Encores!, which has delighted us with numerable Sondheim treasures over the years, now brings the master’s most recent musical to the Off-Center series. The show which came to be called Road Show underwent a difficult path en route to its final version, which opened at the Public in 2008, revealing itself to be a highly interesting but not-quite-satisfying opus. The City Center rendition, under the direction of Will Davis, is anything but dissatisfying. Perhaps its simply that time has caught up with the material, in the very best of all possible ways. The prevailing sentiment among never-say-die Sondheim fans exeunting the house at the opening last night seemed to be a thrilled but surprised “I had no idea that the show was this good.”
This production is, indeed, very good; fence-sitters—and those who might have gone through two or three earlier versions and decided to pass on this one—are hereby advised that they’d better get over to 55th Street before the fifth-and-final showing on Saturday night. This presentation suggests that Road Show might now start to work its way into the repertoire, in the same way that Merrily We Roll Along took a decade to overcome its initial failure and start to find its feet. Hopefully, this won’t be your last chance to see Road Show; but here we have Raúl Esparza—at his very best—equally matched by Brandon Uranowitz. So go!
[Read Elysa Gardner’s ★★★★ review here.]
Road Show tells the tale of turn-of-the-century brothers Addison and Wilson Mizner, who left a trail of dazzling adventures and notorious failures. We could call this a true-to-life epic, except that their relationship with the truth—even in life—was never exactly true. Most of what the brothers built crumbled into dust long before the boys did, although examples of Addison’s grandly extravagant architectural style can still be seen in Palm Beach and Boca Raton, Florida.
The musical tracks the boys as they head up to the Yukon in 1899 to try to cash in on the Klondike Gold Rush, where they amass and lose their first fortune. Addie (Uranowitz) flees across the Pacific, depleting his bankroll in sucker investments. The addiction-prone gambler Willie (Esparza), meanwhile, plants his gold in a saloon and loses it all at the card table. Willie goes through a series of high profile careers (fight promoter, Broadway playwright, Hollywood screenwriter), which always end in spectacular disaster. The unfulfilled Addie turns out to be an architect with flair, establishing Palm Beach as a major resort until becoming immersed by the Florida land boom collapse of 1926.
Fame, fortune, and disaster; carefully groomed celebrity hiding moral and financial bankruptcy; a talent for emerging unscathed while ever-loyal friends and associates are destroyed—where have we heard this before? Or, rather, since? Road Show formerly felt a bit quaint, a tale of days long ago. Suddenly, this tale of a master builder and a master swindler—performed in the shadow, literally, of Trump Tower a block over—becomes a morality tale of our times.
While it has never seemed apparent and was presumably far from the minds of the composer and his equally game librettist John Weidman, we might well start to think of their three musical collaborations as something of a trilogy. Pacific Overtures examined the pervasive influence of American imperialism, while Assassins shined its spotlight on fringe outsiders who realized that with one gunshot they could, and did, change the world. Road Show, we can now begin to understand, presents the lethal underside of the American dream, tarnishing all that once glittered.
Sondheim wrote the score in blocks, if you will. His prior musical, Passion, contained myriad recurring musical themes, often set to lyrics which significantly changed the mood and tone. He continued this in Road Show, additionally sculpting his themes into extended musical scenes where the lyric changes reflect the action. “Gold,” for example, starts with the boys enthusiastically taking leave of Mama (Mary Beth Peil) to brave the Gold Rush; continues as they struggle through the vicissitudes of establishing a claim; follows the boys as they strike a lode; and ends as Willie starts to gamble it away.
These musical block-scenes—the second being Addie’s trip of disillusionment, “I’m on My Way” (which inevitably morphs to “I’m in my way”)—begin as entertaining interludes. As the intermissionless evening moves on, though, the blocks become stunning musical and emotional beauties, most notably the “You” sequence. As for Weidman, his craftmanship and insightful humor—not necessarily apparent in the earlier productions—now shines through.
Those earlier productions, in brief. The show was commissioned by Kennedy Center and announced for the 1996-97 season. Wise Guys finally came to the stage in a 1999 workshop at New York Theater Works, with Sam Mendes directing a cast led by Nathan Lane (as Addie) and Victor Garber (as Willie). This version—though in many ways exceedingly fascinating—was withdrawn in a duststorm of recriminations. Bounce—the title coming from a newly written title song—appeared at the Goodman in Chicago in June 2003, under the direction of Harold Prince with Richard Kind and Howard McGillin in the leads. It headed to Kennedy Center that October, where it came to a second ignominious end. Director John Doyle finally came along to tackle the material, resulting in the November 2008 Road Show at the Public (with Alexander Gemignani and Michael Cerveris). Once again, the production dead-ended without a Broadway transfer, and that was until now journey’s end. In the course of which, what was initially intended as a satiric version of the Bing Crosby-Bob Hope-Dorothy Lamour “Road” movies turned decidedly downbeat, with the female character eliminated altogether along the trail.
Director/choreographer Will Davis—whose credits are mostly in non-musicals, including the memorably inventive Men on Boats—is highly impressive in what seems to be his professional musical theater debut. He places this concert version within a radio studio setting. This might be due to the Encores production realities, with the on-stage orchestra. It nevertheless works exceedingly well, allowing us to concentrate more fully on the text without distractions from scenery. James Moore ably conducts a band of 13, playing the typically expert Sondheimian orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick.
Uranowitz, whose whirlwind Broadway career since 2015 includes An American in Paris, Falsettos, and Burn This, is pure delight to watch as Addie (who in former versions, and in real life, was the physical opposite of the wiry Uranowitz). Esparza, following a long exile to the lucrative world of network TV, demonstrates how well-suited to the musical stage he is. His Sondheim experience is long and full, including the 2008 Broadway Company plus high-profile productions of Merrily We Roll Along, Sunday in the Park, and Anyone Can Whistle. Here, he slithers and slides about the stage in a manner reminiscent of—what? Who? One wonders whether he studied internet clips of Eddie Foy Jr. In any case, Esparza is here a marvel and, in this opinion, far more compelling than his predecessors in the role.
Peil, a veteran of productions of Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park, and Follies but best known as The Good Wife’s mother-in-law, positively shines as the mother who unblushingly loves her wayward son the best. Jin Ha, from the Broadway revival of M. Butterfly and the Chicago company of Hamilton, is most impressive as the sympathetic millionaire-aesthete who forges a professional and intimately personal career with Addie. The entire ensemble contributes mightily, with a special nod to Liz McCartney as a heiress Willie fleeces along the way.
The final line of Weidman’s book is “Sooner or later, we’re bound to get it right.” With this Road Show at Encores!, yes, they get it right.
Road Show opened July 24, 2019, at City Center and runs through July 27. Tickets and information: nycitycenter.org
