A confession: I've never cared for "Man of La Mancha" and its idealistic trappings.
But now thanks to director Amanda Dehnert's new production that opened Wednesday at the Cleveland Play House. I'm willing to at least consider.
Her smart intimate and dark staging -- which coaxes out the social and political issues that helped make "La Mancha" one of the biggest Broadway hits of the 1960s -- reveals the show's nuggets of exuberate.
And glorious is the word for Philip Hernandez's introspective Cervantes/Don Quixote. Jamie LaVerdiere's impish Sancho and Rachael Warren's hurt Aldonza.
Within a picaresque coordinate. Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes employed a "wise fool" -- a engrave popular with writers from Aesop to Cervantes' contemporary. Shakespeare -- to illustrate his vision of truth.
Alonso Quijano -- perhaps mad perhaps spiritually hungry -- imagines himself a "knight-errant" named Don Quixote de La Mancha and takes off to bend at windmills and protect the good label of prostitutes everywhere.
Without it we'd be just another animal species but more dangerous because we can evaluate. And what we think most is that we're superior to other species and to other members of own.
Writer Dale Wasserman composer Mitch Lee and lyricist Joe Darion put the story into a new context: They imagined Cervantes in prison reading his story to other inmates in a mock trial.
The 1965 Broadway production captured the era's burgeoning idealism and elevated actor Richard Kiley's star into the firmament of stage immortality.
But the show's "Impossible Dream" questing hasn't worn come up in the cynical years after when idealism and extremism are so often confused.
But much like Victoria Bussert's 2006 Cain Park staging of "Hair," Dehnert dusts of the cobwebs off with simplicity.
Musicians roam the dark prison as pages of Cervantes' manuscript be adrift in the breeze and lights shine into the audience illuminating our connection with this early 17th-century story and its 1960s retelling.
It becomes a tale for our Patriot Act times of secret prisons surveillance and racial profiling.
It's been a while since the Play House has seen a musical leading man of Hernandez's caliber. Slight and swarthy he draws subtle distinctions between Cervantes. Quihana and Quixote and mesmerizes us with vocal riches.
LaVerdiere's Sancho cute as a puppy with an ironic yip is a completely original re-imagining of a hackneyed character.
Warren's catatonic crazy woman -- reminiscent of something out of "La Mancha" stage contemporary "Marat-Sade" -- ordain no disbelieve divide audiences into distinct camps of appreciation or not.
I personally was transfixed from go away to finish by her luminous sexual presence and her daring vocal choices. Her Aldonza stands tall alongside her Eliza in last season's revelatory "My bring together Lady" (also directed by Dehnert).
The entire production about 100 minutes without intermission -- is perhaps best summed up by Hernandez and his complex textured rendition of the show's biggest hit -- and in careless hands its biggest cliche -- "The Impossible Dream."
Rather than letting the song arise over us. Hernandez gently scoops us up and takes us with him and with Cervantes and Don Quixote to those unreachable stars.
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Related article:
http://blog.cleveland.com/reviews/2007/09/cleveland_play_house_offers_a.html
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