Friday, February 19, 1999
Shiny and new
THEATER: Garishly entertaining, newest revival
of ‘Cabaret’ speaks
to a ’90s audience
By Cheryl Klein
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Norbert Leo Butz had just taken over the role of Roger in "Rent"
when his agent called with an opportunity to audition for a revival
of "Cabaret." It would be a supporting role, and Butz would have to
play the banjo.
With his guitar and bass background, he could probably fake it.
But next to a lead in a surefire, youth-driven hit, the audition
circuit didn’t look so appealing.
Butz, who didn’t see Harold Prince’s original 1966 "Cabaret" or
Bob Fosse’s 1972 film starring Liza Minnelli, took in Sam Mendes’
and Rob Marshall’s interpretation some six months later when it
opened on Broadway. He sat at one of the tiny, lamp-lit tables that
replaced traditional theater seating. He watched the Kit Kat girls
and their emcee evoke 1930s Berlin in raunchy, rhythmic
decadence.
"I called my agent immediately and said, ‘If that role ever
opens up, get me in for an audition,’" Butz says. "I just wanted to
be a part of it. I would have come in and played the banjo if
they’d wanted me to."
Though it took six callbacks, Butz avoided banjo duty and landed
the part of the kinky, impish emcee, the role that launched Joel
Grey’s career over 30 years ago. It will take Butz to the Wilshire
Theatre beginning Tuesday, for the first stop on the quadruple Tony
Award-winning revival’s national tour.
The production also managed to momentarily lure Teri Hatcher
away from a film and TV career to play coy club singer Sally
Bowles. ("Cabaret" marks her stage debut, but her costars assure
that she carries to the back of the house like a veteran). It
convinced actor Dick Latessa to leave his New York comfort zone to
go on the road as Herr Schultz, a Jewish man whose love affair with
Sally’s landlord is cut short by encroaching Nazism.
Usually, Latessa says, tour proposals prompt two questions: "How
short is it?" and "How much money?" But the seasoned performer,
bubbly where Butz is contemplative, repeatedly emphasizes, "This
one’s worth the ride."
So just what has everyone convinced that life is a cabaret?
Revivals are commonplace, often coinciding with anniversaries and
often unimpressive. One argument proposes that "Cabaret" plays to
the savvy, jaded perspective of ’90s audiences. "Chicago," another
Kander and Ebb musical, opened to unspectacular acclaim in the ’70s
only to be rehashed in sleek, satirical brilliance in 1997.
"The time of the musical has changed so much," Latessa says.
"It’s not there to solely entertain – it’s there to entertain and
inform and shock. And I believe this one shocks people honestly
because that’s the way it really was."
He refers to the explosive political scene that took so many
Germans by surprise as the Jazz Age drew to a close, a scene
Christopher Isherwood documented in his "Berlin Stories," the
literary collection that would eventually provide the basis for
"Cabaret." The musical perhaps coincides with current interest in
World War II (in addition to the prominent battle films, several
books about Hitler and the holocaust have recently hit the
shelves). Yet Butz explains why this look to the middle of the
century is apt.
"We’re constantly being made to feel good through entertainment,
and I think there’s definitely something underneath that (director)
Sam Mendes is asking us to look at. He’s asking us to look at our
society outside how wonderful and perfect Hollywood makes it seem,"
Butz says.
In other words, he continues, "The message in ‘Rent’ is ‘Can you
feel the love?’ and ‘Cabaret’ is a show that says, ‘No, I can’t
feel the love.’"
Butz’s emcee synthesizes this philosophy perhaps more than any
other character. The numbers he leads are anything but carefree
dance breaks, despite his urging: "Leave your troubles outside. So,
life is disappointing? Forget it. In here, life is beautiful."
Escapism is quickly revealed as a naive fantasy, something set
designer Robert Brill drives home by inviting audiences into not
the Wilshire Theatre, but the Kit Kat Club – refurnished and
repainted to make them acutely aware of where they are.
"I sort of take the audience by the hand and say, ‘Look at this
society,’" Butz says. "There are moments in the show where I
actually sit in the audience. I sort of break that fourth wall in a
very direct way."
Latessa’s Herr Schultz, who may have the most cause to worry,
instead turns out some of the more innocent, hopeful moments in the
musical.
"(Fraulein Schneider and I) are people who are finding love and
finding wonderful things together," Latessa says. "It’s like a
peaceful time in the show."
Nevertheless, the production’s flair for the gritty required
some song shuffling, scrapping Herr Schultz’s endearing Yiddish
fable, "Meeskite," and adding "Mein Herr," a Sally Bowles number
from the film which has her straddling chairs and trashing her man
with determined coldness.
There is a moment, during the rousing but somber finale, when
the emcee dons showgirl regalia and goose steps creepily out of the
chorus line. This garishness and propensity for double-takes seem
somewhat typical of the production.
"I’m sort of becoming a reflection of Sally Bowles’ psyche,"
Butz explains. "I’m not just out in drag to sort of say, ‘Oh look,
there’s a man in drag, isn’t that funny?’"
It might be a little funny and certainly entertaining. But
that’s entertainment at its eeriest – it has a habit of bringing
your troubles inside.
THEATER: "Cabaret" begins performances Tuesday (official opening
March 3) and runs through April 11 at the Wilshire Theatre. Tickets
range from $40 to $72. For more information, call (213)
365-3500.Photos courtesy of Neal Preston
Teri Hatcher stars as Fraulein Sally Bowles in the national tour
of "Cabaret."
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