The problem was not Cyndi Lauper as Jenny. She doesn't quite have the chops for the stage, but her solo ("Solomon's Song," with a touch of reverb) was quite affecting. The problem wasn't Nellie McKay as Polly, although doing an Audrey Hepburn imitation is not the same thing as acting innocent, darling. The problem wasn't so much Ana Gasteyer as a shrieking Mrs. Peachum. The problem wasn't that the show was nearly stolen by Jim Dale as Mr. Peachum and Brian Charles Rooney as drag Lucy Brown.
No, the problem was Alan Cumming. He's a fine actor, but he just cannot pull off the role of Macheath (Mack the Knife). On stage, it's simply unbelievable that he could be a killer, a rapist, a thug. A libertine, yes. But he plays too low status, and doesn't radiate any menace. It's essential for the play that we view him as a criminal, and about the most criminal act Cumming's Macheath seems capable of is bisexuality.
It's playing until June 25 if you must see it. I'm glad we were in the cheap seats.
Wow, this sounds like two stars, at best. Worse?
I saw the last Broadway Threepenny Opera back around 1989 with, wait for it...Sting as Macheath, and he was similarly cipher-like in the role – not in a bisexual sense a la Cumming, of course, but equally unbelievable as a killer. (And to think this is the guy who wrote and sang "Murder by Numbers," which is probably why they cast him in the role in the first place.)
Comment #1 :: link :: May 24, 2006 4:23 PM :: homepageI'd say two and a half stars -- the production wasn't actively bad, and some of the numbers worked, but...
We decided Hugh Jackman would have been a better Macheath.
Oh, and this would have given me something else to say to Wallace Shawn on the train, "I enjoyed your translation of Brecht."
Comment #2 :: link :: May 25, 2006 10:42 AM
