Magic to Do

Pippin. Orange County Performing Arts Center. 1/7/07.

I have a special affection for Pippin, even though I wouldn't say it's a particularly good musical. I love it because I worked on it in college, which was miserable and incredibly stressful at the time, but in retrospect I only remember the fun. It's a wacky, dark, sort-of-backstage musical by Stephen Schwartz, currently most famous as the composer of Wicked. It's a very 1970s musical and my one complaint is that this production had a very 1970s feel. Like many '70s musicals (Tommy, Jesus Christ Superstar, Godspell), Pippin has an Everyman/Jesus theme.

The Goodspeed Musicals production that arrived at the OC Performing Arts Center was a solid production with a very talented cast including Micky Dolenz (of The Monkees) as Charlemange. Pippin is the extremely fictionalized story of Charlemange's son, Pippin (minus the hunchback part), as he searches to find himself.

I would have liked to see more of a contemporary look, especially for Pippin himself, played by Joshua Park with his faded jeans and 'fro-like hair. He's an extremely talented actor and singer who did a good job in the role, but, really, I wish they had made him look a bit more contemporary.

André Ward gave an excellent performance as the seductive Leading Player. The thing that made the original production was Bob Fosse's direction and choreography and Ben Vereen as the leading player, both of which are mostly preserved on this Canadian TV broadcast. Ward makes the role his own, evoking an history of African-American performance styles and genres though subtle gestures and inflections while owning his position as narrator and director.

I do, however, have a problem with the Leading Player role in general being cast as African-American in an otherwise mostly white-looking cast (with the exception of players Mayumi Miguel and possibly Vincent Rodriguez III although he was hidden by whiteface). Like Judas in the film version of Jesus Christ Superstar, or Satan in The Apple, the most visible African-American character is a fabulous performer who also happens to be seductive, threatening, and evil. In general, it's a pretty creepy depiction of race relations.

Pippin also happens to be pretty heterosexual in this production, which I think is completely unnecessary. The play ends with the triumph of the heterosexual family over the sexually liberated, partially naked company of players, which the script demands. The seductiveness of the players, however, makes more sense if the sexual license and bisexuality of the company is played up rather than down. Even the weird incestuous relationship between Fastrata and her son, Lewis, didn't feel particularly sexual and the orgy scene didn't feel all that threatening. Perhaps I'm jaded, but the mere appearance of a dominatrix doesn't necessarily mean to me that sex is bad.

The set was a pretty cool giant rotating metal framework designed by Beowulf Boritt which was nicely flexible. The ensemble was composed of extremly talented dancers who were fascinating to watch with Fosse-esque choreography by Mark Dendy.

Overall, I had a lot of fun watching this production with its talented cast, though it is in many ways a problematic show.