Gypsy on Broadway - Review
Tony-Winners Patti Lupone, Boyd Gains, Laura Benanti Entertain You!
Dec 12, 2008
Gypsy tells the tale of a traveling vaudeville family. Mama Rose is the archetypal stage mother, pushing her children, Louise and June, into the limelight of show-biz, but when Rose dashes June’s chances of becoming a star, June runs away to become an actress, leaving seemingly plain Louise to fulfill her Mama’s dreams for their mildly successful vaudeville act. However, as vaudeville dwindles, the act is reduced to playing burlesque, where an unexpected star is found, and stripper Gypsy Rose Lee is born!
Burlesque Before Broadway
The musical is loosely based on the memoirs of real-life stripper Gypsy Rose Lee (1911-1970), who was born Rose Louise Hovick, but who became one of America’s most famed burlesque queens. Many of the misadventures of her early life are represented by the musical, although the musical, like her memoirs, takes poetic license with some truths.
Gypsy: A Musical Fable
The striptease artist Gypsy Rose Lee published her memoirs in 1957. These memoirs were turned into a musical in 1959, with music by Jule Styne, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and book by Arthur Laurents, the director of the current revival.
The original musical starred Ethel Merman, as Rose, the ambitious mother, and most actresses who have taken on the role since seem to be measured against Merman.
The Current Cast
Patti Lupone plays Rose in the current production. Lupone successfully portrays Rose both comically and movingly, giving an emotionally evoking and musically incomparable performance.
Lupone is brilliantly supported by the performances of rising-star Laura Benanti, playing dutiful daughter Louise, and four time Tony-Award winning actor Boyd Gains, playing Herbie, the decent man who loves Rose and becomes the vaudeville act’s agent. Benanti shows versatility as she portrays Louise through various stages of the character’s development, successfully showing the character to sweet, sympathetic, and later something more. Gains plays the character of Herbie with dimension, and adds to both the emotional and comical fascists of the story and songs of this moving musical.
The leads of this production well deserve the Tony-Awards they each won for their performances. Their performances are so entirely flawless that they each seem to become the character rather then seeming to be playing roles.
The Music
The musical numbers of this show assist in presenting an enjoyable and evoking entertainment. Some of the famous show-stoppers include “Let Me Entertain You,” “Everything’s Coming Up Roses,” and “You Gotta Get a Gimmick.”
The score successfully mingles comedy with emotion, and the current orchestra of the St. James Theater plays sensationally!
This Production
All the aspects of this production work well together, and the show has strong pace. The audience is permitted to sit back and relax while watching pros put forward a show in the best Broadway tradition.
Gypsy is due to close on March 1, 2009, after a year-long run and numerous awards, so there is still time to let this show entertain you!
