When I sat in the audience at the Highland Arts Theatre in Sydney on Wednesday evening for their production of The Drowsy Chaperone it had been a long time since I had seen the show and I had forgotten just how entirely delightful it is, and how much I adore the way Bob Martin, Don McKellar, Lisa Lambert and Greg Morrison constructed the show. It is truly a Canadian gem.
The musical is centred on the unnamed Man in Chair, a musical aficionado and amateur theatre historian who lives alone and escapes his loneliness by listening to old musicals on vinyl records. He decides to share his obsession with one of his favourite musicals with the audience, the fictional 1928 Gable and Stein show The Drowsy Chaperone, and it, magically, comes to life in his apartment. The plot of the fictional musical is that Janet, a showgirl, is planning on marrying Robert, an oil tycoon, and the Follies producer, Feldzeig, wants to stop the wedding because he is afraid of losing his only star: mayhem ensues. We watch it all unfold, while getting trivia pieces, critiques, and added commentary from Man in Chair throughout in a gloriously nerdy meta-theatrical romp. In real life the show began in Toronto in 1997 as a musical pastiche created by McKellar, Lambert and Morrison for their friend Bob Martin’s Stag Party. It was then workshopped as a musical for the Toronto Fringe, and nearly a decade later it opened on Broadway in 2006 where it ran for 674 performances. The show retains the joyful silliness of its unexpected beginnings.
The production at the Highland Arts Theatre is ambitious and strong. Wesley J. Colford directs the piece well, keeping a zany, frenetic pace, crowding an entire Broadway extravaganza inside a small apartment, and he does a good job of clearly weaving the plot pieces together, making good use of limited space, and ensuring that amid the chaos the story is still easy to follow. Cynthia Vokey choreographs some great Broadway production numbers, a few feel a bit crowded, but there is something charming about how cramped everyone is inside this apartment. Standout performances include Zion Stephens as Trix: the Aviatrix, whose voice is literally soaring, Chris Corbett as the hilarious straight-man Underling, Colford as the much put-upon Best Man, George, Lesley MacLean as Kitty, Mark Delaney as Robert Martin, Katherine Woodford as Janet Van de Graaf, Michele Stephens as the Chaperone, George MacKenzie as Aldopho and Andrew Gouthro as Man in Chair.
The construction of the musical means that everyone in the cast, with the exception of Gouthro, is playing two parts simultaneously. They are both the character they play in the fictional The Drowsy Chaperone and the actor who played that part in that fictional 1928 original production. Man in Chair specifies, for example, that Percy Hyman, the actor who played Robert, was not considered to be very good, and thus Delaney has fun with purposefully being quite superficial and performative as Robert. Lesley MacLean shines brightly as Kitty, who is continually auditioning to replace Janet in the show, and finds any opportunity she can to show off. We learn that the Chaperone was played in 1928 by fictional Grand Dame of Broadway Beatrice Stockwell and she is the object of Man in Chair’s most fervent admiration and obsession. She belts the show’s rousing anthem “As We Stumble Along,” to which Man in Chair exuberantly exclaims, “DON’T YOU JUST LOVE HER?” and in Michele Stephens’ deft hands the answer is a just as exuberant “YES.” Katherine Woodford captures the pull Janet feels toward her love of the limelight and her devotion to Robert well, as well as all the stereotypes of the ingenue. The moments where Woodford plays Janet’s emotions with depth and sincerity, despite their ridiculousness, are the strongest and help us see what made Jane Roberts such a successful star, while accentuating that Hyman isn’t nearly as skilled as she is.
There is a lot going on in this show: blindfolded roller skating, tap dancing, a plane crash, an entire scene of successive spit-takes, and all of the frameworks that make this show work are here at the HAT, but the cast still feels a bit cautious at times, like they haven’t quite settled into all these elements yet. George MacKenzie, however, throws everything he has into Adolpho, the shameless Latin Lover stereotype who is enlisted by Feldzeig to seduce Janet before the wedding. MacKenzie is obviously having a blast and it shows, and I think once all the elements settle, everyone in the cast will be able to go out and attack every moment with as much aplomb and fun as MacKenzie.
The show’s heart is rooted in Man in Chair, and Andrew Gouthro gives a beautiful performance that oscillates between silly and sad and back again seamlessly. His joy is infectious, his pain palpable, and his love, reverence and respect for musical theatre, and its power to transport you to a better place for a little while, speaks, I think, with even more relevance in 2019 than it did in 2006.
In all, The Drowsy Chaperone made me feel propelled to stand up and cheer, along with everyone else in the theatre on Wednesday evening. I think this is a production that likely keeps getting better and better with each successive performance, so with that in mind, I recommend you check out the last two performances of this really special Canadian love letter to musical theatre.
The Drowsy Chaperone plays at the Highland Arts Theatre (40 Bentinck Street, Sydney) until May 21st, 2019. Both shows are at 8:00pm. Tickets are $42.00 (plus HST) and are available AT THIS WEBSITE, by calling 902.565.3637, or visiting the Box Office at 40 Bentinck Street. For more information visit this website.
You can follow The Highland Arts Theatre on Facebook. Twitter and Instagram (@highlandartstheatreofficial).
