Word: verdon
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...direction, there is a constant sense of zip, an occasional effect of explosion. There is plainly a belief that all music aspires toward a brass band's exuberance, all locomotion toward a fire engine's clanging speed. And there is a very proper belief that one Gwen Verdon is the equal of a hand-picked chorus line, a spotlighted siren, a surefire comic, and a sought-after premiére danseuse...
...once a buyer with a cloven hoof appears, and transforms beefy Joe Boyd into lithe, 22-year-old Joe Hardy, the greatest ballplayer of all time. There is, however, an escape clause in the deal; and to keep Joe from escaping his clutches, the Devil puts redheaded Miss Verdon to work as an enchantress...
...paste board people, Damn Yankees develops a stage full of entertaining characters. Ray Walston, as Applegate, seemed to me the best of all. A fast-talking pitchman with fire-red tie and sox, Walston has the cards, and all the best lines, stacked in his favor. Red-haired Gwen Verdon, as a witch Applegate imports from 'Chicago, sings a little and dances a lot. If you've heard "Whatever Lola Wants," you may have dismissed it is standard juke-box gruel. The meal may seem finer after you watch Miss Verdon grinding it. She also takes part in a prolonged...
Even Miss Verdon's calculating gyrations don't put her way out in front of the rest of the east. As befits a baseball musical, Damn Yankees is a team effort. Stephen Douglass as the young players, Robert Shafter as the cocoon from which Douglass emerges, and Shannon Bolin as a baseball widow all have acting as well as singing talent. When Douglass sings "A Man Doesn't Know" or Shafter sings "Goodbye, Old Girl" the show takes on a melodious wistfulness surprising, and welcome, in an evening so high-spirited...
...format for reviewing musicals this season has become sadly routine. The critics regularly begin by sighing that Shirley Booth (or Alfred Drake, or Gwen Verdon, or Jeanmaire) is delightful but that the show's book (or music, or lyrics, or both) is far below par. In The Pajama Game, the balance is finally restored: the excellent cast must compete with the script and score for the evening's honors. As a result, the intermission in The Pajama Game is an unpardonable intrusion and the final curtain falls hours too soon. It is the most consistently entertaining musical in several years...