THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, December 3, 1995 TAG: 9512020062
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E11 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Theater review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, THEATER CRITIC
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
THE NATIVES are restless!
As the temperature dips into the 30s outside, Virginia Stage Company is doing its best to work up a heat wave. A lively and energetic company, dancing to the rhythm of the drums, weaves ``Once On This Island'' into a poignant, lovely Caribbean fable of lost love and class strife.
As directed by Gerry McIntyre (a cast member of the original 1990 Broadway production), the 11 singers and dancers go about their task with enough verve to keep the winter doldrums at bay. Spurred by three outstanding designers - Leonard Harman (sets), Howard Tsvi Kaplan (costumes) and Kenton Yeager (lighting) - this is by far VSC's most imaginative and fully realized musical since the long-ago ``Strider.''
Here, at last, is the musical that proves that this company can loosen up enough to present theater that looks seamless, uninhibited and free of pretense. Too often, the company looks over-rehearsed and overly concerned with ``craft'' and ``technique.''
Here, there is plenty of both qualities but, as it should be, neither shows. We are encouraged to relax with the assurance that the ensemble can easily handle the seemingly hectic pacing. Such insouciance is not often present in this theater.
Swivel-hipped calypso routines give way to soul-music influences as a chorus of storytellers creates a circle to tell us about the ill-starred love affair between a black peasant girl and a handsome young French mulatto aristocrat. When his Mercedes crashes on a jungle road, she nurses him back to health. He makes her his mistress, but refuses to marry her. Class rituals prevent it.
Based on a novel called ``My Love, My Love'' by Trindad-born Rosa Guy, it owes quite a bit to Hans Christian Andersen's ``The Little Mermaid.'' Andersen's lovers, barred by the differences between land and sea, are little different from Ti Moune, the girl, and Daniel Beauxhomme, the mulatto aristocrat, although the division here is due to class and race.
The music is by Stephen Flaherty with lyrics by Lynn Ahrens. The music is rousing enough but hardly distinctive. It's melodic, but you won't go away humming tunes. The aim is storytelling - unified, seamless storytelling - rather than stand-out songs. Pleasingly, the show looks and sounds as if it were the work of a unified force. Style and substance merge with an emphasis on mime, movement and, especially, dance.
Graciela Daniele's choreography for the Broadway edition has been faithfully re-created here, ranging from ritual dances to European waltzes. The jungle flora has bright colors that might be Disneyland more than a real jungle - a kind of Gauguin Tahitian influence mixed with Chagall's jungle. The dancers occasionally turn into birds and other creatures via a touch of costuming.
Each member of the ensemble gets a chance to shine and all should be mentioned. The true stand-out, though, is Vanita Harbour, who has also played the role of Ti Moune on Broadway. She moves with the lithe grace of a woman of nature, but with the innocence of the naive peasant girl. Her handsome but weak suitor is portrayed by Dennis Stowe, in fine voice for the show's one bow to traditional Broadway ballad, ``Some Girls.''
Myra Lucretia Taylor has an earth mother quality for Mama Euralie, a woman who realizes the folly of the lovers all along. The mischievous gods of earth, water, love and death are portrayed by Monica Pege, Virginia Woodruff, Jim Weaver and John Eric Parker. Michael Le Melle (who scored as Jim in Founders Inn Dinner Theater's ``Big River'') is one of several strong local talents recruited to complement the on-target out-of-town casting.
Kevin Wallace's musical direction makes his musicians sound more numerous than they are. This is a marked improvement over his ``Peter Pan'' last season.
While less imaginative theater companies around the country are wallowing in yet-another version of ``A Christmas Carol,'' isn't it refreshing that our own ``holiday musical'' is something this original and comparatively offbeat? It may not be traditional, but there are those who can readily feel that a Caribbean musical is the perfect choice for December.
The show requires verbal and visual imagination from the audience. The crashing sports car, for example, is represented by two flashlights carried by an actor who is both the driver and the car itself. Rain is suggested by silver streamers cascading from black umbrellas. The smallness and stylization of the show is in marked contrast to the grandiose ``Phantom of the Opera'' which is running just down the street. Here are two widely different musicals, both with their own merits. And doesn't downtown Norfolk currently look like a bona fide theater district? ILLUSTRATION: Photo
KEN QUEMAN
A lively cast helps make ``Once on This Island'' the most
imaginative musical production at VSC in years.
by CNB