By Les Spindle for Backstage West
NEVER GONNA DANCE

Recapturing the essence of a Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers film classic leaves formidable tap shoes to fill. Charismatic performers, glorious choreography, and sumptuous production values can go a long way in compensating for antiquated genre conventions. Director Larry Raben's classy exuberant West Coast premiere staging of this Broadway extravaganza, based on Swing Time (1936), renders Jeffrey Hatcher's silly book beside the point. Everywhere one looks, there is shimmering talent on display.

It's a close call as to whether the star billing belongs to two lead players (David Engel and Tami Tappan Damiano) at the top of their craft or to Lee Martino for her breathtaking dance numbers. Individually, Engel and Damiano have the charisma to hold an audience in the palms of their hands. Put them together, and the result is musical theatre alchemy. They sing and dance with consummate grace and polish and create likeable and engaging characters without much help from the script. The thin story follows Lucky (Engel), a vaudeville hoofer who comes to Manhattan to earn $25,000 to prove to his controlling future mother-in-law (Kim Van Biene) that he can make a living outside of show business. His conviction doesn't last long, as he enters a contest with a ballroom dance instructor, Penny (Damiano), and love blossoms between them.

Skillful performers lend formidable support. As Penny's close confidante, Harriet Harris is a comic delight with her droll line deliveries and bravura song-and-dance routines, highlighted by her high-flying shimmy number. She's exquisitely matched with Henry Polic II as a stockbroker-turned-street-bum, an unlikely pair made magically compatible in the number "A Fine Romance." Hilarious camp sensibility comes courtesy of John Moschitta Jr.'s flighty dance-studio manager. Ditto Joshua Finkel's loopy Latin Lothario and his backup singers, the Rome-Tones (Seth Belliston, Chip Abbott, and Aaron Pomeroy). As a competing dance couple, Danial Brown and Yvette Tucker are resplendent.

The patchwork score, with music by Jerome Kern, includes a handful of tunes from the movie, supplemented by other Kern songs created with a host of legendary lyricists, ranging from Oscar Hammerstein II to Ira Gershwin. Darryl Archibald's music direction eloquently serves this illustrious material. Design elements match the overall excellence: Joe Yakovetic's lush and amazing sets, Leigh Allen's dreamy lighting, and Thomas G. Marquez's stylish costumes. Thankfully Raben, Martino, and company throw the titular dictum out the window, allowing this delectable diversion to soar.

2/23/2006

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