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<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><B style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Mercury’s
marvelous ‘Grand Hotel’ is filled to capacity<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns =
"urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p></SPAN></B></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><B style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></B></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #1f497d; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">Bob
Abelman<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #1f497d; FONT-SIZE: 12pt"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #1f497d; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">News-Herald,
Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times,<o:p></o:p></SPAN></I></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #1f497d; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">The
Morning Journal, Geauga Times Courier<o:p></o:p></SPAN></I></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #1f497d; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">Member,
American Theatre Critics Association <o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"
class=MsoNormal align=center><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></I></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0in 0in 10pt" class=MsoNormal
align=center><SPAN
style="LINE-HEIGHT: 115%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #1f497d; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">This
review will appear in the <I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">News-Herald</I></SPAN><SPAN
style="LINE-HEIGHT: 115%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">
7/22/11</SPAN><SPAN
style="LINE-HEIGHT: 115%; FONT-SIZE: 12pt"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Mercury
Summer Stock’s current production of <I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Grand Hotel </I>is a testament to the notion
that less is more.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">The
play itself, by Luther Davis, is an efficient compression of Vicki Baum’s
complicated 1929 novel.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>With music
and lyrics by Robert Wright, George Forrest and Maury Yeston, it is also a song
and dance adaptation of the </SPAN><SPAN class=st1><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">luxurious
</SPAN></SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">1932
Hollywood film of the same name.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"><o:p> </o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT size=3><I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">Grand Hotel </SPAN></I><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN>focuses
on the intersecting lives of the eccentric guests of an opulent Berlin hotel in
1928.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>On the fragile threshold of
world-wide financial ruin, moral bankruptcy and war, everyone is restless.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Everyone is in desperate need of
something they do not have and cannot possess.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Everyone is going somewhere but
eventually end up where they began.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN></SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'"><o:p><FONT
size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN>The original 1989 Broadway production of this show won five Tony Awards,
including Best Musical, but many New York critics were less than
captivated.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>They noted that the
show generated theatricality, </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">tumultuous
atmosphere,</SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN> and a churning pace but did so without the </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">conventional elements
of attractive songs and characters to care about.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'"><o:p><FONT
size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">The show’s success was largely the
result of the flair of its presentation rather than the material itself.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The vast, state-of-the art </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN>Al
Hirshfeld Theatre stage was filled with a </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">lush, multi-tiered, art deco Grand
Hotel set, lavish costuming, perpetual movement and period choreography, and a
foreboding yet seductive aura of Expressionism.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'"><o:p><FONT
size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>Mercury Summer Stock director Pierre-Jacques Brault does even more with
less.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>In the shoe-box that is the 150-seat Brooks Theatre at the Cleveland Play
House, Brault strips the shallow and narrow stage bare.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is so bare that the interior brick
walls and the stage’s antiquated infrastructure of wire rigging and ropes are
fully exposed, leaving only dramatic lighting, clever staging, and the
omnipresent players to tell the story and create the illusion of the Grand
Hotel.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>Expressionism is accentuated in the place of production values in this
presentation.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN>With
less emphasis on production values, greater attention is committed to each
character’s story.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>As a result, and
so very unlike the Broadway production, we come to care about these </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">characters.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We become vested in their respective
exercises in futility.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN></SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN>This,
in turn, places greater focus on the detailed performances of a very gifted
cast.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>Emily Grodzik offers a tour de force performance as Flaemmchen, the
self-destructive typist so desperate to be who she is not.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Her featured “I Want to Go to Hollywood”
number, her tender moments with Otto Kringelein, a fatally ill bookkeeper with a
lust for life, and her devastating disappoints are all played to perfection.
<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>As the bookkeeper, Brian Marshall ventures close to caricature but
manages to never lose his character’s humanity.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>His participation in the bittersweet
"Who Couldn’t Dance With You?" is poetry and, in Act 2, his featured "We'll Take
a Glass Together"—an uncharacteristically upbeat and rejuvenating piece of
musical theatre—is a treat.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN>Another
is t</SPAN><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'">he delightful “Maybe
My Baby Loves Me” as performed by two hotel porters played by the charming
Eugene Sumlin and Marcus Martin.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN></SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>Holly Feiler is wonderful as Elizaveta Grushinskaya, the fading prima
ballerina on yet another final farewell tour played before empty houses.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Feiler captures Grushinskaya’s façade of
grandeur as well as her vulnerability and, while her songs are among the least
attractive in the show, she performs them for all they are worth.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>And she moves
beautifully.<o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>Also superb are Amiee Collier as Grushinskaya’s sullen assistant who
wants nothing but unobtainable intimacy; Dan DiCello as Hermann Preysing, a
businessman in the process of losing everything; Nate Huntley as the destitute
Baron surviving on charm and petty crime; and Mort Goldman as the
death-obsessed, morphine-imbibing narrator of this tale. <SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN><o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><FONT
size=3>In fact, everyone in this cast is wonderful and executes Brault’s clever
choreography with incredible precision and passion.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>All this is accompanied by a small
on-stage orchestra under Ryan Neal’s direction that further reinforces the
notion that less is more. <o:p></o:p></FONT></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN><o:p><FONT size=3> </FONT></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN>Stripped down to its essentials, </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Mercury
Summer Stock’s </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN>highly stylized </SPAN><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Grand
Hotel </SPAN></I><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">is
miraculously greater than the sum of its parts.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is a </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN"
lang=EN>production that is revealing, wonderfully theatrical, and not be missed.
<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P>
<P style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><FONT size=3><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; mso-ansi-language: EN" lang=EN><SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN></SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'"><o:p></o:p></SPAN></FONT></P>
<P style="LINE-HEIGHT: normal; MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt" class=MsoNormal><I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Grand
Hotel </SPAN></I><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">continues
through July 30 in The Cleveland Play House’s Brooks Theatre, </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; COLOR: #333333; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">8500
Euclid Ave., Cleveland</SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Arial','sans-serif'; FONT-SIZE: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'">.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>For tickets, $15 to $18, call
216-771-5862 or visit <A href=""><FONT
color=#0000ff>http://mercurysummerstock.ticketleap.com</FONT></A>.<o:p></o:p></SPAN></P></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>