If there is a musical comedy masterpiece, it is Frank Loesser, Abe Burrows, and Jo Swerling's Guys and Dolls. Swerling and Burrows' book adapts Damon Runyon's stories of funny, flavorful lowlifes with wit and zest. Loesser's tasty lyrics and wonderful music are even better in the plot-oriented songs that have no life outside this show than the standard popular numbers, like "I'll Know When My Love Comes Along," "I've Never Been in Love Before," "I Love You A Bushel and a Peck," or "If I Were a Bell." Actors relish the roles they play to sing "Fugue for Tin Horns" (aka "I Got the Horse Right Here") or "A Person Could Develop A Cold," and the show-stopping "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat."
I think a bad version of Guys and Dolls would be a pleasure, so Stratford's top-of-the-line treatment is a delight. I did like Brian MacDonald's 1990 production at Stratford better. But the show is worth redoing, and Kelly Robinson shapes a winning revival with the help of Michael Lichtefeld's choreography, Berthold Carriere's always top-notch musical direction, Debra Hanson's playful designs, and with the same Sky Masterson.
Cynthia Dale is a revelation as Sarah Brown, the Salvation Army lass. Dale always sings gloriously and acts well, but here she turns out to be the funniest Sarah I've seen, and, of course, one of the most beautiful. Her drunk scene in Havana is a treat. Scott Wentworth has got slyer and craftier along with older, but is no less appealing as Sky and sings and dances "Luck, Be a Lady" well enough to dominate Robinson and Lichtefeld's show-stopping dance number.
Geordie Johnson is an oddly glamorous Nathan Detroit, but sells that gambler's "Sue Me" with raffish charm. As his long-suffering Adelaide, Sheila McCarthy has a fine time switching from flashy showgirl to neurotic with a nasal drip -- all caricature, and all right on the money.
Bruce Dow's amusing Nicely-Nicely Johnson is almost overpowered by his dazzling tenor singing. Douglas Chamberlain's dry Salvation Army veteran Arvide Abernathy rises with artful understatement to turn his fond "More I Cannot Wish You" into an art song. And a big cast of adorably raunchy characters brings the show to triumphant life. There's an almost religious fervor in their awed choral anthem to "The oldest established, permanent, floating crap game in New York."
