Audra McDonald Lights Up Broadway in ‘Gypsy’
Multiple Tony Award-winner Audra McDonald positively stuns in the revival of a beloved classic American musical.
The chandelier at the Majestic Theater is gone. So are the Gothic, elaborate sets replicating the Palais Garnier, which served as the inspiration for Phantom of the Opera, a musical about an apparition obsessed with a leading lady of the Paris Opera House. The spectacle would become a global phenomenon and the longest-running show on Broadway, where the Majestic Theater served as host for 35 years.
After a 16-month renovation, not a trace of the Andrew Lloyd Webber show exists. Yet another supernatural and transcendent tenant has swept into the building, holding audiences in her clutch and bulldozing every barrier that blocks her. Her name is Audra McDonald, and she has stepped into the well-worn shoes of Rose in the fifth Broadway revival of the great American musical Gypsy.
Most theater aficionados are familiar with the show that had a Holy Trinity for a creative team: Arthur Laurents (book), Jule Styne (music), and Stephen Sondheim (lyrics). Loosely based on the memoirs of Gypsy Rose Lee, it tells the story of Rose, a thrice-married, overbearing stage mother who pushes everyone around her to the brink of exhaustion to make Vaudeville stars of her children, June (Jordan Tyson) and Louise (Joy Woods).
With the heyday of the Vaudeville circuit drying up, Rose turns to the more risqué option of Burlesque and inspires one of them to adopt the stage name Gypsy Rose Lee. You might believe, then, that the story is about her, but when producers first presented the idea to Laurents, he was more interested in the idea of a mother living vicariously through her children and placed the focus directly on Mama Rose.
That choice led to the creation of one of the most coveted roles in what is widely considered one of the best musicals ever written. Clocking in at three hours, it is an epic work, but it is time well spent.
Since its premiere in 1959 starring Ethel Merman, Rose has been undertaken by Angela Lansbury, Tyne Daly, Betty Buckley, Bernadette Peters, Patti LuPone, and, on London’s West End, Imelda Staunton. Nearly all of them (including Merman) walked off with a leading actress award for a role that has been compared to Shakespeare’s King Lear in terms of its scope, depth, and demand for physical stamina. There is rarely a moment when Rose is not onstage.
Six-time Tony Award winner McDonald blazes her way through this depression-era tale with ferocity and laser focus under the smart direction of another six-time Tony winner, George C. Wolfe. She is making history as the first black woman ever to be cast in the part on Broadway, and while not one word of the original script has changed, certain lines land much differently and more powerfully than they have before.
“I have to think of my girls and their happiness,” she tells her boyfriend and manager, Herbie (Danny Burstein), who tells Rose that her kids should be in school. “And be like other girls; cook and clean and sit and die!” she retorts. “You looked like a pioneer woman without a frontier,” Herbie says, recalling the first time he saw her.
Though never mentioned in the script, McDonald’s Rose unarguably faces additional challenges of racism, which she is sure to both meet and overcome. Still, she knows her self-worth and the worth of her children, forging a trail of survival for her family and herself.
It’s a common reaction to vilify the character of Rose. Past performers, while excellent, have made her a relentless narcissist and too hard-edged. McDonald imbues her with an elegance and softer delivery. Consequently, it allows us to better understand her motives and actions.
Vocally, however, McDonald, a classically trained soprano, doesn’t quite fit the bill and fails to bring full-throated brass and brashness to the part. It’s particularly evident in the show’s most important number, “Rose’s Turn,” when she realizes what she could and should have if only she were given the chance.
Still, audiences will continue to jump to their feet and flood an already robust box office for McDonald. The rest of the cast, including Tony winner Burstein and Joy Woods in the transformative role of Louise, are delivering top-tier performances. The best comic moment goes to the trio of Leslie Margherita (Tessie Tura), Lili Thomas (Mazeppa), and Mylinda Hull (Electra), who stop the show with “You Gotta Get A Gimmick.”
Choreographer Camille A. Brown provides exuberant dance moves amidst Santo Loquasto’s appropriately shabby, worn-looking scenic design. Toni-Leslie James adorns the cast with a wealth of carefully thought costumes ranging from ramshackle to resplendent.
Styne’s ever-glorious score, Wolfe’s production, and McDonald’s overall performance make this a worthwhile Gypsy, even if vocally, it isn’t the most ideal.
Gypsy (★★★★☆) is playing at the Majestic Theatre, 245 W. 44th St. in New York City. Tickets are $69 to $421. Visit www.gypsybway.com.
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