Word: cohan
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...kind of rudimentary sociocultural chronicle. In "Arrivals," a Jewish immigrant (Jerry Zaks) just off the boat sings The Yankee Doodle Boy with an accent you could ladle with a chicken soup spoon. Later, as a fully assimilated show-biz tintype, he repeats the same number á la George M. Cohan...
There is a song in the Goodspeed Opera House's smashing revival of George M. Cohan's Little Johnny Jones that invariably stops the show: Give My Regards to Broadway. Nearly everybody in the audience has heard the words and smiles in recognition. But to the people who run the Goodspeed, those lyrics might just as well be Scripture: for the past 17 years they have been giving their regards to Broadway by reviving the great musicals of yesterday and the day before -and by adding a few new shows to the list...
...together, were rudimentary. Modern audiences expect more of a plot, and the books have to be extensively rewritten, with dated jokes carefully excised. The editing has to be judicious, however, so that the show's spirit is retained. In Johnny Jones, for example, Adapter Alfred Uhry wisely kept Cohan's quaint jingoism. "You think I'd marry an heiress and live off her money?" asks Johnny (Thomas Hulce), a jockey who is in love with one. "What do you take me for? An Englishman?" And: "French pastry ain't worth 30? compared to American apple...