The Reprise Theater Company is currently presenting a superb production of Man of La Mancha. It's up at the Freud Playhouse at UCLA and it runs through March 1. Michael Michetti, who did such a good job staging their production of Li'l Abner last year, really outdid himself…and there are two especially interesting changes in the material.
One was to eliminate the overture. That sounds like a mistake since the overture is usually quite a treat…but without the overture, the orchestra doesn't start playing until Cervantes begins telling the story of Don Quixote. Therefore, all the music occurs more or less within his imagination and the effect is worth the sacrifice.
Then they changed some dialogue. Dale Wasserman, who wrote the book for the musical Man of La Mancha, had written it previously as a non-musical play for television called I, Don Quixote. With Mr. Wasserman's blessing, some lines from the TV play were interpolated into the Reprise production of the musical. (Mr. Wasserman literally gave his approval on his death bed. He passed away last December 21 at the age of 94.) It all worked. All of it.
Most of that was due to a superb cast. Brent Spiner is playing Cervantes and therefore Don Quixote. He's great in the part, just as he was great playing John Adams when I saw 1776 on Broadway a few years ago. What a shame that some people only think of this superb musical comedy talent as "that guy from Star Trek." Lee Wilkof is a great Sancho Panza…and I hear opera star Julia Migenes is wonderful as Dulcinea but we deliberately didn't see her.
Carolyn and I went to the matinee today and at matinees, Dulcinea is played to perfection by a lady named Valerie Perri. Let me tell you about Valerie Perri.
Thousands of years ago, when I was a story editor on Welcome Back, Kotter, the night receptionist — the lady who answered phones when we worked late — was Valerie Perri. She used to sing around the office and, ever-so-politely, invite us to see a little musical she was appearing in on weekends. I went and was blown away by her talent. (There was also another new performer in the show who was obviously star material — a then-unknown actress named Wendie Jo Sperber.)
When Valerie went on to better things, I was utterly unsurprised. Just a few years later, the biggest theatrical event in Los Angeles was a production of Evita that ran a long time at the Shubert Theater. They had a big star playing the title role at evening performances and this unknown named Valerie Perri playing the role at matinees. One of the local theater critics wrote a piece that said, approximately, "Hey, the lady playing Evita at matinees is better than the lady playing Evita in the evenings!" Before long, Valerie was the evening Evita in many other productions — Harold Prince personally cast her — and she went on to other roles and other plays. She now divides her life between raising handsome twin boys and performing in shows all around the country. You can find her schedule (and hear some of her singing) over on her website.
Aiding her in her great performance today was another friend of mine. Brad Ellis was the Musical Director of this production of Man of La Mancha. Everything sounded great and after, when I told Brad that, he said it was because Reprise splurged for a full orchestra, the same size the show had on Broadway, and it had "no garage band instruments." That means real horns, real violins, etc., and no synthesizers and such. That's probably one of the reasons the music was so magnificent but I also think Brad had a lot to do with that. Maybe one of these days, I'll post some audio here and let you listen to some of the songs we've written together. He's real good, too.
If you're in or around L.A. and want to catch Man of La Mancha before March 1, here's a link. I've raved enough.