April 22, 2009 - The Pajama Game at the Mary
Moody Northern Theatre
The Sleep-Tite Pajama Factory is open for business again, this time at St. Edward's Mary Moody
Northern Theatre. And
the student cast of The Pajama Game sings and dances their hearts out with
gusto. It's just too bad they are trapped in such a
convoluted production.
The current economical
climate mirrors that of the show's 1954 origins, so it was a
good choice to close the Theatre Department's season. But
the uneven quality of the production
makes this Pajama Game into a real mess.
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Standouts in the cast
include leading man Andrew Cannata, who possesses a voice that
will amaze even the most jaded musical snob. Sherry
Mauch, playing leading lady "Babe," has a nice
singing voice, but she never strikes the spark that would
ignite a believable romantic story. And Jacob Trussel as
"Hines" and Julia Duffy as his foil
"Gladys" both steal the spotlight more than once with
their comic deliveries and vaudeville hoofing.
But the show suffers
from severe physical problems - which is unfortunate,
considering the pedigrees of the creative team. The sound
design is just terrible; there is no other way to describe it
than "terrible." The orchestra was serviceable,
but the brass section was very muddy (and often off-note), and
it didn't help to continually hear the conductor counting off
each musical number.
And although the Mary
Moody Northern Theatre's "in the round" layout has
always played havoc with musicals, the set design for this show
is especially non-functional. The dramatic portions of
the show are obscured from 50% of the audience at any given
time.
Both the director and
co-choreographers have impressive resumes, but they can't seem
to grasp the physical demands of this production. We were
unfortunately seated on the front row, and spent the entire 2.5
hours of the show feeling like either an actor would land in
our laps, or straining to see the main action - which always
happened either behind us or hidden among a sea of bodies on
the stage. Only the classic song-and-dance number
"Steam Heat" seemed to work...but just barely.
So if you go to see
this production (it closes this weekend), make sure your
tickets are in the top three rows of the theatre.
Otherwise, you'll miss most of the show.
(Image: Andrew Cannata and Sherry Mauch;
photo by Bret Brookshire)