Word: agassiz
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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KNOWING even less about bats than I know about opera, I was not a liule abashed last night to arrive at the Agassiz only to discover that Johann Strauss Die Fledermans (in English) is actually subtitled "The Bat's Revenge." Now what in the world do I know about bats? (To be honest, I was able to recall a snatch of lvric from Il est Side Story that sang about bats out of hell, but I hardly thought that would see me through.) However, halfway through the second act, it became somewhat clear that the Eledermans libretto isn't about...
...fact, there is a curious timelessness about the whole evening at Agassiz. In a day when we are all alienated or committed or anguishing somewhere in between, it's quite surprising to find a bunch of kids dedicated to bringing off an entertainment so blatantly irrelevant. In its way, that can be really refreshing...
...jerk who first started telling the world that apple pie was synonymous with America? William Jennings Bryan? Alexander Graham Bell? Durward Kirby? Well. whoever he was. he would probably insist that Take Me Along, this fall's Agassiz musical, is as American as apple pie. The show has all the credentials: a fourth-of-July setting, young lovers making a marriage pact under a full New England moon, parades, red-white-and-blue razzmatazz, you name it. But despite all that, don't be tricked: Take Me Along is as American as Jack Daniels booze-and all the better...
...booze is in the show at Agassiz thanks to one man. Eugene O'Neill, whose one comedy, Ah Wilderness, is the show's source. While his play is essentially the story of two couples-one old, one young-who slowly but surely find happiness one Independence Day weekend in pre-World War I Centreville, Connecticut, O'Neill could not leave it that simple or that cute. Instead, he gives us a hero who is a good-natured but pathetic drunk and a heroine who is a lonely schoolteacher. All ends happily in the end, but there...
Birnbaum is helped tremendously by the sets (unaccredited in the program), which are both atmospheric and serviceable. (The show really moves; it is the first time I have been out of an Agassiz musical by eleven o'clock.) Sara Linnie Slocum's lighting and Gail Steketee's costumes also contribute much to the production's dreamlike, hangover mood...