Kiss Me Kate Revival
Marin Mazzie and Brian
Stokes Mitchell, the Lilli and
Fred of Broadway's aborning
Kiss Me, Kate revival, which
begins previews at the Martin
Beck Theatre Oct. 25, will be
joined by 26 performers,
including Stanley Wayne
Mathis as the "Too Darn Hot"
soloist, Paul.
Mathis was Schroeder in the
1999 Broadway revival of
You're a Good Man, Charlie
Brown and appeared in the
original cast of The Lion King.
Michael Berresse (Chicago,
Fascinating Rhythm) and Amy Spanger (Chicago), as
previously announced, are Bill Calhoun/Lucentio and Lois
Lane/Bianca, respectively.
Official opening is Nov. 18.
The long talked-about casting of Mazzie and Mitchell (who
were Tony nominated for playing Mother and Coalhouse
in Ragtime) puts the performers in roles of sparring
partners: In the 1948 Cole Porter musical, they play a
divorced husband-wife acting team fighting both off-stage
and on during a Baltimore tryout for a musical version of
The Taming of the Shrew. They also sing in the roles of
Katharine and Petruchio.
Exploiting the aggressive nature of the lead roles, the ad
campaign has a boxing theme. A print brochure is a boxing
poster that cries, "The Season's Main Event!" with "Brian
Stokes Mitchell Vs. Marin Mazzie" in "The Musical
Comedy Knockout." Mitchell and Mazzie are seen in
boxing gloves.
Director Michael Blakemore is interpolating one number
not in the Broadway original: "From This Moment On,"
cut from Porter's Out of This World (1950) but used in the
MGM film version of Kiss Me, Kate (danced Ann Miller,
Tommy Rall and Bob Fosse), is now part of the revival,
according to a brochure distributed by the producers.
,br>
The upcoming cast also includes John Horton (Harry
Trevor), Adrian Lenox (Hattie), Lee Wilkof (First Man),
Michael Mulheren (Second Man) and Ron Holgate
(Harrison Howell). Wilkof (the original Seymour in Little
Shop of Horrors in New York) and Michael Mulheren
(Titanic, the "Encores!" staging of Li'l Abner) play a pair of
gangsters who come backstage to collect a gambling debt,
and end up singing the Bowery waltz, "Brush Up Your
Shakespeare."
Ron Holgate, the Buffalo Bill of the current Annie Get Your
Gun and the original Richard Henry Lee of 1776, will play
a rich sugar daddy to Spanger's Lois Lane (no relation to
the "Superman" character) in Kate.
The ensemble also includes Paula Leggett Chase, Merwin
Foard, Eric Michael Gillett, Patty Goble, Blake Hammond,
JoAnn M. Hunter, Darren Lee, Nancy Lemenager, Michael
X. Martin, Kevin Neil McCready, Carol Lee Meadows,
Elizabeth Mills, Linda Mugleston, Robert Ousley, Vince
Pesce, T. Oliver Reid, Cynthia Sophiea and Jerome
Vivona.
*
Producers Roger Berlind and Roger Horchow are behind
the production, directed by Michael Blakemore and
choreographed by Kathleen Marshall.
Blakemore's musical projects have included The Life and
City of Angels. He also directed Noises Off, Joe Egg and
Lettice & Lovage for Broadway and Death Defying Acts
Off Broadway.
br>
Marshall is known as artistic director of the popular
"Encores!" musical theatre concert series. In February
1999, she staged Rodgers and Hart's Babes in Arms for
"Encores!"
On Broadway, Marshall choreographed 1776 and Swinging
on a Star.
Designers are Robin Wagner (sets), Martin Pakladeniz
(costumes), Peter Kaczorowski (lighting) and Tony Meola
(sound). Paul Gemignani will conduct the classic score.
Kiss Me, Kate was Porter's greatest triumph and his most
fully integrated book musical, coming late in his career
after hits in the 1920s and 1930s with Paris, Fifty Million
Frenchmen, Jubilee and Anything Goes.
The musical tells of the tempestuous relationship between
estranged Fred and Lilli, touring in a musical version of
The Taming of the Shrew, and the secondary leads, Bill
and Lois, on the rocks because of his gambling habit and
her wandering eye.
The show is said to have been inspired by the contentious
behavior of acting greats Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne.
Songs from the score include "Why Can't You Behave?,"
"Wunderbar," "Another Openin', Another Show," "So in
Love," "Were Thine That Special Face," "Too Darn Hot,"
"Where Is The Life That Late I Led?," "Always True to
You in My Fashion" and "Brush Up Your Shakespeare."
The 1953 film version interpolated the song, "From This
Moment On," cut from Porter's Out of This World.
Another cut song, "We Shall Never Be Younger," has
found life in recordings, in cabarets and in the revue, Cole.
Several years ago, John McGlinn conducted a studio cast
and recorded the entire score -- including such cut
material as "What Does Your Servant Dream About?,"
"I'm Afraid, Sweetheart, I Love You," "We Shall Never Be
Younger," "If Ever Married I'm" and "A Woman's Career"
-- for a two-disc release on the EMI/Angel label.
-- By Kenneth Jones, Playbill
Back to Articles and Reviews
