August 23, 2001
by Rob Kendt
The power of a single performer to hold the stage is a rare
giftÑto both audience and performer. If you'll indulge a reminiscence of my one
major theatrical acting credit, Mr. McAfee in a high school production of Bye
Bye, Birdie: I still recall with a kind of grateful awe the moment in Act Two
when, abandoned by Mrs. MacAfee and other concerned parents, I stood alone on
the stage of Central High and regaled an audience of some hundreds with the
lament, "KidsÑwhat the devil's wrong with these kids today?" A stage
solo, as I remember it, is not about showing off or about ego gratification but
quite the reverseÑit's an act of communion as selfless as channeling or, well,
communion. It's profoundly humbling. For an audience, it can have the emotional
force of a close-up on film, except that it works its magic not by inviting us
to lose ourselves in contemplation of the human face, a reflection that draws
us ineluctably deeper into ourselves, but to reach out for connection, to feel
the space between audience and performer as tangibly as skin.
This is what I've had the privilege to witness, in varying
degrees, over the past weeks. First was Megan Mullally's cabaret benefit for
Evidence Room, whichÑthough she was supported by a brilliant five-piece band
called Supreme Music Program, and though she engagingly broke
"character" to set up songs and introduce her guest performer, the
smooth Billy PorterÑfound its mŽtier in a series of character-studies-in-song
as strange and haunting, and as recognizably human, as any I've seen in a play
lately. It may be axiomatic that songs by the likes of Randy Newman, Tom Waits,
or John Prine are like short stories or one-act plays, but it takes an
actor/singer of Mullally's talents, of her sugar and grit and spectacular
sensitivity, to realize their full theatrical possibilities. Some critics have
found her cabaret act precious, and indeed her blithe blend of rock, soul,
blues, show tune, and classical does verge on esoteric; even Holly Cole isn't
this eclectic. And I suspect many of her Broadway and TV fans would rather see
her vamp and camp it up through a revue of sassy Jule Styne numbers, with a
little Weill for seasoning. For my money, I prefer Mullally's weird alt-pop
soliliquies over the hoary, comforting conventions of most of what passes for
cabaret these days. I can think of few other singers who could both send up
George Jones' magisterial "The Grand Tour" and do it perfect justice.
Then came the Rodgers/Sondheim/Laurents stepchild Do I Hear a
Waltz?, in a perfect gem of a production at Pasadena Playhouse, recently
closed. (Apparently this definitive production will be recorded. It alsoÑand I
don't say this lightlyÑdeserves a Broadway run.) Smartly and lovingly directed
by David Lee, this overlooked masterwork was no one-woman showÑquite the
contrary, it had a well-oiled ensemble without a weak linkÑbut it belonged
indisputably to Alyson Reed, a towering talent with a big laughing/crying voice
that suggests the All-American spunk of Doris Day, with the occasional wiseacre
snap of Kay Thompson. It was a performance that brooked no resistance, leaving
us completely helpless for her drunken, forlorn second act solo,
"Everybody Loves Leona." I don't know that I've ever before felt an
audience's heart break in unison.
Amazingly, I felt it happen again the next week, in Marc Wolf's
compelling Another AmericanÉ Asking and Telling, currently at
Mark Taper Forum. Wolf does a miraculous thing: He shows boundless compassion
and respect for the real people he interviewed, and whose interviews he here
recreates, on all sides of the debate over gays in the military, but he
nevertheless manages to give the evening a wicked wit and sense of play,
leaving us unguarded for its unforced flashes of raw emotion. I've seldom wept
as unselfconsciously in the theatre as at the story told simply, sadly, without
self-pity by the mother of Alan Schindler, a gay servicemen beaten to death by
shipmates. Nor can I recall the last time an earnest, politically engaged piece
of theatre was so wholly entertaining.
Not as wrenching but no less entertaining is Charlayne Woodard's In
Real Life, also at the Taper, in rep with Wolf's show. Woodard's tale of
youthful success on Broadway at great personal and creative cost is a diverting
variation on be-careful-what-you-wish-for which, for any readers of this paper
who aspire to pound the boards or grace the screen, should be mandatory
viewing. And take a friendÑit's the solo performer who, Garbo-like, must be
alone, not the audience.