DVDs: Conga!

Three of Leonard Bernstein's Broadway musicals are now on video in concert versions taped abroad. Candide had Bernstein himself at the helm, while On the Town was conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, with narration performed by Betty Comden and Adolph Green.

Both of those concerts were taped in London, and both were released on VHS. Already issued in Europe and available here next month is a concert version of Wonderful Town, conducted by Sir Simon Rattle and recorded live at the Berlin Philharmonic on December 30 and 31, 2002. The video features the same cast and conductor as EMI Classics' 1999 CD of Wonderful Town, with Kim Criswell, Audra McDonald, Thomas Hampson, and Brent Barrett in leading roles.

Included in the concert are the "Conquering New York" and "Village Vortex" ballets. Omitted are the entr'acte and "Conversation Piece," which deprives McDonald of her coloratura moment. It's good to hear the score played by such a sizable and distinguished orchestra, and the overture and ballets sound grand.

The seventy-six-minute DVD features only the score and, but for some very brief lead-in dialogue, none of the book. There's also no linking narration. Superb as the Bernstein-Comden-Green score is, Wonderful Town is a somewhat odd choice for a songs-only concert, as the book is so strong.

Still, this is an enjoyable outing, thanks to the conducting and the principals, who are more fun to watch than to listen to on the CD. Hampson, who also appears in the On the Town concert video, is quite good, McDonald is wonderful, and Barrett is solid. The latter sings Wreck's "Pass the Football," but gets additional presence by also singing the tour guide in the opening "Chrisopher Street" and one of the editors in "What a Waste."

As Ruth, Criswell is fine. The role lies very low for her, and while she has no trouble whatsoever with the music, the score doesn't allow her to show off what she's vocally capable of. Even so, she offers an effectively forthright "One Hundred Easy Ways" and a crisp "Swing." One can fault her only for not memorizing the lyrics of "Conga!" and "Swing"; her acting of those numbers would be more fun if she didn't have to glance down to refer to the texts.

One can occasionally glimpse projections of German supertitles. The event ends on an appropriate New Year's note, with the entire cast, orchestra, and audience joining in a celebratory encore of "Conga!"

This Wonderful Town was announced for a PBS telecast in the fall of 2003. But then the Broadway revival of the show happened, and the telecast was cancelled. Now that the revival has come and gone, perhaps PBS might consider showing it, as the concert makes for pleasant viewing. One can't help wishing, though, that the first Wonderful Town DVD gave us the 1958 television production, with Rosalind Russell's peerless Ruth.

A NIGHT ON THE TOWN Ovation

This one's a bona fide oddity, a recently released DVD in European PAL format of a 1983 British made-for-television musical fantasy 108 minutes starring Ann Reinking, Elaine Paige, Eartha Kitt, Bobby Short, and Hinton Battle. It's also a jukebox musical, with a thin narrative woven around the words and music of Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Noel Coward, and George Gershwin. From a concept by Judith de Paul, the book is by Paul Myers and Ned Sherrin Side by Side by Sondheim, with direction by John Vernon and choreography by Terry Gilbert.

Rummaging through a theatrical costume shop are the designer Reinking and photographer Lewis Collins of a commercial to be shot in 1930s attire. The owner of the place is played by actor-impressionist Frank Gorshin, doing a Bela Lugosi accent.

In the course of the film, Reinking and Collins will be transported to five cities in the 1930s. At each one, they will be welcomed by Gorshin in a different guise, and in each, Collins will be drawn to a variation on the same woman, all played by Paige.

First up, Reinking and Collins arrive at the Blue Angel club in Berlin, where Gorshin is a Cabaret-style Emcee, leading "Anything Goes" with three ladies, one of them in drag. During "Change Partners," Reinking does. Then Bobby Short is at the piano to sing "Twentieth Century Blues," during which two black-clad men and a young woman do a dance with a pole.

Three ladies appear as caged animals to perform "Let's Do It"; the same trio will reappear in each city, each time in a different get-up, singing a new arrangement of the same song. Collins is drawn to Paige, here playing a Russian countess who calls him on the table telephone because she's "All Alone." Again caught up in the proceedings, Reinking joins a male partner to dance to "Begin the Beguine."

We dissolve to London, and we're at a theatrical opening-night party at Ciro's, with Gorshin a Cary Grant-type doorman. Reinking and Collins sing "Time and Again," then the man of the hour, "Cole Howard" John Moffat, arrives and entertains the crowd with "Mad Dogs and Englishmen." Collins is drawn to a socialite named Anne Paige, who sings "If Love Were All." Short does "Sigh No More." Anne is stolen away by Cole, but Collins is cheered by a big production number to "De-Lovely."

Next, we're at Maxie's in New York, a gangster joint where Paige is a cigarette/hatcheck girl. Reinking sings and dances "Cheek to Cheek" with the men of the house, then Paige salutes Collins with "You're the Top," a song Paige would sing again a few years later in the London revival of Anything Goes.

Short does "Night and Day." Then the joint is raided, but Gorshin's cop is swept up in another production number, "Top Hat, White Tie, and Tails." Paige and Collins duet on "From This Moment On."

Then we're off to the Golden Gate, a bordello on New Orleans' Bourbon Street. Gorshin is first a W.C. Fields type, welcoming Reinking and Collins, then a Clark Gable-style host who leads "Puttin' on the Ritz." The madam of the house turns out to be none other than Eartha Kitt, who offers a striking "Love for Sale."

Collins is again drawn to Paige, who's one of the Golden Gate girls. She sings "What Is This Thing Called Love," to which he replies "I've Got You Under My Skin." Kitt bursts the mood with a rowdy "Alexander's Ragtime Band."

The final segment takes place in Paris, with Gorshin a Chevalier-type host. This sequence has as its centerpiece a fifteen-minute ballet choreographed by Irving Davies to Gershwin's "An American in Paris," starring Hinton Battle and Reinking, the latter in especially glamorous form.

And that's about it, the musical numbers punctuated by brief exchanges of dialogue that are mostly an excuse to link the songs. A Night on the Town is a bizarre curiosity, and while there's fine singing from Paige, Kitt, and Short, and some sparkling dances with Reinking, the whole thing is pretty pointless, the problem residing mostly in the flimsy overall concept. Still, fans of these artists may wish to check this film out now that it has been made available on disc.