Theater Review: Eighties Redux
Let's disabuse each other of the idea that we should think at Broadway musicals. Maybe, once upon a time, that's what some intelligent folk thought could be done with the form-and yes, we know that musicals can be written to make us think as well as feel. But can we be honest? Who is writing thought-provoking, intellectual musicals and getting them on Broadway?
I know, I know: Grey Gardens, the brilliant musical by Doug Wright (book), Scott Frankel (music) and Michael Korie (lyrics), based on the cult-hit documentary was the capstone of the Off-Broadway season at Playwrights Horizons and is now rumored to be Broadway bound-which is, of course, terrific. But when it comes to Broadway musicals, the brain, in the main, stays plainly down the drain. For thinking theatre, there's the reservoir of Off- and Off-Off-Broadway. For entertainment, there's Broadway, where the idea is "Make me smile! Make me laugh! Make me roar!"
Well, The Wedding Singer made me smile a lot, laugh a good bit and roar a fair amount. So if I'm wrong to sit here, not railing maniacally at the lowering of artistic standards, fine. Need The Wedding Singer be Sunday in the Park with George? Connect the dots, George.
For those unfamiliar, The Wedding Singer is set in 1985 in Ridgefield, N.J. It's there that dopey, adorable Robbie Hart (Stephen Lynch) fronts a band whose bread and butter is playing wedding gigs. He'd have married skanky Linda (the stupendous Felicia Finley), but she dumps him at the altar. This would make anyone have trouble doing our job, but given Robbie's profession, things quickly turn disastrous. Had Julia (a game Laura Benanti) not befriended him, Robbie might never have "come out of the dumpster," as one of the show's bounty of catchy, well-crafted, irony-rich songs smartly phrases it.
How sad for rebounding Robbie that Julia is unavailable to him: She's busy getting hitched to suave, skanky Glen (Richard H. Blake), a slick Wall Streeter who drives a car with a license plate reading "Xmas Bonus" and hits on every girl in sight. The rest of The Wedding Singer tracks how far Robbie will go to win Julia's heart, including a thoroughly improbable denouement set in Las Vegas with some of the funniest impressions of 1980s cultural and political figures this side of the Capitol Steps.
To keep things well paced, there are also subplots involving Robbie's randy, skank-friendly grandma Rosie (Rita Gardner), Julia's skanky friend Holly (a supremely blow-dried Amy Spanger), Robbie's skanky bandmate Sammy (a mightily greasy Matthew Saldivar) and Robbie's other skanky bandmate, George (Kevin Cahoon).
The Wedding Singer entertains so much and so well because it's as much a love letter to the 1980s (and, obviously, to skank) as it is a smart, well-shaped adaptation of the film. At its core, the story has an untrammeled innocence that the pastiche score and coy, expedient book tap into directly and unapologetically. The score particularly nails all those feel-good '80s harmonies, starting with the infectious opening number, "It's Your Wedding Day." While I did turn to my partner at one point and whisper, "Wow, Spandau Ballet should sue," it wasn't meant as a slam-it's just clear there's a big romantic, nostalgic heart beating in this show amid all the asymmetrical, well-gelled haircuts and proto-Madonna costumes. The less-polished book offers goofy one-liners, cultural references, and groan-inducing puns.
Aside from the performances, which all exude kitsch and verve, John Rando's spiffy direction and Rob Ashford's period-perfect choreography do exactly what's they're supposed to do-entertain us and then get out of the way of material determined to make us grin, laugh and roar. What's more entertaining than that?