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| PHAMALy / Eric Weber |
| Ali Zimmerman, who plays Babe Williams and is deaf, falls for Sid Sorokin, played by Don Mauck, who is blind. |
"The Pajama Game" is hardly the perfect musical, and no one will claim this is a perfect performance of it.
But attending PHAMALy's "The Pajama Game" is nevertheless the perfect theatergoing experience. It's a heroic accomplishment by a group of actors for (some of) whom just getting out of bed in the morning is a heroic accomplishment. Walk a mile in their shoes, and it's no wonder how these plucky pros can tackle a little challenge like a monstrous musical with such "believe me, this is nothing" aplomb.
PHAMALy productions are an annual summer blessing, and not just for the actors. For the cast, made up of actors with physical or mental disabilities, PHAMALy is a rare opportunity to perform in a professional environment. But for the audience, watching what they do is the equivalent of undergoing a soul-cleansing with a Brillo pad. Yes, the harshest of critics could find minor flaws with aspects of its execution - but only if one wants a one-way ticket to Hades.
"The Pajama Game" is a joyous and uplifting experience that is a reminder of what makes for a profound and satisfying evening of theater. You might see better theater elsewhere, but you will never see so much joy on a stage.
Make no mistake: PHAMALy director Steve Wilson compromises nothing in his productions. His setting is none other than the Space Theatre at the Denver Performing Arts Complex. His creative team is made up of some of the Denver Center Theatre Company's finest. His sets, lighting, costumes and sound are up to DCTC standards, executed to precise, minute detail.
And Donna Debreceni is more than the best musical director in the business. She is a miracle worker, not only for the way she coaxes such exuberance out of every note from her actors but from a more practical standpoint. Debreceni transposes nearly every arrangement to complement her actors, and she often winds up with music that sounds better than the original because what might be impossible for an actor is made possible.
"Miracle workers" is a term that also could be applied to Wilson's cast, if for nothing else than taking a dusty 1954 musical comedy that is among the most insipid in theater history and making it outrageously fun. This isn't just corn on the cob; it's stalks that are 6-feet tall. But somehow Wilson makes it sweet corn.
The familiar story is of a woman named Babe who works at a pajama factory and falls in love with her superintendent as she tries to win a raise of 7 1/2 cents an hour. It is best known for the classics "Hey There" (you with the stars in your eyes ... ) and "Steam Heat."
Maybe I've been so softened by this company that my bloodstream would register nearly toxic levels of Downy. But you try not to be moved as you watch a blind actor (Don Mauck) sweep a deaf actress (Ali Zimmerman) off her feet. Or a suave, able-bodied dancer (Curt Niblack) tango with a partner in a wheelchair (Teri Westerman).
Try not to laugh at Wilson's irreverent (and maudlin) sense of humor as he has fun with his actors' real-life circumstances. One girl in a wheelchair has a Hula Hoop at a picnic. The inflection of one line being addressed to Sid is changed from "I'm not BLIND" to the deviously witty "I'M not blind." And he gives a woman in a wheelchair a Weekly World tabloid with a headline shouting, "She's Got Legs: Three of Them!"
These repeatedly disarming moments are intended to remind those who may find it impossible not to focus on the actors' handicaps that the order of the day is to have fun.
The most remarkable among a litany of terrific performances is from Mauck, whose blindness is written into his character of sexy superintendent Sid (the John Raitt role). Mauck's vocal range is astounding, from the bluesy low of "A New Town Is a Blue Town" to the falsetto in "Hey There." Mauck's range glides from baritone to tenor, hitting a g-flat high above middle C. And when "Hey There" turns into a clever duet with himself (he first sings his love into a dictaphone), it brings the house down and the goosebumps up. It happens again as the first act fades, when Mauck for the first time removes his blind glasses and exposes to the audience both his and Sid's vulnerability.
Cherubic cutie Ali Zimmerman is charming as Babe (Doris Day's movie role), and you can't help rooting for her knowing that she's deaf in one ear and at a 60 percent loss in the other. But she sings her heart out thanks to a specially formatted sound mix that's being transmitted into her hearing aid. When Mauck sings to Zimmerman, "Are you too much in love to hear?" it ratchets your heart like a vice.
Lucy Roucis, a successful Los Angeles actress before developing Parkinson's, hasn't lost a bit of her trademark comic timing as tough- talking Gladys, who has great chemistry with her boss Hines (Jim Hubbard). But leave it to the devilish Wilson to give an actress with Parkinson's a drunken, slurred-speech scene that Roucis knocks out of the park like she's Lucille Ball on the candy-factory assembly line. Roucis also leads a cavalcade of beautiful women for a version of "Sssssteam Heat" that nearly sets off the fire alarm. And as Mabel ("I'll Never Be Jealous Again"), Kathleen Traylor may be the best singer of the bunch.
Even those with profound disabilities are given moments to drain the spotlight. Wilson practically shoots Donna Gunnison out of a cannon by letting her walk around the workplace swigging from a flask, and later breaking into an impromptu solo.
Last year, I wrote that I stood at the end of PHAMALy's "Once Upon a Mattress" because many of them could not. A year later, I do not stand corrected. I stand for the performance, and the reminder that with the right work ethic and a sense of humor, there is no handicap that cannot be overcome.
Go see it. You'll be a better person for it.
The Pajama Game
**** (out of 4 stars)
Directed by:Steve Wilson
Starring:Don Mauck, Ali Zimmerman, Jim Hubbard and Lucy Roucis
Presented by:Physically Handicapped Amateur Musical Actors League
Where:Space Theatre, Denver Performing Arts Complex, 14th and Curtis streets
When:8 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays through Aug. 17 (also 7 p.m. Monday)
Running time:2 hours, 30 minutes
Tickets:$25 through the Denver Center box office at 303-893-4100