Stuart Weitzman made Cinderella’s glass slippers! Talk about product placement!
“The Prince has beautiful balls,” enthuses one of the lavishly clad guests at the charmingly choreographed festivity in the current and fabulous production of Cinderella, now at the Broadway Theater. Unfortunately, the enthusiastic standing ovation audience only gets to see one of the Prince’s balls. There is also a princely banquet later on, but that’s offstage, possibly because this lavishly produced musical revival already has too many props to take care of.
Although there is more than just a hint of previous Richard Rodgers scores — think “Shall We Dance” (from The King & I) — Mark Brokaw’s scintillating staging of Cinderella is like a revival compendium of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s greatest hits. With production values to spare.
Who but multi-award winning costume designer William Ivey Long could have created so many dazzling ball gowns & richly royal apparel? Could any Broadway set designer other than Anna Louizos conjure up a forest that seems often on the move, with little animals popping out of holes where branches once were?
Laura Osnes is a lovely, compassionate Cinderella, with Victoria Clark an often airborne Fairy Godmother. Their instant transformations — from rags to riches — are astonishing, thanks to Long’s genius and some ingenious stagecraft.
Turning the pumpkin into a fairy coach is also an astonishment, as is the transformation of woodland animals and mice into coachmen and horses — who are wonderfully articulated by what seems to be bicycle-like pedal power.
[Many years ago, in a London Christmas Pantomime, the Fairy Godmother said, “Cinderella, run quickly to do my bidding! Bring me a pumpkin! I’m going to make you a Fairy Coach!” Cinderella, who seemed to be an East Ender, responded: “What’s ‘e goin’ to teach me?”]
Santino Fontana — who looks a bit like a Fairy Prince in his elegant costumes — is charming as the Prince, who learns to take an interest in his people, from which he previously has been dissuaded by his Regent Advisor, Sebastian (the wonderfully pompous Peter Bartlett).
In the end, even Cinderella’s two unkind Stepsisters & their doting mother turn out to be not so bad, after all.
Watching Josh Rhodes’ old-fashioned choreographies brought back wonderful memories of the good old days of Broadway musicals! So how about bringing back some of those Agnes de Mille choreographies for landmark Rodgers & Hammerstein musicals, the way the late Lee Theodore used to do with “The American Dance Machine.”
