La Cage aux Folles`: A single Sterling Performance Can’t Rescue Suzart’s Show
Photo: Patricia Curtis. Kraig Paul Proulx on the piano.
The trouble with Suzart’s new production of La Cage Aux Folles is that it contains only one performance of genuine dimension, commitment and conviction.
It comes from Kraig Paul Proulx, excellent in the role of Albin, the aging St. Tropez drag queen whose long-term relationship with Georges, long-time manager of the venerable La Cage nightclub, is thrown into crisis when the son they have raised together falls in love with the daughter of an ultra-conservative household.
There are moments when Proulx can be extremely funny, as he stomps about the stage, flamboyantly milking the image of the prototype stage diva for all its worth. And when he descends the club stairs, displaying extravagant costume after extravagant costume, as well as a progression of sumptuous wigs, he is a stunningly assured inhabitant of his world. We believe in him — as we also believe in the hurt he feels when his partner and the young man he considers to be his son conspire to hide him away from the future in-laws. So there’s also pride and poignancy in Proulx’s performance, especially at the close of Act One when he sings I Am What I Am, songwriter Jerry Herman’s hymn to a gay person’s right to be gay.
However, it’s this fine actor’s misfortune to be trapped in a generally flaccid treatment of the 1983 Broadway musical. The original Jean Poiret play had earlier led to a marvellous 1978 movie that in turn spawned a spirited musical version with book by Harvey Fierstein and music and lyrics by Herman. Yes, it contained a gay-themed message but it would be delivered — to quote the composer — “in a sweetly entertaining manner.” Moreover, the overriding aim was to create “a charming, colorful, great-looking musical comedy . . . an old-fashioned piece of entertainment.”
Sadly, with the exception of that one sterling performance from Proulx, Suzart has failed to serve the purpose of the show’s creators. There are a couple of portrayals which do manage to work somewhat: Mackenzie Breeze Bone exercises a buoyant charm as the fiancee, and Chad Wolfe’s uppity maid gives new meaning to the word “flounce.” And as Georges, Jim Baldwin demonstrates his soaring vocal powers when he and Proulx’s vulnerable Albin revisit the past in the affecting memory piece, Song In The Sand. But these are the only moments when there’s some semblance of much-needed chemistry between these two characters. Indeed, whenever he’s denied the chance to sing, Baldwin’s performance becomes tentative and incomplete which just about describes everybody else in the show, as well as the tone of the production itself. This musical calls out for snap, crackle and pop, but it gets a depressingly soggy treatment here under the direction of Susan Fowler Dacey.
It’s not surprising, therefore, that the evening keeps striking false notes. Too many performances don’t offer real characterizations; they give us pallid deliveries of the lines. The chorus girls are so ill-defined as to be interchangeable when they’re not before the footlights, and when they’re summoned to do a musical number, it can scarcely be said that they respond with spirit and — more importantly — attentiveness to the demands of Dani-Bone Corbishley’s promising choreography.
The original material for this show goes back four decades. Given what’s happened in more recent years, it should be treated as a period piece. But when it conveys no real sense of time or place, which is a further problem with this production, it seems more of a musty anachronism. Suzart can do better than this.
Director: Susan Fowler-Dacey
Musical director: Gabriel Leury
Set designer/technical director: Elaine McCausland
Choreographer: Dani Bone-Corbishley
Lighting: Alan Viau
Sound: Shauna-Lee Thompson
Costumes: Maureen Russell
Cast:
Albin.Zaza……………………………………………..Kraig-Paul Proulx
Georges………………………………………………..Jim Baldwin
Jean-Michel……………………………………………Jay Landreville
Jacob…………………………………………………..Chad Wolfe
Anne Dindon…………………………………………..Mackenzie Breeze Bone
Edouard Dindon……………………………………….Dave Corbishley
Marie Dindon………………………………………….Mary Lou Hulan
Jacqueline………………………………………………Jacqueline Roy
M. Renaud……………………………………………..Liam Gosson
Mme. Renaud………………………………………….Lynn Harper-Ciaronni
Francis………………………………………………….Les Hope
Hanna…………………………………………………..Kevin Fowler Dacey
Bitelle…………………………………………………..Caitlin Mears
Chantal…………………………………………………Gwyneth Whalen-Hughes
Phaedra…………………………………………………Mahtab Sabet
Dermah…………………………………………………Val Ladouceur
Clo-Clo…………………………………………………T.J. Wong
Mercedes………………………………………………..Megan Hulan
Angelique……………………………………………….Jamie Rice
Odette…………………………………………………..Stef Fairbairn
Hercule et al……………………………………………Ross Couchman
Tabarro et al……………………………………………Adam Goldberg
Etienne et al………………………………………….Emi Lanthier
Fisherman et al……………………………………….Alex Shephard
Babette et al………………………………………….Rita Thompson
Musicians
Mark Allen, Pierre Desjardins, Lisa Concessi Maclean, Chris MacArthur, Shawn MacArthur, Jason Sinkus, Allan Snider, Chris Thiessen, Joanne Thiessen
A Suzart production, continuing to Dec/ 7 at Centrepoint Studio