The lobby of the Grand Hotel, Berlin—“people come, people go, and life goes on”—has been transplanted to the stage of City Center in altogether stunning fashion. Six performances only, and this one is not to be missed.
The evening benefits from a number of main performances—the plot is built around six more-or-less-equal characters—but the true star is most decidedly director-choreographer Josh Rhodes. This relative newcomer, whose most auspicious credits to date are the dances for Cinderella, Bright Star, and It Shoulda Been You, has staged up a storm here; this Grand Hotel is always afoot, led by a pair of phenomenal tango dancers moving through the evening like ghosts and backed by a stageful of flailing bodies.
Grand Hotel The Musical, as it is officially called, was something of a legend of its own making. The original production—built on an altogether remarkable staging by Tommy Tune—remains memorable, certainly; but the trappings, and one or two performances, came off considerably more successfully than the overall enterprise. Faced with a mixed reception, the ads quickly heralded the show as “The Mega-Hit of the Nineties,” but just because the producers said it and emblazoned it on city buses, didn’t make it so. The show did manage to hold on for a fairly successful, 1,000-performance run. (Tune won twin Tonys, but the major awards that year went to City of Angels.)
[Read Steven Suskin’s ★★★★ review of Encores’ Me and My Girl here.]
All of which is relevant to the Encores presentation for an unlikely reason: The written material seems to play considerably better than it did back in 1989 at the Martin Beck. It might well be that after 30 years of not necessarily brilliant Broadway musicals, the richness of the score by Robert Wright, George Forrest, and especially Maury Yeston stands out. (In a backstage saga not at all out of tune with the 1929 Vicki Baum bestseller on which it was based, the 1989 Grand Hotel was a revision of the 1958 flop At the Grand. When the new production seemed on the verge of once again folding, Yeston was brought in at the last minute—against the vociferous complaints of the original songwriters—to replace a significant chunk of the score. Luther Davis’ book, too, was given an uncredited overhaul by Peter Stone.)
What had been a disjointed score now sounds more of a piece. Wright and Forrest (of Song of Norway and Kismet) provide the effective atmospheric and rhythmic novelties, while the expert character-analyses-in-songs of Yeston (Nine) retain their impressive power. We should also acknowledge the contributions of the original music staff—orchestrator Peter Matz, arranger Wally Harper, and conductor Jack Lee—who held the show together under tumultuous circumstances.
The cast is not star-filled, as these things go, but the performers impress. Heading the group is Heléne Yorke (Bullets over Broadway) as Flaemmchen, the “flame girl” who wants to go to Hollywood. She brings a desperation to her role, demonstrating that she is clearly not destined for a screen career. Yorke offers an early highlight with “Girl in the Mirror”; note her nightmarish frustration, and the menace of Rhodes’ upstage dancers, during the gritty “Freiderichstrasse” section—which serves as a good illustration of Yeston’s distinctive strength as a musical dramatist.
James Snyder, who made a brief splash in the title role of the 2008 Cry-Baby and more recently appeared in If/Then and the Encores Fanny, might be considered the find of the evening: As the ill-fated Baron, he sings his sometimes melodramatic songs with ringing strength, capped by Yeston’s grand “Love Can’t Happen.” Brandon Uranowitz (of American in Paris and Falsettos) has what might be the most difficult chore: Anyone who saw Michael Jeter’s Tony-winning performance as bookkeeper Otto Kringelein will never forget what Jeter (and Tune) wrought. No matter; Uranowitz thoroughly conquers the role, and his “We’ll Raise the Glass Together” is altogether rousing. At the same time, he handles the comedy with charm and aplomb. Also on hand are Irina Dvorovenko as the fading ballerina; Natascia Diaz as her long-suffering assistant, who dreams of retiring with the her to a “Villa on a Hill”; and John Dossett as the blustering, crooked, mistress-bullying industrialist. John Clay III adds emotional pull to the evening as Erick, the desk clerk and expectant father.
Music director Rob Berman expertly leads the orchestra, and do pardon us if we say that at every Encores presentation. Allen Moyer contributes what might be the most effective scenic design we’ve seen at City Center, dominated by a thoroughly grand red staircase intersecting the stage, backed by an enormous vertical mirror (used in the manner that Hal Prince introduced in Cabaret, suggesting that the audience watching the play shares the failings of the characters). The resulting crimped playing area forces Rhodes to stage the scenes thrust forward, which results in great immediacy and enhances the emotional pull of the material.
The most staggering performances come from Guadalupe Garcia and Junior Cervila, who in the program (but not on stage) are identified as The Countess and The Gigolo. These are non-talking, non-singing roles; but oh, how they dance! On and on through the night, and always eye-opening. Cervila is the anchor of the pair, and in one sequence appears to be an acrobatic strongman as well. Garcia, for her part, often seems to be dancing on air; that is, she appears to be draped over Cervila’s shoulders in comatose fashion, with only her toe tips maybe touching the floor. Argentine ballroom dancers of note, they appear to have contributed their solo choreography; and not surprisingly, as they offer violently abrupt moves that I don’t suppose anyone else could have come up with. They continue dancing even after the curtain calls, and the audience understandably remains rapt in their seats.
Let it be added that there was something refreshingly reassuring in seeing Yeston and Tune at the opening, both happily in attendance. Almost seemed like we were back in 1990.
Grand Hotel opened March 21, 2018, at City Center and runs through March 25. Tickets and information: nycitycenter.org
