THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, July 28, 1994 TAG: 9407280045
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E6 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Theater Review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, ENTERTAINMENT WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 103 lines
WHAT IS IT about ``Cats'' anyway?
A bunch of singer-dancers (mostly abnormally thin) dressed up in whiskers and feline fur, chanting varied pop-music styles adapted to light, very light, British verse.
No plot.
Repetitive choreography.
Garbled, often indiscernible, lyrics.
Add them all up and what have you got?
One of the biggest hits in musical theater history. (To be more specific, the third-longest running musical - and still running).
Go figure.
``Cats'' is back at Chrysler Hall and ticket sales have been brisk. This show has been running for 12 years in New York, and ran for 17 months before that in London. Its ads, which proclaim that it is ``Now and Forever'' don't seem, anymore, to be exaggerated.
The secret to ``Cats''' success is simple to define - theatricality.
Theatricality is in short supply in theaters across the land. Here is a visual spectacle that tries mightily to transport you into another world - a world created on its own terms. In New York, where the prices are still $65 per seat, the entire theater has been remodeled to suggest a nocturnal feline junkyard. Here, where the top price is $37.50, the junk is all kept on the stage - except for a few colored lights scattered about. It seems a bargain.
The anthropomorphic glories for cat lovers net a rock cat, a troupe of dancing Siamese cats, a railroad cat, a theater cat, a magician cat, a faded cat, an old cat and, as the King of Siam used to say, etc. etc. etc.
``Cats'' is a success primarily because it is an event - and because it has the one lone song, ``Memory,'' sung here in soaring glory by Mary Gutzi, a singer who is so gutzi that she fairly makes the rafters shake. She gives La Streisand a run for her trills with this Puccini-stolen melody that is to this show what the title song was to ``Hello, Dolly'': cash. ``Memory'' is a tease in Act I and is trotted out in all its glory as a grand finale, just before Grizabella, the faded glamour cat, sings it and is transported to ``the heavenside layer.'' No matter how often you've heard the song done by off-keyed cocktail-lounge pianists, there is still a chill when it's sung by a stylist as powerful as Gutzi.
``Cats'' was perhaps the first of the ``event'' shows that have now become almost commonplace. You can buy T-shirts and coffee mugs for them all - ``Miss Saigon,'' ``Les Miserables,'' ``Phantom of the Opera,'' ``Beauty and the Beast.'' Learning how to market, Broadway even is turning revival shows, such as the upcoming ``Show Boat'' into a big, over-produced T-shirt show.
For awhile, it was generally thought that ``Cats'' could never go on the road. Producers believed that it would have to run six months or so in each theater if it was going to break even. But designers proved to be more economically imaginative than anyone thought. Suffice it to say that the ``Cats'' currently at Chrysler Hall is a suitable facsimile of the spectacle you'll get anywhere else from this outing. Electronically lit eyes glower from the darkness. The junkyard, home of the jellicle cats we visit, is lit by moonlight by way of David Hersey.
John Napier's original stage design has been maintained wonderfully. An oven and an oversized toothpaste tube are among the junk items seen from a cat's point of view. And, in the end, Grizabella, accompanied by the godlike Old Deuteronomy, do ascend heavenward in a spaceship straight out of ``Close Encounters.'' It's a lot for the eye.
For the ear, there are verses from T.S. Eliot's ``Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats'' as performed by a feline company of varied styles. Ron DeVito, as the insolently macho Rum Tum Tugger, represents rock. He's not as wild as some other Tuggers. There are cats to represent swing and cats to represent an opera spoof.
This is, to a great extent, a dance show but Gillian Lynne's choreography does little more that preserve jazz and ballet cliches. Her dancers are required to have high extension and energy - and to repeat the same steps over and over. This company is as good as any of the five others I have seen. The long run (which featured recent visits to St. Louis and Richmond) has not, apparently, tired them out. We might appreciate them as much as gypsies as we do as cats.
Christopher Gattelli's acrobatics as Mistoffolees is a standout.
Richard Poole has a fine turn as the theater cat - complete with nostalgia that leads into the opera spoof. In the land of the Virginia Opera, the bit seemed to get even more recognition than it does in New York.
Leo P. Carusone's firm hand on the orchestra paid off in perfect balancing. Martin Levan's sound design, which obviously includes formidable balancing of many body microphones, is adept but, even so, the Eliot verses are often indiscernible. (After a while, you don't care).
This touring ``Cats'' is a first-class outfit that preserves the visual spectacle and theatricality that is a mainstay of any Cameron Mackintosh production. It has become clear that Mackintosh is not going to put anything shoddy out on the road. There might be inherent banalities, but they won't be on the production end. MEMO: THEATER REVIEW
What: ``Cats,'' the musical composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, based on
verses by T.S. Eliot Where Chrysler Hall in Norfolk
When: Tonight and Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m., Sunday
at 2 and 7:30 p.m.
Tickets: $27.50 to $37.50. To order: 671-8100 ILLUSTRATION: Photo by PAUL GATES
Ron DeVito stars in ``Cats,'' the musical being presented through
Sunday by a touring company at Chrysler Hall.
by CNB