Crazy For You

Reviewed by Holly Bartges

It isn’t possible to get any more Crazy For Boulder’s Dinner Theatre than I have been for eons. Show after show after show it gets more Broadway than Broadway can sometimes get.

Alicia Dunfee as Polly Baker and Scott Beyette and Bobby Child in Boulder’s Dinner Theatre production of Crazy for You.

Combine George/Ira Gershwin music with director/choreographer Michael J. Duran assisted by Alicia Dunfee, with Susan Stroman’s original choreography, and a magnificent highly-awesome talented cast along with the tap dancing extravaganza Crazy For You and the result is a winner par excellence.

Adapted from the 1930 Gershwin hit Girl Crazy, Crazy For You opened on Broadway at the Shubert Theatre in New York in 1992 winning two Tony’s for Best Musical and Best Choreography. In that stunning production was BDT’s very own executive director Duran. Little wonder why he would want to grace the BDT stage with its built-in ecstasy.

It is one thing to use Stroman’s original choreography, but it takes refined expert dancers to bring off the execution, and this cast does it providing open-mouth gasping reactions.

A.K. Klimpke rules the roost as Bela Zangler a know-it-all-wait-on-me-hand-and-foot producer of Zangler’s Broadway Theatre in 1930 New York. He’s a very important man and the first one to let you know with very little time for nonsense. Nonsense according to him comes his way when Bobby Child insistently gets in his face. A born to dance dancer, Bobby wants an audition so badly he can taste it. Scott Beyette takes those dancing feet of Bobby and makes them his own. Zangler tells Bobby to stay away from him with the sharp words “You could be unknown all over America.” KlimpkeÕs ability to sharpen the edges plays right into Zangler’s puffed up heart.

Bobby happens to be the son of a wealthy banking family, and Barb Reeves wonderfully brings Mother to life. Shelly Cox-Robie plays Bobby’s fiancée Irene Roth with demands, control and Mother’s approval. Cox-Robie gives her that wonderful demanding scratchy edge that flirts with bitchiness. The bank is closing on a theatre in Deadrock, Nevada and Mother insists Bobby take the papers to Deadrock. Horrified at his leaving, Irene demands he choose: “Me or Deadrock,” and Bobby flees to Nevada.

On a delightful ingenious set designed by Amy Campion, the flats turn themselves inside out with a little help from the crew, and the stage becomes a slow movin’ out west cowboy town where the residence just sort of hang around. With Wayne Kennedy on the guitar Mingo (Stephen Benton), Moose (Brian Jackson) and Sam (Duran plays him the first five weeks, then Stephen Bertles takes over) harmonize on “I’m Bidin’ My Time.”

Lank Hawkins (John Scott Clough), owner of the saloon, wants to buy the theatre owned by Polly Baker (Dunfee). The theatre hasn’t been used for several years, and Polly’s Father, Everett Baker, (Kennedy) takes great delight in reminding everyone frequently how wonderful her mother was on that stage.

When Bobby drags himself into town from exhaustion, he finds himself in the middle of the saloon in the midst of a gunfight that nearly gives him heart failure. It’s only a reenactment of gunfighters of the Old West. At the expense of Bobby’s heart, the scene execution is hysterical.

Bobby falls in love with Polly. Polly wants nothing to do with him, and he must not let her know he is connected with the bank.

To save the theatre the town comes up with the idea of putting on a show to pay off the loan.

Bobby decides to pose as Zangler, and Polly falls head over heels for the would-be Zangler. Having already sent for the New York girls, Bobby will see to it the Gaiety Theatre has a show to put on.

Teaching lazy left-footed cowboys to dance is hysterical when its Mingo, Moose and Sam attempting to move their feet other than in a cowboy swagger.

Moose handles the viola as though it was a guitar playing dumb cluck about the theatre, but Moose has a surprise for everyone, and Jackson grabs audience attention.

The comedic timing all the way through is magnificent on every level, in every way by everyone. Humor, romance, loneliness, and desperation dance side by side in this production. When the real Zangler shows up there is nothing but hilarity between Bobby as Zangler and Zangler as himself. The mirror piece as they sit across the table from each other both having taken the business end of a bottle to heart, is sheer classic comedy performed as only Klimpke and Beyette can do it. Masterful.

The songs are all familiar having been Gershwin hits for years: “Can’t Be Bothered Now,” “Shall We Dance,” “Slap That Bass,” “Embraceable You,” “They Can’t Take That Away From Me,” “Nice Work If You Can Get It,” and the one that will knock your socks off, roll them up, hand them back to you, and knock them off again with the cast tap dancing their heart out at the same time incorporating a variety of antics is “I Got Rhythm.” Closing Act I it swings the energy in the room around by the tail, generating enough energy to make the audience want to join them if they could close their mouths long enough.

Behind the powerful music, behind the set is the BDT Orchestra under the direction of Neal Dunfee, unsung heroes, but heroes they are. Heroes, and top of the line musicians who know how to play Gershwin with flair and style.

What happens when Irene and Mother arrive in Deadrock? What happens when Polly gushes over the real Zangler and he has no idea who she is? How does Bobby convince Polly the Zangler she loves is really him? What happens when the show fails? What happens when the show doesn’t fail? What happens when Reeves shows up as Patricia, writing a book on the old West? What happens when East meets West?

Mayhem, mishap, mistaken identity, lovesick souls, desperation, and determination dance their own dance throughout this magical musical with a cast of stars turning their characters inside out and sideways with detailed intent.

Luscious costumes and cowboy garb designed by Linda Morkin differentiate between 1930s New York, and dusty laid back Deadrock with flared style.

The smashing cast also includes Joanie Brosseau-Beyette, Christina Sullins, Cindy Lawrence, Lara Chamberlain, Teresa Cope, Matthew Peters, and Brain Norber and they deserve top-flight attention because of their over the top stunning performances.

Crazy For You is a magical marvel in disguise as a Broadway musical. But it’s more than that. It’s thoughtful, hilarious, with voices that fill the notes the way Gershwin intended and an orchestra that plays the notes from the inside out, with incredible actors who bow to their trade to perfection.

Don’t wait until the end of the run to make reservations. You’ll want to see it a second time to absorb the energy generated by this production. Musical theatre just doesn’t get any better than this production of Crazy For You.

It has been said that good reviews don’t sell tickets. Bad reviews do. If that’s the case, I’m in big trouble. I only have magnanimous splendiferous words that aren’t big enough to fill the tap dancing shoes surrounded with musical notes and honest hilarity of this production.

Just go and thank me later.