BWW Reviews: HERSHEY FELDER AS IRVING BERLIN

Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin/music & lyrics by Irving Berlin/book by Hershey Felder/directed by Trevor Hay/Geffen Playhouse/through December 21

Once again* the uniquely talented Hershey Felder endears his audience to him with his newest presentation, the life and work of the one and only composer Irving Berlin in Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin. Currently onstage at the Geffen Playhouse through December 21, Felder's tribute, although a bit long - coming in a tad short of two hours without an interval - is enriching, humorous and replete with most of the brilliant Berlin tunes.

Israel "Izzy" Beilin was a Jewish immigrant from Russia and was born May 11, 1888. He, his parents and siblings worked at menial jobs in the early 20th century on the lower East Side of Nw York to carve out a living until he was given a break playing piano in a club in Chinatown. Self-taught, Berlin never read music and learned to play the piano, hammering out melodies on the keys as a child. From an early age, he fell in love with music and, like his idol Stephen Foster, set his goal to "write music for the people in a most refined way". Through the years, his songs symbolized America, and at a tribute to his 101 years - he died September 22, 1989 - it was quoted that Berlin "was America".

Perhaps one of the reasons for the length of Felder's show entails Berlin's longevity. It's quite a bio to cram into two hours. Tragedy did strike for he lost his first wife Dorothy Goetz to typhoid fever after a mere five months of marriage and his first child, an infant son died suddenly one night - he just stopped breathing - but, unlike other composers who died young suffering from malnutrition or life-threatening illnesses and who are remembered for only one or two compositions, Berlin lived to 101...and was so prolific with a plethora of standards to his credit, as well as many Hollywood films and Broadway shows. Movies with Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby like Top Hat, Holiday Inn, White Christmas and musical stage shows such as Annie Get Your Gun, and Call Me Madam, that Ethel Merman put her eternal stamp on, are still considered some of the best ever created. Tunes like "Always", "Alexander's Ragtime Band", "God Bless America", - all proceeds to this day go to the Boy and Girl Scouts of America - "What'll I Do?", "Blue Skies", "Puttin' On the Ritz", "Heatwave" and "There's No Business Like Show Business" to name but a few, remain without a doubt the greatest compositions in the American Songbook. Berlin deserves to be revered. He is a legend, an institution, but like anyone else had his failures and, toward the end, pretty negative views about how musical tastes have evolved through the years.

Felder as writer has cleverly set the piece with both the young Berlin and the old wheel-chair bound man opening the show. As some Christmas carolers pass by on Christmas Eve, the old Berlin complains that they know nothing about the meaning of what they are singing like"White Christmas". He also thumbs his nose at Elvis Presley who brought a newfound success to the song in the 50s. The young Berlin, on the contrary, still unjaded, invites the singers in, lauding their enthusiasm for his music. He then relates his story, taking us back to the very beginning. Through good and bad times, his philosophy about music remained unchanged; he always longed to create, 'the perfect song', simple and unfettered. "Say It With Music" expresses his claim that "the safest place to be is in a song".

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