Review - Milk and Honey

When Jerry Herman was pegged by producer Gerard Oestreicher to write the score for a Broadway musical set in the fledgling State of Israel, he was a 28-year-old composer/lyricist mostly known for writing clever lyrics and snazzy tunes for Greenwich Village topical reviews like Nightcap and Parade. But now, instead of writing for hip, downtown performers like Charles Nelson Reilly and Dody Goodman, he'd be penning a romantic score for opera stars Mimi Benzell and Robert Weede, with special comic relief material for Yiddish Theatre legend Molly Picon.

Milk and Honey was a solid hit that 1961-62 season, running for 543 performances, with Herman's first full Broadway score earning a Tony nomination and the show itself nominated for Best Musical. Though time has not been kind to playwright Don Appell's book concerning the romantic escapades of a tour group of Jewish American widows in Holy Land, the score is impressively varied, with hints of the classics to come.

There's the first example of a catchy Jerry Herman title song and the sweet, optimistic waltz, "Shalom." Picon, playing an outspoken yenta, had a humorous tango where she asked her late husband for his approval when she finds a new man courting her, much like the sentiments expressed by the title character of Hello, Dolly! There's even a trademark Herman dramatic ballad, "Let's Not Waste A Moment," sung by a middle-aged man encouraging his new middle-aged love to embrace romance even "when you face a short forever."

Mel Miller's Obie-winning company, Musicals Tonight!, has been embracing musical theatre obscurities and rarely-revived hits since 1997. Their book-in-hand, piano only productions are among the barest of bare-boned mountings to be found, but their spirited evenings provide opportunities - rapidly shrinking, I'm afraid - for audiences to enjoy looks at imperfect musicals without modern attempts to improve them. (Okay, a bit of tweaking had to be done this time to eliminate the original production's need for live animals, cut the cast down to ten players and eliminate the choreography.) Under Thomas Sabella-Mills' direction and James Stenborg's music direction, the company sings with gusto and ably treads some of the more dated aspects of the book.

Handsomely-voiced baritone Richard White (the voice of Gaston in Disney's animated film, Beauty and the Beast and originator of the title role in Maury Yeston and Arthur Kopit's Phantom) and perky Barbara McCulloh share delightful chemistry as a couple sorting out their past romantic baggage before plunging into a new relationship. Verna Pierce nicely milks her broad, Borscht Belt laughs in the Picon role, as do Sandy Rosenberg and Deborah Jean Templin as her man-hungry companions.

Though the piece isn't especially political, Yaniv Hadad is very effective in the small role of "Arab Boy," which gives some recognition to those who were there before Israel was established. Aaron Berk, Emily Glick, Yael Gonen, Michael Mott and Peter Tedeschi all make fine contribution as Israelis facing the joys and frustrations of building their young country.

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Back in 2009, The Public Theatre presented Tracy Scott Wilson's ambitious and very capable drama, The Good Negro, a work of fiction with one character obviously meant as a stand-in for DR. Martin Luther King, Jr., which depicted the leaders of the 1960s civil rights movement as everyday human beings with normal flaws, making what they accomplished a greater achievement than if it were done by the demi-gods some would make them out to be. To that end, the playwright showed the fictional King and his colleagues orchestrating a fight for racial equality by pushing only the most media-friendly images of black people before the press.

Likewise, playwright Katori Hall has been describing The Mountaintop as her attempt to show Dr. King a normal man with normal flaws. To this end she depicts him urinating (off-stage), smoking, drinking a bit, flirting with a young lady and, the real shocker, having smelly feet. Remarkably, that's about as deep as this flimsy little comedy (It can't seriously be called a drama.) gets.

I say remarkably because this ninety minute two-character sketch somehow won the Olivier Award for Best Play and has attracted the involvement of director Kenny Leon and stars Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett. What anyone saw in this script is completely beyond my understanding.

Set on the thunderstorming evening of April 3rd, 1968, shortly after the great orator delivered his, "I've been to the mountaintop," speech, Hall offers a fantasy of King's last hours before being assassinated, beginning with him anxiously trying to unwind in room 306 of the Lorraine Motel (excellent work by set designer David Gallo). Jackson's few minutes alone on stage suggest we might be in for a thoughtful portrayal, but the chances for any kind of satisfying drama fly out the door once Angela Bassett enters as Camae, an attractive new maid delivering King's coffee. Playing a character based on the author's mother, Leon has Bassett buffoonishly overacting the kind of jivey urban soul sister stereotype familiar to fans of 70s sitcoms and the kind of contemporary entertainment known to its admirers as the "urban theatre circuit" and to its detractors as the "chitlin' circuit."

The evening is handed to Bassett as soon as she enters, with Jackson's King being regulated to straight man as Camae goes from nervously scolding herself for cussing in front of "Preacher King," to giddily having a pillow-fight with him and mimicking the man in a speech where she pleads with her people to, "Kill the white man!"

The cheap gags are mercifully ended once the plot takes a sharp spiritual turn, and there are more lines that seem designed to draw out vocal responses from the audience. As a grand finale, Hall gives each character a solo oration. Camae's sound-bite timeline of the King legacy is flashy but toothless (check out Branden Jacob-Jenkins' Neighbors for a far more biting version of the same type of speech) but once Jackson gets a few moments alone to reflect, we finally get glimpses of a Dr. King that would have been worth the time spent in the theatre.

With its high-profile stars and subject matter, The Mountaintop is likely to be a big commercial success, but if this one is awarded the Tony come June, it will mean we've indeed suffered through a sad and sorry Broadway season.

Photos of Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett by Joan Marcus.

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