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| The cast of Foolerie Photo by Lance Brown |
So…You know that musical that’s playing now, the one that
has Shakespeare as a central character and where the cast runs around acting
very silly and sings songs that remind you of other show tunes?
Well, this isn’t about that
show.
This is about the other
musical that’s playing now, that also has Shakespeare as a central character,
with the cast running around acting very silly and singing songs that remind
you of other show tunes.
Confused? Good. You are now primed to enter the topsy-turvy world
of Foolerie, a musical which is not Something
Rotten! but which, in its own distinguished way, mines the same source
material.
Foolerie is one
of the 50 or so productions that are being presented in that annual three-week whirlwind
of activity known as the New York Musical Theatre
Festival, whose purpose is to provide a showcase for up-and-coming writers and
composers of musicals.
In this case, the up-and-coming writer and composer is
Santino DeAngelo, who has fashioned a work that will leave you feeling as
though you had consumed some funky mushrooms and fallen into a dream about a land
of zanies. There you will take a journey into burlesque-style bada bing bada boom low comedy, encounter
traces of Gilbert and Sullivan, and experience a full-bodied embrace of Stephen
Sondheim.
The premise is this:
A troop of traveling players (fools and clowns all) proposes a
competition. Is there anyone in all the
land who can outclown their leader, Clowne (Ian Knauer)? The prize is the scepter and all the spoils
of power that go with it. For the loser,
the reward is death.
Just when it appears there will be no takers, up onto the
stage steps Knave (Ryan Breslin), a doe-eyed philosopher who believes that the
antic Clowne has it all wrong. The
purpose of fools is not to distract us with pratfalls and hijinks, he posits,
but to “heal with the truth.”
The gauntlet has been tossed. The game is on.
At this point, logic melts away into a series of
Alice’s-Adventures-In-Wonderland moments, as the company puts on a
play-within-a-play on the theme of love before their host and judge, the Earl.
The characters in their play include, among others, Shakespeare and his mother
(Clowne and Knave alternate between these roles), and various characters from Shakespeare’s
works, including Malvolio (Patrick Massey), Friar Laurence (Geoff Belliston),
and Shylock (Patrick Richwood).
The plot, such as it is, keeps reshaping itself as Clowne
and Knave each attempts to seize control of the goings-on in order to come out
on top. When Clowne holds the reins, the
jokes and songs fall into the category of buffoonery and crude burlesque. When Knave is in the driver’s seat,
things turn lyrical. In the end, the
Earl, voiced by comic Gilbert Gottfried (which should give you a hint about the
sort of jokes you can expect to encounter) decides… (we’ll let you find that out for
yourself).
As a playwright, Mr. DeAngelo could use a hand in shaping
the convoluted plot, and the reliance on unsavory frat boy humor does wear
thin. But he does show more flair as a
composer. I was particularly taken with
a manic number called “Malvolio’s Soliloquy,” splendidly performed by Mr.
Massey, and by the company’s rendition of the optimistic “The World Can Be Your
Oyster.” But far too much of the music
sounds like variations on a theme by Sondheim – so much so that I’d be inclined
to retitle the musical, “Into The (Arden) Woods.”
However, Foolerie is still
in “workshop” mode, and its composer, a recent graduate from Binghamton University, is just entering his
mid-twenties. Let’s hope both will
continue to evolve. We'll be watching!
Feel free to share this blog with your friends, and to share your own theater stories by posting a comment.
Feel free to share this blog with your friends, and to share your own theater stories by posting a comment.
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