Winning 'Game' lacks only a standout score
SHEFFIELD -- Julianne Boyd has accomplished amazing things in the nine years since she formed Barrington Stage Company in a high school auditorium. Her productions of "Cabaret" and "The Diary of Anne Frank" were better than the Broadway versions that followed. Her "South Pacific" reminded us what was great about the musical before sentimental bloat set in, and she gave glorious new life to Jerry Herman's "Mack and Mabel." There have been US premieres ("A View From the Roof") and world premieres ("Ciao!"). This fall she'll be coproducing a new version of Chris Calloway's "Blanche and Her Joy Boys" with the New Repertory Theatre in Newton.
"The Game," a world premiere musical based on the novel "Les Liaisons Dangereuses" -- known to Hollywood Francophobes as "Dangerous Liaisons" -- is the latest feather in Boyd's cap. The singing is superb, the staging fluid, the book and lyrics clever, and the songs melodic -- more than you can say for most musicals these days.
Its major flaw, though, is one that might keep it from having a longer life -- Megan Cavallari's music is more serviceable than savory. Though always tuneful (with Baroque touches) and expressive enough to bring out the power of Sara Ramirez (the wicked Marquise de Merteuil) and Heather Ayers (the saintly Madame de Tourvel), it lacks range, heft, and most of all distinction.
Like Charles Strouse's music for last season's Huntington Theatre Company production of "Marty," it sounds perfectly OK while you're listening, but is any of it memorable? Would you buy the cast album?
It's too bad, because the lyrics by Amy Powers and David Topchik are witty enough to play Hammerstein to a more complex, less sentimental Rodgers. That might be overstating their talents, but in general they know how to tell a story through both prose (they also wrote the book) and song. The musical moves along with the same passion and inevitability as the theatrical version written by Christopher Hampton and the film by Stephen Frears (with John Malkovich and Glenn Close) -- not to mention the book, of course, which caused a sensation when it was written in 1782. It was banned in the 19th century.
Boyd keeps the pace flowing, with the help of choreographer Jan Leys. Among the many things she does right is strike a mischievous musical-comedy tone in the first act that gets you on the side of the wicked but wonderfully charismatic Marquise and her partner in crimes of seduction, the Vicomte de Valmont, played with roguish charm by Christopher Innvar.
I would have thought that the light, sexy, and irreverent approach -- akin to Stephen Sondheim's "A Little Night Music" -- would have subverted the tragedy of the second act, but it doesn't. As lives start to get ruined by the decadence of the rich and famous, the tone gets darker and our sympathies shift, although it's hard to take one's eyes and ears off Ramirez, who has garnered attention in New York for her roles in "A Class Act" and "The Gershwins' Fascinating Rhythm." Both her voice and her presence convey beauty and menace simultaneously. She's perfect for the part and seems poised for stardom.
Heather Ayers (sister of Becca from Barrington Stage's "Cabaret") has a more straightforward soprano, but when she's allowed to let loose -- "My Sin" is the musical highlight of the evening -- she unveils a tremendous talent of her own.
The quintet led by conductor-keyboardist Michael Morris asserts itself without drowning out the singers.
The characters in "The Game" are the kinds of people that made the French Revolution inevitable and drenched in blood. If only the musical connections were as dangerous as the liaisons.
Ed Siegel can be reached at siegel@globe.com.
The Game
Musical in two acts. Book and lyrics by Amy Powers and David Topchik. Music by Megan Cavallari.
From the novel "Les Liaisons Dangereuses'' by
Choderlos de Laclos.
Directed by: Julianne Boyd. Sets, Michael Anania. Costumes, Fabio Toblini.
Lights, Jeff Croiter. Choreography, Jan Leys. Produced by Barrington Stage Company.
At: Consolati Performing Arts Center, Sheffield, through Aug. 23. 413-528-8888.
