Acting Up

Cilicia A. Yakhlef

JERRY'S GIRLS

Arvada Center
6901 Wadsworth Blvd.
303-431-3939
Tu-Sa $28-32

The dynamic femme role model portrayed in musicals like "Mame" and "Hello Dolly" inspired an archetype that helped propel American women through the feminist movement and into the arts, education, and big business. Jerry Herman, the Broadway "boy wonder" composer/ lyricist whose scores grace "Milk &Honey," "Mame," "Mack & Mabel," "Hello Dolly" and "La Cage Aux Folles" created characters that demonstrated both strength and tenderness and who, like most heroines, always managed to find the proverbial "happy ending."

"Jerry's Girls," a musical tribute to Herman, is a cabaret event featuring full renditions and medleys of more than thirty of his most famous musical compositions. If you choose to go, remember this is a revue, not a musical-- there is no plot and the only relevant theme is to reflect the "spirit" of Jerry Herman. Talented and emotive as that spirit may be, because I can be a major pain in the butt, I found it difficult to maintain interest in anything that lacks dramatic motivation.

My sneering lip began to twitch when, in the opening number I found that the band overpowered the vocalists both visually and aurally. One of the major faux-pas of national tours is that stage managers, in their endeavor to represent the work as originally directed, often fail to make accommodations for divergent acoustic values and stage elements from theater to theater. This can be a fatal mistake, especially in a case such as "Jerry's Girls" where there is little drama to involve the audience. When attending a show to hear showtunes, it is very annoying to have to strain your ears just to catch some of the lyrics. Additionally, the presence of the orchestra on stage created the artistic value equal to having a large immobile blob that took up nearly one-third of the visual space. This cumbersome set design slows the aesthetic heartbeat of this piece down to somewhere between barely living and flatlined, when indeed the musicals upon which the revue is based were vigorously out of breath.

However, the performances were well rounded with stand-out numbers performed by Tracy Lore, Diane Vincent and Gordon Goodman. Choreography was somewhat sedate, but perfectly performed, and all five cast members delivered solid performances. Additionally, we can't blame our favorite big theater-- the Arvada Center-- for the flat production, since they were only responsible for scenic construction.

Although this show held none of the technical magic I've raved about at the AC, it is still worth seeing if you are a fan of sixties musicals.