Word: songs
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...works of Dawn Kramer and Judith Chaffee Black are well-crafted, polished statements. Both choreographers steer clear of the dangerous gap between conception and realization haunting Gray's work. Yet neither compacts the poetic suggestiveness of Soll. Kramer's "Notion" is a slick dance to a slick song, picking up its title from Billie Holiday's croon, "If I should take a notion to jump into the ocean, ain't nobody's business if I do." Kramer uses her own slinky way of moving to draw the sinuous lines of Holiday's lament. At one point she cooly trails...
Russell made his initial reputation as a director with a series of subdued, en terprising biographical films for the BBC. Song of Summer, a life of Frederick Delius, is still one of the best and most subtle things he has done. With 1970's feature The Music Lovers, a parboiled melodrama about Tchaikovsky, it became clear that Russell was not interested in the fine details of fact. He is not much interested in narrative structure either, or intellectual or emotional consistency. What interests Russell most is turmoil, and where there are not sufficient amounts available in his subject...
With Martocchio setting the tone, the cabaret scenes are always suitably grotesque, sometimes stunningly so. Among the show's best numbers are "Two Ladies," an athletic celebration of a menage a trois complete with tumbling and the obligatory obscene gestures, and "Sitting Pretty (The Money Song)," featuring elaborate sequined, rhinestoned and feathered costumes and the talents of "Mary" (America) Lou Fackler as a red, white and blue drum-assed American dollar...
...Mather Drama Society not only poured profuse energy (and cash) into this production, but also found the talent to complement it. Best then to take the advice of the show's title song, and come at least to this particular Cabaret...
...with us--it's not another world any more, an escape to childhood. But I think Angell's sadness will abate--along with the rest of the country's--in the green months of high summer, and that the successor to this wistful meandering will be an impassioned swan song to July...