Say what you will about the Alliance’s recently closed “Ghost Brothers of Darkland County.” (Given the vast majority of comments I’ve heard from others, I feel like the only person in town who really loved the show.) If nothing else, at least it was a piece of original material – and that’s more than can be said for most of the company’s world-premiere musicals over the last several years: “The Color Purple,” “Sister Act,” “Bring It On!”
At present, it's more than can be said for the state of musical theater in general, too. It isn't a very groundbreaking observation, but just look at the current offerings on Broadway. Eliminate the decades-old revivals and a few of those nostalgic jukebox revues, and what's left to pass for "new" work is, one, "The Book of Mormon," and no less than nine shows "inspired" by movies. Whether the cinematic sources happen to be great ("Once"), adequate ("Ghost"), forgettable ("Leap of Faith") or reviled ("Newsies") is sadly irrelevant.
By every account, “Newsies,” the stage production, is an earnest attempt to learn from and improve upon all that was so wrong about “Newsies,” the motion picture. (More power to them.) “Xanadu,” meanwhile, the 2007 Broadway hit based on a legendarily egregious 1980 Hollywood flop, doesn’t even try to better itself. Instead, it’s lazily content to wallow in its basic awfulness, theoretically motivated in the interest of campy fun. (Shame on them.)
Under the dubious circumstances, it could be considered a compliment to call Actor’s Express’ “Xanadu” a bad production of a bad show adapted from a bad movie.
The film starred Olivia Newton-John as a mythological muse in then-modern-day Venice Beach, who falls in love with a mortal “bonehead” with dreams of opening his own roller disco. The theater version features a script by Douglas Carter Beane (“The Little Dog Laughed”), a recycled score of period pop songs by Jeff Lynne and John Farrar, and an inordinate amount of talk about “artistic vision” and “creative inspiration” for a project that’s largely devoid of either.
There’s no telling what director Sherri D. Sutton might have pulled off with this game cast and stronger material, but her chintzy Express rendition of “Xanadu” leaves a lot to be desired. To see the tacky scenic design of Phillip Male, you’d never guess he were among the finest local talents in his field. Ditto Mike Post, whose lighting is essentially limited to overusing a couple of follow spots. What mostly distinguishes a 1940s flashback scene or a fantasy sequence set on Mt. Olympus is the noxious output of a fog machine.
With choreography by Ricardo Aponte and music director Bill Newberry leading a four-piece band, the production numbers are mildly diverting. Jill Hames stands out in an ensemble that also includes Lindsey Lamb Archer and Jordan Craig as the lackluster lovers, and Mary Nye Bennett, Greg Bosworth, Christen C. Orr, Al Stilo, Craig Waldrip and the ordinarily resourceful Marcie Millard (in a rare misstep as the comic villainess).
For a show that doesn’t really want to be “good” in the traditional sense of the word, “Xanadu” ultimately gets just what it asks for.
THEATER REVIEW
“Xanadu”
Grade: D+
Through June 16. 8 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays; 2 p.m. Sundays. $25-$47. Actor’s Express, 887 W. Marietta St., Atlanta (King Plow Arts Center). 404-607-7469. actors-express.com.
Bottom line: A show that lives down to the infamous movie flop that “inspired” it.
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