I think they took "Dirty" too literally

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Orange County Performing Arts Center. 8/31/06.

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels was fun and funny, and I believe a great deal of the audience with whom I saw it loved it. It has it's strong points, and I certainly didn't hate it, but it wasn't for me. What bothered me throughout the show were profoundly weird class politics. The play, based on the movie with Steve Martin, is the story of two con men in the French Riviera. Tom Hewitt plays Lawrence Jameson, a high class con artist who cheats women out of only the diamonds they can afford to lose, while offering them in exchange dreams of romance on the Riviera. Norbert Leo Butz, reprising the role he originated on Broadway, for which he won a Tony, plays an upstart young American con man with no class and no self-restraint.

My complaint is that this show has the emminently talented (and well-accoladed) Butz playing a slightly-less-lovable Jack Black character. If they had toned down the vulger and ratcheted up his charm, this could have been an awesome musical. At the few points where his singing talents shine through, Butz could be a show-stopper, but I fell that this show fails to give him a chance. As it is, it trades on the basest humor to the complete exclusion of probability or sensitivity.

The other significant flaw in this show is its failure to properly build the relationship between the two con men. The best song in the show, "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" comes at the very end, and its the only song they really sing alone together; this song reminds me of "Two Lost Souls" from Damn Yankees, which I liked, but I think it should have come earlier in the play. Unlike "Wicked," or even "The Producers," where the friendship is a major issue throughout the play, these two men failed to sing to establish their friendship, and if they're not going to sing about it, what's the point putting it in a musical?

There were some other structural flaws in this play, primarily that the opening song didn't set an appropriate mood. It might have worked with a super-famous lead in the role, but someone less well-known, such as Tom Hewitt, needs to earn the audience's attention. The show didn't really seem to start until Butz sang "Great Big Stuff" well into the first act.

While the show itself has serious flaws (personally I'm kind of sad that it was such a success, since I think they really need to go back and rework it and it might actually be a good new musical), the touring cast is superb. Several of the cast members from the Broadway production are performing with the tour at the moment, so I was fortunate enough to see people comfortable and familiar with their roles. Though it took some time for him to earn my respect, I loved Tom Hewitt, and he did a great job with a couple of fun and challenging patter songs. Drew McVety as the overly-accented French policemen in league with the con men was hilarous, and had an excellent and highly entertaining with Hollis Resnik as a gullible divorcee from Omaha. I also wish they had a more memorable, more fun song together. Jenifer Foote as Jolene Oakes, an heiress from Oklahoma, led a fabulous high-spirited spoof of a hoe-down number. Laura Marie Duncan gave a solid performane in the somewhat muddled role of Christine Colgate.