Certainly was impressed by If You See Something, Say Something, Mike Daisey’s riveting monologue about visiting Los Alamos, New Mexico, where the atomic bomb had its out-of-town tryout on July 16, 1945. Fascinating to hear that after the government dropped the first and second bombs respectively on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it had no bombs left – but the Japanese didn’t know that, and had to surrender. However, once again, for my umpteenth visit to Joe’s Pub, I had a hard time seeing the stage. Who designed this place? Max Bialystock? I think so, for as I looked around, I noticed that this was indeed theater in the square, where almost nobody had a good seat. Add to that that waitpersons were always walking past, blocking my view, and the guy next to me shifting in his chair, hitting my foot with his, mumbling “Sorry” – at least for the first few times; after a while, he ceased to apologize, because he knew that I knew the set-up was impossible, and how many times can you say you’re sorry? Nevertheless, If You See Something, Say Something was so impressive that it was worth enduring the lack of theatrical amenities.

How odd to hear completely different lyrics for a song I’d known for some time as “Bounce.” But that’s the way Road Show begins, and I went along for the ride with Sondheim, Weidman, and Doyle. The story of Willy and Addison Mizner, two brothers who had a love-hate relationship, could have been sharper. The story threatens to go in an incestuous direction when Addison seems strangely eroticized during a night when he shares his bed with his brother, but this turns out to be the love that Weidman dare not even broach. Later, when Addison begins a romance with Hollis Bessemer – and Willy shows up to give advice on developing Boca Raton and Hollis sides with him – I expected something to be made of that triangle, with Addison’s feeling betrayed. That didn’t quite happen.

The score is pure Sondheim. Even the most casual theatergoer, if put in front of the show without virtue of advance word or program, would be able to identify its songwriter – except for “The Best Thing That Ever Happened,” an utterly beautiful song that has to be the most gorgeous exchange ever between two men on a New York stage. As for the lyrics, what a pleasure to hear intelligence and rhymes in the same score. Loved the lyric from one corrupt character: “Once I was a pro, but now I’m a con.”

Both Alexander Gemignani and Michael Cerveris had a wonderfully real, easy-going style, while the latter was unrecognizable from his 15-year career, and not just because he had a head of hair; he was so startlingly different that I still wouldn’t be surprised if I found that the ushers forgot to put in the understudy slips. Good for him for chameleoning himself into someone brand-new.

Lehman Engel always told his students to “Look for humor in dark places,” and he would have been pleased at the way Sondheim and Weidman treated the Mizners’ mother’s death. Road Show is another musical where applause is discouraged; often, a number ends and is immediately followed by a line of dialogue. Guess Sondheim feels he’s had enough applause in his life. He hasn’t received much for this project, but it’s an amiable enough show.

Speaking of Boca Raton, I went there to see the Caldwell Theatre Company’s brand-new playhouse and their inaugural attraction: Bock and Harnick’s She Loves Me. Amy Miller Brennan was charming and vulnerable as Amalia, while Laura Hoods was jaded but not too far gone as Ilona. And though David Kelley had to step in as Georg, his letter-perfect performance belied his understudy status. But what really impressed me was the statement on the playbill cover: 34th season. How does a local theater stay in business for that long? Okay, the new digs are called the Count de Hoernle Theatre, so some rich noble or his heirs picked up the tab – but what would prompt a royal to get financially involved? Quality. I’m guessing that a good deal of this has to do with Michael Hall, for his playbill bio says that he “co-founded Caldwell in 1975 and had remained its artistic director.” How many other artistic directors have had that long a reign? So one of the secrets of Caldwell’s success can be expressed in another Bock and Harnick song from another show: “Stability.”

What kid calls his mother “Mud”? What mother would allow it? How did it happen? Can it be short for “Muddah?” Jeff Hochhauser offers no explanation in My Vaudeville Man, his two-person musical at the York. Nevertheless, there’s Jack Donohue writing letters to “Mud” about his start and rise in vaudeville, while Mud constantly cautions him against drink and theater. (Constantly. Might make a good show for A.A. meetings.)

I complained that Billy Elliot was a too-familiar story about parents-vs.-kids in show biz, but at least that one has a miner’s strike that adds to the tension. “Don’t drink” and “Get a real job” are all we get here. Still, Traditional Show Music flows through composer Bob Johnston’s every vein, making for one of those scores that has you humming the number you just heard during the next scene where Mud and Jack argue about what they’ve been arguing about since the show began. Karen Murphy does what she can in playing this dishrag, but, oh, that Shonn Wiley as Jack. What a song ‘n’ dance man! Everyone connected with this show should bow down and kiss his feet – though I’m sure that each foot wouldn’t stop tapping long enough to give the grateful staff a chance.
Last week marked the 45th anniversary of my going to the Shubert in Boston to see the road company of Stop the World - I Want to Get Off. At that point, I didn’t know the show’s score - only the three songs that had become pop hits: “Gonna Build a Mountain,” “Once in a Lifetime,” and, of course, “What Kind of Fool Am I?” Loved the show, and told my parents that one of my Christmas presents could be the cast album. They obliged, and on Christmas morn, I listened – and immediately realized that I couldn’t have heard one song as originally written. For in, “All-American,” in which the bubble-headed Ginny Romaine tells about herself, she sang, “And I think that Mr. Eisenhower’s absolutely great” - at which point the orchestra conductor tapped his baton as a way of alerting her that she’d made a mistake. He then whispered some information to her, which prompted her to say, “Oh, really? When?” - before singing the same melody line with “And I think that Mr. Kennedy is absolutely great.” You see, five days before I’d seen the show, President Kennedy had been assassinated. Had I known the score in advance, I would have noticed what change was obviously made. Still wonder to this day what was substituted.

Finally, I spent one afternoon this past month attending a backers’ audition of Let My People Come, the erotic revue that, in the ‘70s, lasted quite some time at the Village Gate - and even braved Broadway. Producer Bob Blume is trying to mount a revival, which will be called Let My People Come ... Again. As in the original, there’s nudity - but what most fascinated me was a tattoo that one of the young women had to the left of her pubic hair: “No Day But Today.” Now this is what I’d call a Renthead – or a Rent-uhhhh, well, I’ll let you come up with the right term.

You may e-mail Peter at pfilichia@aol.com

Tony Janicki opted for “Betrayed” from The Producers. “It’s a tour de force that concisely relates the entire two-hour story that precedes it in about five very hilarious minutes -- including intermission.”

Val Addams cited “Been a Long Day" (How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying). “Almost anything from this show qualifies for the most clever musical moments ever, but this song at the elevator bank is a matchmaking gem stitching together three internal dialogues and ending with an elevator arriving on cue with a full load of passengers to sing the final bars. I don't think musical writing has gotten more clever than this in the forty-some years since.

Josh Ellis instead selected "I Believe In You" from the same show. “The love song sung to a mirror is Frank Loesser at his most clever,” he wrote. Actually, Josh, what I find to be cleverer is having the men shave with electric razors that provide the buzzing orchestration. This, of course, was parodied by Bruce Kimmel in The First Nudie Musical, in which he had vibrators supply the electronic orchestrations in the song many of our sons and daughters will choose as the First Dance at their weddings: “Dancing Dildos.”

Laura Frankos prefered "Famous Feet" (A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine). “The memorable people of Hollywood, from Mickey Mouse to Dracula -- but only from the knees down.” Bob Gutowksi mentioned a different part of the boyd (Well, in a manner of speaking): “When we met Tom Thumb in Barnum, and the chair he was supposedly standing behind -- like the Christmas tree in The Nutcracker -- grew and grew so that a normally-scaled actor coming out and standing in front of it would seem like a little person.”

Matthew Murray said, “The last 15 seconds of Act I of Dreamgirls. Peter, I know how much you really, really, really hate Effie White, but isn’t that exactly why this should have been at the top of your list? Because she’s getting her comeuppance at last for being so completely and utterly unsympathetic that not a single person on Earth could possibly think of even the tiniest reason to even like her just a little? She sings this huge song, the audience goes nuts, and—bang!—suddenly they’re cheering for the people who’ve ruined the life of this horrible woman who doesn’t have a single good thing about her. It doesn’t get cleverer than this, and I would hope even an anti-Effie-ite such as you would agree.”

“You're Nothing Without Me” (City of Angels) was the choice of many. In case you don’t know it, Laura Frankos will set it up for you: “We see the fictional detective Stone confront his creator, the writer Stine, and accuses him of selling out. But while Stone's points are valid (and Stine really knows it inside), Stine's still the man at the keyboard ...and he types the fateful words, "Fade out." Added Jason Flum, “Every time I listen to it I'm simply amazed at how clever those lyrics are. Not only is there not a single wasted word, but nearly every line seems to have a pun that is completely appropriate to the character who’s the writer and the character who’s the character.”

Ed Weissman mentioned “Please, Hello” (Pacific Overtures). “The national operetta pastiches are wonderful, especially the G&S for Britain; it actually outdazzles William S. Gilbert (I assume the model is “My Eyes are Fully Open” from Ruddigore.) But it is devilishly clever because operetta was actually a model for European colonialism. The genius behind this was Disraeli, the British prime minister extraordinaire who, for a time, to use J.S. Mill's phrase, turned the Conservatives into something other than the stupid party. Dizzy, as he was called, created grand events to mark occasions, and invented traditions along the way. He did this to create legitimacy for the British presence esp. in India. He was accused of creating operettas. He loved a good operetta. So this was art imitating life imitating art." Now we know!

Bert Fink said he thought a “non-musical moment” was the most clever moment in a Broadway musical -- “in the middle of the second act of Jeff Calhoun’s Big River (with DeafWest Theater’s non-hearing actors and Roundabout Theater Company’s hearing actors). Calhoun had the chorus perform a rousing gospel number, ‘Waitin’ For the Light to Shine,’ in all its roof-raising, hands-clapping, foot-stomping exuberance. Then, suddenly, for a few amazing seconds, he had them continuing full out – but in total silence. The stage was still bright, the faces still shining, the hands and arms a blur, but of sound there was none. This was an audience of hearing and non-hearing theatergoers alike, but for one awesome moment, they were all inside the same world.”

I said in the first column that I didn’t pick “Rose’s Turn” (to the consternation of many) because “clever” wouldn’t be the first word that came to my mind; “magnificent” and “astonishing” were among the two that came to mind. But that doesn’t excuse my overlooking three others from Gypsy. Doug Braverman mentioned, “You Gotta Get a Gimmick” – “the funniest song ever to appear in a Broadway musical, with some of Sondheim's wittiest lyrics – ‘You can sacrifice your sacro / Working in the back row’ -- but the concept itself is clever. Instead of showing burlesque as a world of glamorous stars disrobing (which will come later in Gypsy's big ‘Let Me Entertain You’ montage), our first glimpse of the world of burlesque in the show is three over-aged, over-ripe strippers singing about the need for a gimmick to be a star in a fairly sleazy venue. It's hysterical, true, and also rather sad, but certainly clever.”

Paul Roberts wrote, "I'm impressed by the double use of 'Let Me Entertain You" -- that it's a kiddie song the first times we hear it, but it sure grows up by the end of the show. Whenever a composer and lyricist can find a completely new use for a song they've introduced, I'm always impressed."

Amy Lynn Shapiro smartly centered on "The transition between the young/teenage June and Louise et al in Gypsy after 'Newsboys.' Seeing the kids in the same 'dull' costumes obviously years too young for them makes it embarrassingly obvious who is running the show."

A couple of other things before we close. Ryan Stotts offered "Farewell, Little Dream" (Lolita, My Love). “Through clever and nearly perfect lyrics, Humbert (John Neville) envisions the many, many ways he can kill Charlotte (Dorothy Loudon) - the only problem is she keeps springing back to life ... until she really IS hit by a car and he thinks it's all part of his fantasy. CLEVER! With so many folks writing in, I hope my pick of doesn't get knocked out because my show didn't open on Broadway.” Yes, Ryan, it IS ineligible for that very reason. Sorry to put you in the broken-promise land.

Michael Dale asked, “Will you accept one from Off-Broadway?” No, Michael, thanks anyway. Can you imagine how many more entries we’d have if I did? Off-Broadway, with its small Frankly Frank-sized revues – not to mention umpteen Forbidden Broadways – has always been the province of the clever, much more so than The Main Stem. It’s taken me forever to get through the many, many responses on Broadway cleverness and editing them into these three columns, so –

Wait a minute! It’s Thanksgiving weekend, and I’m not being very thankful to you all. God love you for writing in and expanding my worldview of musical theater.

You may e-mail Peter at pfilichia@aol.com