Word: vera
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...story revolves around Joey Evans, cheap nightclub dancer par excellence, who gives up Linda English, the girl he loves, to profit from the attentions of Vera Simpson, a wealthy matron willing to pay--quiet handsomely--for her pleasures. Joey quickly tires of Vera and look pleasures. Joey quickly tires of Vera and looks and Linda against...
...Joey" departs from the stock formula for gangster shows. It's a strikingly bold and saucy trollop of a play, one that must have titillated or even shocked 1940s audiences. Lorenz Hart's lyrics do not play coy. Vera warbles of Joey in the classic song, "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered," that...
Then, having moved in with each other, Vera and Joey trill contentedly, "In our little den of iniquity...We've separate bedrooms; one for play and one for show." If one were to look for a central theme of "Pal Joey," a Wagnerian leitmotif, if you will--it would have...
Salvos of applause to Holly Sargent, however, who in the role of Vera, evinced a polish and versatility lacking in her male lead. Joey (Peter Mulrean) managed to look either peeved or bored throughout the entire show; I kept hoping they would pull him offstage with one of those big, vaudevillian hooks. Sargent, on the other hand, oscillated with ease from ladylike dignity to heartfelt compassion, to aching sexuality. She waxed multi-dimensional, in contrast to Mulrean's iron-poor performance. Mulrean's heart did not seem...
Joey does get erased at the end of the show, as Vera dumps him and sweet, sincere Linda (convincingly played by Linda Stafford) can only feel sorry for him. Joey is forced to leave town, in part because of blackmailing gangster Ludlow Lowell (Joe Shrand). Shrand, by the way, stands out as one of the snappiest characters in the show, in his brown pinstripes and white tie. His use of "dems" and "dose" would have made Damon Runyon proud...