suggests that his songs could be removed and nobody would miss them. His music and lyrics are absolutely integral to the evening's fun.

Consider "Impossible," in which Hero and Senex each gloomily suspect that Philia is in love with the other. Or "Everybody Ought to Have a Maid" (in which "a menial" rhymes with "congenial"), an enthusiastically bawdy number sung by Pseudolus, Senex, Hysterium and Lycus. Or "Lovely," when Philia happily admits that being lovely is what she does in life. It's funny and sweet when it's first sung and very funny when reprised by Hysterium, who, disguised as Philia, begins to fancy himself in his miraculous transformation.

And what can one say about the show's amazing courtesans? Today's fashion might require that one identify them, possibly, as showwomen, or maybe showpersons. Though they're trained dancers and do some athletic turns choreographed by Rob Marshall, they also function as -- there's no other term that fits -- showgirls. They are the sort of long, leggy young women that Ziegfeld used to dress up his revues by undressing them.

It may not be too much to suggest that "A Funny Thing" is making fun of all such sexism while clearly enjoying the spectacle.

Not even the courtesans can upstage Lane, however. Unlike the legendary Mostel, who delighted audiences by reportedly climbing all over the show and more or less taking it hostage, Lane succeeds by working with his colleagues. He insinuates himself into the consciousness with a kind of devious, hard-edged innocence. He's as priceless in uncharacteristic repose as when he's cavorting about the stage organizing some new caper or blissfully caught in a courtesan's scissors grip. Coming from "The Birdcage," his first big Hollywood hit, Lane is welcome back on Broadway where he belongs, at the top of the bill.

In the context of the season's other musicals, "A Funny Thing" looks heaven-sent.

PRODUCTION NOTES:

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. Book by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart; music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim; directed by Jerry Zaks; choreographed by Rob Marshall; sets and costumes by Tony Walton; lighting by Paul Gallo; sound by Tony Meola; orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick; musical supervision by Edward Strauss; dance music arrangements by David Chase; musical coordinator, Seymour Red Press; associate choreographer, Sarah Miles; associate producers, Marc Routh, Perseus Productions and TV Asahi. Presented by Jujamcyn Theaters, Scott Rudin/Paramount Pictures, The Viertel-Baruch-Frankel Group, Roger Berlind and Dodger Productions.

With: Nathan Lane (Prologus and Pseudolus), Mark Linn-Baker (Hysterium), Lewis J. Stadlen (Senex), Ernie Sabella (Lycus), William Duell (Erronius), Mary Testa (Domina), Jessica Boevers (Philia), Cris Groenendaal (Miles Gloriosus), Jim Stanek (Hero) and Leigh Zimmerman (Panacea).


Well, that's all well and good. I liked this play because:
1) It was the first show I worked on at LHS
2) I loved the reaction it got by the sold-out crowds in the auditorium
3) It was the first time I ever really enjoyed myself in an extra-curricular activity.

Now, quite obviously, Nathan Lane and all them didn't really play Pseudolus. On the contrary, we had a cast of our own characters:

  • Joey Garris (Pseudolus)
  • Peter Voderburg (Senex)
  • David Williamson (Hysterium)
  • Steve Dunn (Lycus)
  • Derek Augsburger (Miles Gloriosus)
    Sorry, ladies, I forgot who played Domina and Phillia, and all the courtesans, but I will find the program and give you all credit.

    Back to the Plays Page

    Email: jazzgod1@yahoo.com