[NEohioPAL] Review of "Annie Get Your Gun" at Porthouse Theatre

[Bob Abelman]

'Annie Get Your Gun' is loaded with talent, but misfires 

 

Bob Abelman

News-Herald, Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times, Geauga Times Courier

Member, International Association of Theatre Critics 

 

This review appeared in the Times papers 7/30/09



Annie Get Your Gun, which premiered on Broadway in 1946 and is currently on the Porthouse Theatre stage, is a musical comedy relic.



It is the type of old-fashioned show where characters are broadly drawn caricatures, dialogue largely serves to segue from one song to the next, and the songs are usually ballads or the stuff large production numbers are made of.  It offers the classic "boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl" scenario amidst a frothy, creaky storyline set to music.



The thing is, there is something quite charming and genuinely endearing about relics whose music and lyrics are written by maestro Irving Berlin, resulting in some of the best, most evergreen show tunes ever created.



While dated in form and formula, this show is nonetheless chockfull of comedy and showmanship that continues to hold its own.



Although the story goes nowhere, director Terri Kent, choreographer MaryAnn Black, music conductor Jonathan Swoboda and costume designer Judith Picard Cronk make sure it goes nowhere fast and very well appointed.



The story is a fictionalized account of real life old west sharpshooter Annie Oakley.  After leaving a rustic, back woods existence to join Buffalo Bill's travelling "Wild West Show," she falls hopelessly in love with smooth-talking Frank Butler, the show's featured marksman.  When Annie becomes the main attraction, Frank's ego gets bruised and the two part ways, only to be reunited in a huge production number. 

This play is all about Annie and Frank, and the Porthouse production is blessed with two exceptionally talented performers playing the leads-Kayce Cummings and Fabio Polanco.

Last season, Cummings was wonderful as Marian in The Music Man and Hope in Anything Goes, but she is miscast as Annie.  She possesses an absolutely gorgeous voice that fully embraces Berlin's melodic songs, but it is much too gorgeous for this role.  Buffalo Bill would have featured Annie Oakley in a cabaret act instead of a shooting exhibition.  While singing, Cummings loses all semblance of the rough-and-tumble personality that comes through in her acting, which beautifully showcases Berlin's tunes but detracts from this production.  

Polanco has a related problem as Frank.  He, too, has an exceptional singing voice.  Although he manages to communicate his character's playfulness through songs like "Anything You Can Do," he is oddly flat the rest of the time.  He never achieves that "big lug" persona, or the charm and virility that go along with it.  He struts and frets, but generates no chemistry with Cummings, which makes the "boy gets girl" part of the dramatic trilogy a non-issue.

In thankless supporting roles, Robert Ellis as Sitting Bull, Marc Moritz as rodeo agent Charlie Davenport, and Dick Reiss as Buffalo Bill are wonderfully one-dimensional.  Brian Duncan and Alyssa Bruno, as the naïve young lovers Tommy and Winnie, are adorable. MaryAnn Black, as Frank's nasty on-stage assistant Dolly, tries way too hard to do way too much with what is written for her.

This production of Annie Get Your Gun is very pretty to look at and a pleasure to listen to.  Though dusted off, polished and well oiled by the Porthouse players and staff, it remains a corny, old-fashioned entertainment.  If this happens to be your cup of sassafras, it is playing through August 9 inside the pastoral Cuyahoga Valley National Park by the Blossom Music Center. 
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