Review: Madelaine Warren Glows With WARREN SINGS FIELDS at Don't Tell Mama

It was a night of girl power at Don’t Tell Mama on November 30th.  Well, it was the afternoon, and the girls were women, but it was definitely powerful, and it was all about the ladies.  Soprano Madelaine Warren had gathered a standing room only crowd of friends, fans, and fellow artists in order to present to them a program centering around a history-making, groundbreaking woman from the history of show business, Dorothy Fields.  Fields was only groundbreaking because she was so far ahead of her time that she had to blaze her own trails, she had to make her own rules, and she had to do it on her own, which is exactly what she did, and Madelaine Warren is here to tell (bits and pieces of) Dorothy’s story, and share a generous helping of her artistry.  The show, appropriately titled WARREN SINGS FIELDS, is eighty minutes of sheer delight, and it begins and ends with Madelaine Warren.  Don’t get me wrong: Dorothy Fields contributes mightily, by way of lyrics that are both intelligent and comical, poetry that is abundant of imagery and emotion, and storytelling structure of a sophisticated nature.  Dorothy Fields is certainly in the hot seat here, but it is Madelaine Warren that makes the seat comfy and cozy, and a pleasure to enjoy.

Working closely with a dream team (Director Barry Kleinbort, Musical Director/Arranger Christopher Denny, and Bassist Tom Hubbard), the oh-so-elegant Warren has a script filled with stories and histories germane to the Fields legend, but it is not a script that plays like a class at the college level in which music (or musical theater) enthusiasts learn about a legend.  That’s happened at other shows, but not at this one, because Warren is completely and totally in touch with who she is and what she is about.   She has an admiration for Fields, and she wants to talk about her, she wants to share her story - and even though she has memorized her script, Madelaine isn’t so locked into it that she becomes an oratory jukebox.  She breaks free of her script with asides and jokes and off-the-cuff comments most usually executed with a dry delivery of humor and one cocked, quizzical eyebrow.  And it’s hilarious.  There was so much laughter at the November 30th performance that you would have thought it was a comedy show… or a MUSICAL comedy show.  That all originates with Madelaine - indeed, it REALLY did on Sunday because, almost immediately, Warren made a simple mistake when she welcomed everyone to her Dorothy Parker show.  Promptly catching the gaffe, she dove right into laughing about it and making jokes about it a few more times during the performance.  My escort for the day called it, “taking the piss out of herself,” a good old British term for making fun of yourself.  Madelaine takes her storytelling and her artistry seriously, but not herself.  No quality in a person (or cabaret performer) could be more endearing.  Madelaine Warren is unquestionably a person with whom to become endeared.

So with the more personal aspect of the performance covered, let’s talk about the play, itself.

Warren Sings Fields is a fine musical cabaret - informative but not instructional, entertaining in its rhetoric and the choice of stories being recounted, and scripted economically so that Warren can get the tales out and get to the music, which Denny has arranged superbly, with treatments of some songs leaning into a more traditional vibe, while some get downright inventive.  It’s fun hearing a classical soprano perform jazz arrangements, particularly when Denny makes the treatments cosmopolitan but keeps them accessible, like opening number “I Feel A Song Comin’ On.”  But when the more inventive treatments take a seat on the piano bench with Christopher, it is satisfying to hear Warren go legit with songs that Fields wrote for the movies, because hers is the type of soprano sound one might have heard in the movie musicals of Fields’ day (though the shocker of the night was getting to hear Warren’s gorgeous lower register, and a little belting, on the later-written “Where Am I Going?” from Sweet Charity - more of those low notes is my current Christmas wish).  That was a fun surprise.   Also, it’s worth remarking that Madelaine Warren is a fine actress.  Mr. Kleinbort has guided her into expertly expressive performances of lighter songs like “Currier and Ives” and “After Forty, It’s Patch, Patch, Patch” which, as character-driven monologues, are rich with comedic turns that Fields developed for both the actor’s and the audience’s enjoyment.  Warrenis equal to the task.   But even though Dorothy Fields had a gift with cultivated lyrics, she also knew how to touch the heart, which Warren achieves with as much ease, thanks to her efforts with “I Can’t Waltz Alone” from the film Alice Adams (an evening highlight), and a simple, divine “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love,” a song so famous that artists often have no choice but to just sing it - but not here, for Madelaine Warren has come to interpret, and interpret, she does, and beautifully on all the songs in her show.   There is an amuse-bouche from an Abbott and Costello film titled “Remind Me” that stands out for its cheery cuteness, there are some excellent acting choices made for the famed “On The Sunny Side of the Street,” and genuine guffaws for the Broadway-composed “He Had Refinement,” another evening highlight.  This writer has no notes, no critiques, indeed, I am compelled to remark that I didn’t look at my watch once, even though the show came in at nearly eighty minutes, which is a little long for a cabaret.  But it didn’t feel long.  It only felt like a grand afternoon of entertainment… and I even went home having learned something!  Bonus.

Aside from her personal team of creatives working to make Warren Sings Fields a success, it is worth remarking that Kelly Wohlford’s lighting plot for Madelaine’s show was especially eloquent.  There was a lushness about the colors and designs on the cyclorama, as though they were created for a technicolor musical with Dorothy Fields lyrics, or perhaps an Oliver Smith set design for Broadway.  With Wohlford’s meticulous lighting on Warren’s red hair and champagne cocktail frock, Misters Hubbard and Denny to stages left and right, and a house full of colleagues in cabaret, all the pieces were in place for a warm, witty, and whimsical night of musical entertainment just right for one woman storyteller to honor another… and, frankly, vice versa.

Madelaine Warren will present WARREN SINGS FIELDS again on December 6th at 7 pm (Tickets accessible HERE) and December 9th at 7 pm (Tickets accessible HERE).

Find great shows to see on the Don't Tell Mama website HERE.

Madelaine Warren is online HERE.

Photos by Stephen Mosher