While Cole Porter and the Gershwins ruled book musicals on Broadway during the late 1920's and early 30's, it was the return of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart that guided the 30's to their close. From 1935 to 1939 alone, they had hits with "Billy Rose's Jumbo", "On Your Toes". "I'd Rather Be Right!", "Babes in Arms", and this hysterical take on Shakespeare's "The Comedy of Errors". This was years before Porter musicalized "Taming of the Shrew" and Sondheim and Bernstein modernized "Romeo & Juliet" as "West Side Story", and decades before Sondheim spoofed the same era with "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum". It's a hysterical mix of modern swing and ancient farce, a bit lusty from the women's perspective towards men, and an absolute gem of a show.
The 1938 Broadway hit introduced so many standards that in listening to cast albums of the show from the 1963 Off Broadway Revival and the 1990's City Center Encores, you will find yourself humming and tapping along. "Sing For Your Supper", "Falling in Love With Love" and "This Can't Be Love" were instant classics, and the lesser known songs are gems as well. You'd have to read Shakespeare's text to understand a lot of the hidden meanings, but even if some of the lyrics are a little shaky, they are sung and performed with such zest that it's easy to overlook some of the strange twists and turns a few of the songs take. At least, unlike the 1940 Universal movie, all the songs are there, and this Canadian production produced as part of a Shakespeare festival, is delicious from start to finish.
Of the cast, the only actor whose work I was familiar with was Colm Feore as one of two sets of twins separated at birth. Clever credits show each of the sets of twins seeing each other and doing a hysterical double take, as well as the women in their lives and the townspeople who open the show with a deliciously funny song about a pending execution. Feore and Geraint Wyn Davies may not look exactly alike (same with Keith Thomas and Benedict Campbell as their diminutive slaves), but they have enough in common to be believable in the course of a musical comedy. Susan Wright seems to be emulating the movie Luce (Martha Raye) in the way she cuts off each word abrubtly, pleasantly plump and vivacious, and exceedingly needy for physical comforts. Luce is a part perfect for any character actress who excels in rubber faced comedy, making me hope for a more faithful revival than the 2002 Roundabout production which missed the mark in its re-write completely.
Musical farce is very difficult to perfect, but this pretty much gets everything right. Appearing to have been performed in the round, there's enough of a set to emulate ancient Greece, and certain minor changes to the book indicate that the producers were hoping for another "Funny Thing" style spoof, something it got quite right. Wright and Davies get two very funny duets ("What Can You Do With a Man?" and "He & She") which include such ribald lyrics as "I've got a thousand blessings. Each ways a pound", sung in regards to Wright, as well as "And when they died and went to heaven, all the angels moved to hell", giving "He & She" a contrast with the later Rodgers and Sondheim song "We're Gonna Be Alright" from "Do I Hear a Waltz?" and the later "You're Gonna Love Tomorrow" from "Follies". There's also a bit of a gay wink in "Come With Me" where Greek soldiers seem to be encouraging the men to leave their girls and join them in jail. "The Boys From Syracuse" may not get the frequent revivals that "Forum" gets, but it has a much better score and obviously influenced Sondheim in many ways.
The 1938 Broadway hit introduced so many standards that in listening to cast albums of the show from the 1963 Off Broadway Revival and the 1990's City Center Encores, you will find yourself humming and tapping along. "Sing For Your Supper", "Falling in Love With Love" and "This Can't Be Love" were instant classics, and the lesser known songs are gems as well. You'd have to read Shakespeare's text to understand a lot of the hidden meanings, but even if some of the lyrics are a little shaky, they are sung and performed with such zest that it's easy to overlook some of the strange twists and turns a few of the songs take. At least, unlike the 1940 Universal movie, all the songs are there, and this Canadian production produced as part of a Shakespeare festival, is delicious from start to finish.
Of the cast, the only actor whose work I was familiar with was Colm Feore as one of two sets of twins separated at birth. Clever credits show each of the sets of twins seeing each other and doing a hysterical double take, as well as the women in their lives and the townspeople who open the show with a deliciously funny song about a pending execution. Feore and Geraint Wyn Davies may not look exactly alike (same with Keith Thomas and Benedict Campbell as their diminutive slaves), but they have enough in common to be believable in the course of a musical comedy. Susan Wright seems to be emulating the movie Luce (Martha Raye) in the way she cuts off each word abrubtly, pleasantly plump and vivacious, and exceedingly needy for physical comforts. Luce is a part perfect for any character actress who excels in rubber faced comedy, making me hope for a more faithful revival than the 2002 Roundabout production which missed the mark in its re-write completely.
Musical farce is very difficult to perfect, but this pretty much gets everything right. Appearing to have been performed in the round, there's enough of a set to emulate ancient Greece, and certain minor changes to the book indicate that the producers were hoping for another "Funny Thing" style spoof, something it got quite right. Wright and Davies get two very funny duets ("What Can You Do With a Man?" and "He & She") which include such ribald lyrics as "I've got a thousand blessings. Each ways a pound", sung in regards to Wright, as well as "And when they died and went to heaven, all the angels moved to hell", giving "He & She" a contrast with the later Rodgers and Sondheim song "We're Gonna Be Alright" from "Do I Hear a Waltz?" and the later "You're Gonna Love Tomorrow" from "Follies". There's also a bit of a gay wink in "Come With Me" where Greek soldiers seem to be encouraging the men to leave their girls and join them in jail. "The Boys From Syracuse" may not get the frequent revivals that "Forum" gets, but it has a much better score and obviously influenced Sondheim in many ways.
