Published in The News Tribune, July 17, 2015
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| Anita (Melanie Gladstone) and the Shark girls. Photo by Kat Dollarhide |
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| Tony (Ryan Anderson) and Maria (Melissa Maricich). Photo by Kat Dollarhide |
I tend to think everyone in the world has
seen West Side Story, yet I wonder if
people younger than 40 know the story. After all, it’s been 58 years since is
premiered on Broadway and 55 since the popular film starring Natalie Wood,
Richard Beymer, Rita Moreno, George Chakiris and Russ Tamblyn rocked America’s
movie houses. With music by the great Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Stephen
Sondheim, and choreography by Jerome Robbins, it was a sure-fire hit. Yet it
seldom plays regional theaters. In the nine years I’ve been reviewing plays in
the South Sound I’ve not seen it once until this week at Tacoma Musical
Playhouse.
I suspect it’s too big for local theaters to
handle. Robbins’ choreography, and the athletic dance moves as adapted locally
by Jon Douglas Rake and co-choreographer Jimmy Shields, is probably as tough a
challenge as that of any musical. At TMP the dancing may not be as sharp or as
smooth as it was in the movie, but these are amateurs and they don’t have
multiple takes as in the movies. The set is also a challenge, but designer
Bruce Haasl does a superb job of creating a 1950s Manhattan Upper West Side
street scene that smoothly converts to the interiors of Doc’s Drugstore and
Anita’s apartment.
What everyone should know by now is that it
is a retelling of Shakespeare’s Romeo and
Juliet set in a slum area of Manhattan with Puerto-Rican and Italian street
gangs instead of Montagues and Capulets. Maria (Melissa Maricich) is the modern
day Juliet and Tony (Ryan Anderson) is the modern day Romeo.
An interesting point that says a lot about
the time and place is that the Italians were not called Italian, but simply
American; whereas the Puerto-Ricans were called Puerto-Ricans. By the 1950s
Italian immigrants had assimilated into the American culture, while the
Puerto-Ricans had not, and there was hot debate among them as to whether or not
they wanted to assimilate, as humorously illustrated by the catchy tune
“America,” a duet between Anita (Melanie Gladstone) who wants to be American
and Rosalia (Brynne Geiszler) who longs to go home to Puerto Rico.
The street gangs, the Jets (“American”) and
the Sharks (Puerto-Rican) are at war. Tony is a former leader of the jets who
has outgrown the gang activity. He meets Maria at a dance and they immediately
fall in love and try tragically to consummate their love amidst the ongoing
rival warfare. Tony tries to be a peacemaker, as does Doc (Joseph Woodland) and
the cops, Lt. Schrank (Martin Goldsmith) and Officer Krupke (Chris Serface),
who are stupid, incompetent and racist.
The story is romantic and tragic, but there
are wonderfully comic moments such as the aforementioned song, “America” and
the most comical bit in the whole play, “Gee, Officer Krumpke,” wonderfully
sung by Action (Jake Atwood) and danced with great style by the Jets.
The songs “Maria” by Tony, “Tonight” by Tony
and Maria with the entire cast, and “Somewhere” with solos by Tony and Maria
plus Clarice (Maggie Barry) and Francisca (Francesca Guecia) are among the most
beautiful love songs ever written.
There is a lot of fighting and a rape scene,
all of which are executed with highly stylized yet tasteful dance moves.
Bernstein’s music, which blends the operatic with popular music, and Sondheim’s
inventive lyrics go a long way toward making this among the best of musicals.
While TMP’s production might not place this
among the top two or three musicals of the year (I’d give that honor to TMP’s Evita, Cabaret at Tacoma Little Theatre, and Center Stage’s For All That), it is certainly more than worth the price of admission.
West
Side Story,
8 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday through Aug. 2, Tacoma
Musical Playhouse at The Narrows Theatre, 7116 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, $20-$29, 253-565-6867,
http://www.tmp.org
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