Theater Reviews: Charles Dickens' Great Expectations, Looking for Paul, The Night of the Tribades

Also, The Sunset Limited, Uptown Downtown and more

Comments (0) By L.A. Weekly Theater Critics Thursday, Nov 25 2010

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GO THE SUNSET LIMITED John Perrin Flynn's top-notch staging of Cormac McCarthy's 1996 two-character play shows the author is a gifted dramatist as well as a superb novelist. A life-and-death struggle emerges in the dingy apartment of an ex-con named Black (Tucker Smallwood), who has just rescued White (Ron Bottitta) from a suicide leap off a subway platform. That their names are racial signifiers is just one of the dynamics McCarthy uses to mine the ironies in this simple scenario. Black is poor, uneducated and a committed man of faith, an inner-city Good Samaritan whose redemption came in prison and who unwaveringly believes in the value of life and God's grace. White is a hyper-rationalist, a successful university professor and defiant atheist who is weighted down with crushing despair and hopelessness. It's a high-stakes intervention where both men state their cases with unbridled passion and eloquence engendering a back-and-forth shift of empathies, and one never gets the sense of an immutable moral center or of merely listening to lectures. McCarthy, who is noted for his sparse dialogue and powerful imagery, exhibits an uncanny ear for ghetto argot, but just as nimbly utilizes the idiom of the academic. When, at the end, White erupts and expresses a weltanschauung of the darkest hue, one is reminded of Nietzsche's remark about staring into the abyss. Complementing Flynn's fine direction are the equally superb performances. Rogue Machine at Theatre Theater, 5041 Pico Blvd., L.A.; Fri., 8 p.m.; Sat., 5 p.m.; Sun., 7 p.m.; thru Dec. 19. (323) 960-4424, roguemachinetheatre.com (Lovell Estell III)

GO UPTOWN DOWNTOWN As Mel Brooks wrote in The Producers, "If you've got it, flaunt it!" Some living legends delude themselves and cause fans to quietly cringe, but not this one: Leslie Uggams has still got it. Slender and glinting in sequined black pants, she shimmies and sings her way though the highlights of a life spent onstage. Though she remained somewhat physically restrained during her opening-night performance, she made up for it with a vocal dynamism that would shame those less than half her age. When you begin your career at age 6, perform 29 shows a week at the Apollo between the ages of 9 and 16, and graduate to the comparatively cushy (oh, just eight shows a week) world of Broadway, a voice like that's a requirement. Plenty of jazz standards kept the well-heeled crowd tapping their toes and Uggams struttin' her stuff. Showcasing her staggering range, the delicate strokes with which she touched Gershwin's "Summertime" were no less powerful than her lusty belting of Ellington's "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)." The spoken transitions were a little stiff, and they felt forced; naturally, this Broadway baby seemed most at home when singing. It's better to show than tell anyway; mimicking the vocal styles of Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald and Dinah Washington (all of whom she's sung with), she showed why she's still working more than 60 years after she began. Don Rebic leads a sophisticated, happy orchestra that equals Uggams' mastery. Pasadena Playhouse, 39 S. El Molino Ave., Pasadena; Tues.-Fri., 8 p.m.; Sat., 4 & 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 p.m.; thru Dec. 12. (626) 356-7529. (Rebecca Haithcoat)

PHOTO BY KIFF SCHOLL

Rendition In Damascus

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THE WILD PARTY It could be argued that the 1920s were the true beginning of the sex-and-drugs ethos of open pleasure-seeking by the Lost Generation, who were perhaps more accurately described by the French equivalent Génération au Feu, or Generation in Flames. Such flamboyance and Joseph Moncure March's narrative poem of the same title inspired Michael John LaChiusa and George C. Wolfe's musical tribute to the Jazz Age and its decadence. Set in the New York apartment of promiscuous vaudeville dancer Queenie (Krista Sutton) and her comedian husband, Burrs (Casey Zeman), the story centers on a cocaine-and-gin–fueled party thrown by the couple for a coterie of characters that run the social, racial and sexual gamut. While the period is rich in source material (as demonstrated in HBO's Boardwalk Empire), this revival limps out of the gate with uninspired, crisp-as-oatmeal choreography, muddled singing and musical direction that lacks pizzazz, as well as a consistent tempo. Director Julia Holland nicely stages the living mise-en-scène, but nonetheless fails to harness the big Broadway feel and big performances that are vital to carrying an episodic vehicle with little to no plot. Bright spots include Deborah LaGorce-Kramer's intricate costumes and a convincingly catatonic morphine addict in Sally (a barely blinking Bonnie Frank), but absent the necessary bravado and bravura, this incarnation might be more aptly titled The Mild Party. Malibu Stage Company, 29243 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu; Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 5 p.m.; thru Dec. 5. (310) 589-1998. malibustagecompany.org (Mayank Keshaviah)