Hey, big spender entreaty from the dancers at Gulfshore Playhouse’s Sweet Charity (Photos by Matt Schipper)
By Nancy Stetson
Charity wears her heart on her sleeve.
She also wears her heart on her arm; she has a tattoo on her left arm: the name Charlie in the middle of a heart.
Unfortunately, Charlie is unworthy of her love and her inked devotion. He’s a married man cheating on his wife. He makes Charity pay for everything. And he’s uncommunicative and non-supportive.
He also winds up stealing her purse and pushing Charity into the lake in Central Park.
This is Charity’s downfall: she’s desperate for love, but keeps falling for the wrong guy.
Even her name shouts out her desires three times: Charity Hope Valentine. And she dresses in red and pink, just like a paper Valentine.
She is just bursting with love, with no one to give it to.
As Nickie, her friend and fellow taxi dancer, says to her, “You run your heart like a hotel. You’ve got men running in and out all the time.”
Lines such as these were of course penned by Neil Simon, who wrote the book. Even six decades later, they provide plenty of laughs.
The 1966 musical Sweet Charity playing at Gulfshore Playhouse’s Moran Stage through May 4, is based on a Fellini film, with the setting transported to a taxi dance hall in the heart of New York City. And there are plenty of New York locales highlighted. Besides the lake in Central Park, there are scenes at the 92nd Street Y and Coney Island.
Charity earns a dime a dance, but the real money comes with talking up a guy and getting him to buy expensive watered-down drinks. But she longs for more.
Though Charity lives in one of the biggest cities in the world, her life is claustrophobic: over the course of the play, she finds herself not only confined in a closet and an elevator, but trapped in her life and her dead-end job.
Kate Marilley
This production succeeds on all levels, but first and foremost is the brilliant casting of Kate Marilley as Charity, quirky and effervescent and totally appealing. Eagle-eyed patrons will note that Marilley played Ilona Ritter in She Loves Me, which was not only Gulfshore Playhouse’s last show of the previous season, but its last at the Norris Community Center. (Marilley’s character also fell in love with cads in that musical.)
Charity’s romantic interests are all played by the same actor, Benjamin Lurye. Lurye demonstrates great range, from a narcissistic loser to over-the-top Italian movie star to a well-meaning shy guy with baggage of his own. If not for the listing in the playbill, you wouldn’t know it was the same actor.
The stage (scenic designer Kristen Martino, lighting by Dalton Hamilton) is an Easter egg of a set, with Peter Max-like psychedelic colors, including rose, pink, lavender, purple and mango. Smaller sets are wheeled in for various locales: the dance hall, the dancers’ dressing room, a movie star’s bedroom, an elevator at the Y.
Charity’s two friends at the dance hall, Nickie (Kelly MacMillan) and Helene (Cayla Primous) are more street-wise and look after her, sharing her dream that there has to be something better waiting for them. The two get their chance to shine in “There’s Gotta Be Something Better Than This” and “Baby, Dream Your Dream.”
The ensemble works its feet off, portraying various people. I lost count of the costume changes, but there are 50 different wigs in the show (wig designer Bobbie Zlotnik). The Fandango dancers’ iconic number, “Hey Big Spender,” is a show-stopper, delivered with sass and grit. Ditto for the ensemble’s “I’m a Brass Band” and “Rich Man’s Frug,” which was so entertaining and engrossing I could’ve watched it for an hour. (Director Dann Dunn also did the choreography, inspired by Bob Fosse’s original dances.) There are wrist rolls and hip flicks and slanted, angular moves.
The dancers are marvelously costumed by Leon Dobkowski, wearing feathers and fringe, with fabric in stripes, checks, plaids and polka dots, all in black and white.
Ensemble member Maya J. Christian plays Daddy Brubeck, and belts out her exuberant number, “Rhythm of Life.” This strange counter-culture hippie-church scene seems like a precursor to Hair, which hit Broadway a year after Sweet Charity, in 1967.
Another ensemble member, Lily Kren, slinks about the stage as Ursula, the movie star’s on-again-off-again girlfriend, while Matt Wolpe shows range by playing the same movie star’s stiff butler and the gruff-but-well-meaning dance hall boss.
Is Sweet Charity old? Yes. But it’s enjoyed many revivals. The desire for love is universal and timeless, as is Cy Coleman’s music paired with Dorothy Fields’s clever lyrics and twists of phrase.
The songs are accompanied by an eight-piece orchestra led by associate music director/conductor Michael Uselmann. The orchestration makes it sound much larger, though the sound balance was off opening night. Not only was it just a tad too loud for the space, but the percussion stood out at times and didn’t seem to blend with the rest of the instruments.
Dunn’s production blows off any cobwebs Sweet Charity may have and presents the musical with delightful zaniness. And Marilley, as Charity, knows how to tug on our heartstrings even while her own are continually broken. She is, in her own words, just like Mary Martin in South Pacific: “a cockeyed optimist.”
Despite her break-ups and bad endings, she is resilient, and we find ourselves cheering her on.
The men in her life may not be smart enough to fall in love with her, but any audience member wise enough to see this production will fall instantly head over heels.
Sweet Charity plays at the Moran Mainstage at Gulfshore Playhouse’s Baker Theatre and Education Center, 100 Goodlette-Frank Road South, Naples, through May 4. Tickets are $114, $104, $84, $44. For more information, go to www.gulfshoreplayhouse.org or call (239) 261-7529.
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