Theatergoers have spent many an evening with Audra McDonald since she first appeared in 1994 fully formed, winning—or rather earning—Tony Awards just about every time she put on a new role. Television viewers, too, since 2007 or so. Between times, she has played concerts across the country, including extended tours which now go under the catch-all title An Evening With Audra McDonald. A new touring version—with upcoming dates in abeyance, for obvious reasons—came to City Center Dec. 9 as that organization’s 2020 Gala Benefit. The livestreamed event will remain available on demand through Dec. 16.
To suggest that McDonald is exceptional in concert is to understate the case. It is not only that she is a “good” singer, whatever that might signify. She is a powerful actress, first, who has a splendid singing voice and knows how to use it. When McDonald burrows into a song, she doesn’t just stand there and sing it; she performs it. In this, she is comparable to the great Barbara Cook, who brought a similar dramatic truth to the music. At a concert evening with Audra, or with Barbara before her, you didn’t feel merely thrilled to be there but actually privileged.
McDonald’s City Center debut is understandably pandemic influenced, starting with Duke Ellington’s “(In My) Solitude.” This, the singer explains, describes “how a lot of us are feeling, being home and being alone.” She follows this with a relevant salute to our beset city, Cole Porter’s “I Happen to Like New York,” which—as in the aftermath to 9/11—seems especially poignant just now. Also fitting the tempo of the day is what McDonald describes as a perfect expression of her present personal outlook, Arlen & Harburg’s “Happiness Is Just a Thing Called Joe.”
She, and we, are very much aware that the grand 2,200-seat City Center is empty. Much of the time, the camera uses the darkened hall as backdrop, shooting from upstage with barely discernible exit lights and the mezzanine as background. Occasionally, we see the audience of one: Michael Urie, who “hosts” the evening and on a few occasions engages in banter with McDonald. Otherwise it’s just Audra and Andy Einhorn, her accomplished and supportive musical director, at the piano.
What we get is an experience we wouldn’t have at an in-person gala: the intimacy of Audra as if she’s singing just for you. Which she is. This offers an unprecedented look at this exceptional entertainer at work. In live performance, she always has a minute or two of wild applause during which to transition from one moment to the next. Here, the song ends and she has to instantly snap back into her personable, conversational patter. After a couple of instances of this, as we watch the intensity of the prior song dissipate like a cloud passing from in front of the sun, she actually says something along the lines of “You know how hard it is to sing a song, and end, and hear dead silence? So applaud at home.”
After which she gives us a bravura demonstration of what she does so well. Sondheim’s “The Glamorous Life” is the song—the second one he wrote with that title, for the film version of A Little Night Music. Through McDonald’s acting, we discover that this intricate song—about children and art, “ordinary mothers,” and absent parents—is even more emotionally riveting than we knew.
Something of the same effect—a song we’ve heard repeatedly, presented with an added layer that was there all the time—occurs with “Before the Parade Passes By.” Any number of stars have sung this song, including the several Dollys (Bette Midler, Donna Murphy, Bernadette Peters, Betty Buckley) who paraded through the recent revival of the Jerry Herman musical (for which Einhorn served as musical director). McDonald acts the song as a character not only wanting to live life again but clearly apprehensive that said parade has already passed by, never to return. This is an interpretation that might not work within the context of a performance of Hello, Dolly!, but it’s all there in Herman’s lyric, and McDonald makes the song even more compelling than usual.
Along the way, the singer visits the usual suspects (Bernstein, Styne, Rodgers, Weill, Loesser) along with some rarely heard pop songs for which she makes a compelling case. Extra-special treats include a glorious rendition of Arlen’s extraordinary “A Sleepin’ Bee,” with McDonald offering a personal salute to the late Diahann Carroll (who introduced the song in the 1954 musical House of Flowers); and “March Is a Windy Month,” a beauty from Adam Guettel’s as-yet-unproduced musical Millions.
Being that this is City Center’s annual big-ticket gala, there is a bit of fundraising woven into the event. Urie begins, in the City Center lobby, welcoming (online) donors and thanking them for their support. There is something of an intermission midway through, with actor Jonathan Groff addressing viewers from a bucolic farm in Lancaster, Pa. (where one imagines he is presently residing), giving a six-minute look at City Center activities over the past pandemic year.
The event ends with a final pitch from Urie and City Center president-CEO Arlene Shuler, but be sure not to tune out. In a rather deft segue—following mention of City Center’s noted Encores! series—Urie tells us that Audra heard the word encore and is starting to sing again. Back we go for a final number.
On more than one occasion, McDonald yearns for the day when “we will be able to sit back together in the theater”; in this, she appears to be speaking not as a performer but as an audience member. And as if to accentuate her creed, she tells us: “Nothing beats live theater! Nothing beats live theater!”
An Evening With Audra McDonald opened as a City Center gala on Dec. 9, 2020, and will available on demand through January 3, 2021. Information: nycc.vhx.tv
