A
show about the Jackson Five? That isn’t a jukebox musical? And that’s funny?
How can you miss?
Those
questions and more are answered in The
Panther Dancer, written by Logan Cutler Smith and being produced by Playwrights
Local till the end of this week. As directed by Jimmie Woody, it’s a wild rush
of mini-scenes, sort of in the style of the vaudeville play-turned-movie Hellzapoppin’, relying on a frenetic
pace and constant role-switches to feed the entertainment value.
The
story, of course, centers on The Gloved One, Michael Jackson, as we see his
pathway from the youngest member of his family’s singing group to the King of
Pop. The basics of that story are known to most of us, and the show feeds of
that familiarity with inside jokes that long ago came outside. These include
the terrible, bullying nature of father Joe Jackson and some of the particulars
regarding Michael’s siblings.
This
work, that had its first exposure at the NEOMFA Playwrights Festival at Convergence
Continuum Theater, has a number of witty lines. But over the course of two
hours, the jokes fall into similar patterns and become predicable and
eventually tiresome. And the playwright spends too much time exploring small
facets of the MJ story that will seem arcane and off-point to most observers.
Of
course, there are more “celebrities” in this show than in the “We Are the
World” video, along with movers and shakers such as Berry Gordy of Motown,
Michael’s lawyers, and pretty much anyone else who came within an arms length
of the Jackson clan.
Director
Woody employs his substantial skills in staging the piece so that those flaws
don’t drag everything down. And he’s partially successful, thanks to some
yeoman work by the cast. Andrea Belser is a standout, both as Michael Jackson
and as the moody, purple-robed Prince and Robert Branch lends his quirky take
to many different characters. Corin B. Self, when portraying daddy Joe, is
truly fearsome, and Anthony Velez is a whirling fount of dancing energy when he
mimics Jackson’s famous panther dancer video. Although she doesn’t quite dazzle
like the others, Kim Simbeck often plays the necessary straight man to the
frantic activities of the others.
Trouble
is, the script is an overly detailed chronology of Michael Jackson’s stormy
life, and it has no point of view. It swings wildly from poking fun at “Wacko
Jacko” to weeping over his demise at age 50.
Instead
of a two-hour show with one intermission, this play cries out to be a 75-minute
nonstop race to the finish that would make The
Complete Works of William Shakespeare look like a particularly slow-moving
episode of Murder She Wrote. Now that
would be a thriller.
The
Panther Dancer
Through
May 26, produced by Playwrights Local, the Creative Space at Waterloo Arts, 397
E. 156 St., 216-302-8856, playwrightslocal.org.
No comments:
Post a Comment