The culmination of their saga involves two more songs that are well known, Fiona’s “From This Day On,” and Tommy’s “There But For You Go I,” both heart-stopping beauties, wisdom shining through tears, that stir anxiety in an audience at the climactic turning point. Fiona’s “Waitin’ for My Dearie” was the first number to sweeten the room, and “Almost Like Being in Love,” which Fiona and Tommy sang handsomely together while musing separately, made it clear they were two peas in a pod, mere centuries apart. Still, the magic of this show is its insistent fantasy, sustained early and late by the soaring vocals of the leading romantic couple. He functions as Tommy’s droll alter ego and would, were this story set in 2014, have lined up a Skype-shrink and sat him down, pronto, for a time-out among the thistles. The spellbound town’s a splendid circle of enchantment that ensnares us and Tommy, but its fabulous townsfolk with their big hearts and thrilling ceremonial dances fail to seduce the far more practical Jeff. But is “almost like being in love” the real thing? Or is it a siren call to his lost and injured soul, which seeks respite from a bone-wearying world he no longer feels part of? Tommy is instantly smitten by Fiona MacLaren ( Jennie Sophia). Tommy is only days away from a marriage back in New York that he already regrets and he’s soon drawn to a lovely old-fashioned girl who, unbeknownst to him, has just awakened, along with her entire town, from a second hundred years of sleep. In 1946, American war veteran Tommy Albright ( Kevin Earley) is hiking the Scottish highlands with his bachelor buddy Jeff Douglas ( Rod Thomas), a wise-cracking Sancho Panza to Tommy’s quixotic leanings.
Rockwell has correctly sensed that today’s information-weary, conflict-benumbed public might well sympathize with the romantic appeal of a quaint enchanted village, not seen on any map, which awakens from the sleep of each hundred years as if it were yesterday, and this production does indeed ring true in a way the 1954 MGM film musical never did. Allers ushered in all the great Lerner and Loewe musicals and conducted at the Metropolitan Opera, a master of good style in every musical genre. Conductor Roberta Duchak’s reduced orchestra delivered the goods with a spirit that would have put a smile on the lips of old Franz Allers, the original maestro.
It’s a summertime feast of song and a dance extravaganza, with a storybook allure that’s cleverly tweaked toward modern yearnings, as directed and choreographed by Rachel Rockwell. Three Chicago mainstage companies have each expertly revived a Broadway classic through a shrewd rethinking that paired careful respect for the original with sympathy for today’s audience and its contemporary state of mind in changing times.įollowing Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s heart-stopping “ Gypsy” and Lyric Opera’s gorgeous “ The Sound of Music” comes Lerner and Loewe’s 1947 “ Brigadoon,” which ran for 581 performances on Broadway and is now in resplendent bloom at the Goodman Theatre. In this briskly refreshing theater season, the Windy City has performed a hat trick on behalf of the American musical. Review: “Brigadoon,” by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, directed and choreographed by Rachel Rockwell, at Goodman Theatre through Aug.
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