By Bill Lockwood
Main Street Arts of Saxtons River, Vt., has selected the fascinating musical “Cabaret” as its big spring stage production at the Bellows Falls Opera House this year that will run March 13-15 and 19-21 at 7:30 p.m. with matinees March 14 and 21 at 2 p.m.
The 1966 Broadway musical features music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, and book by Joe Masteroff is based on a 1951 play “I Am a Camera’’ by John Van Drutehn, which itself was an adaptation of a 1939 novel “Goodbye to Berlin” by Christopher Isherwood. It is certainly a story that has endured the test of time and also inspired the 1971 film “Cabaret” starring Liza Minelli and Joel Grey, though only a few numbers from the Broadway score were used in the film. The original stage version has also gone through a number or revivals and revisions that have added and taken away quite a bit. Director David Stern, who is also the Main Street Arts artistic director, has chosen the 1998 stage version, feeling that the changes keep refining it. And in this version “they picked the best of everything,” according to Stern.
The story deals with the decadent world of 1931 Berlin between the two World Wars, and the rise of Fascism and the Nazis in Germany. Stern is no stranger to decadence or Berlin, having directed a very successful run of “Hedwig and the Angry Itch” for last summer’s Great River Theater Festival at Main Street Arts’ own theater in Saxtons River. That too was set in a sleazy club in Berlin, but that story is in a much later Cold War world of Communist Germany instead. Stern sees no connection in having picked both works to produce.
“These clubs flouted sexual convention, and were home to heterosexual, homosexual, and bi-sexual clientele,” said Stern about this ‘30s “Cabaret.” “These aspects were toned down in the original productions. Far less in the more recent, 1998 and after.”
Stern also noted in a Viewpoint article he wrote in the Brattleboro Commons on Feb. 12 that, “the decadent entertainment depicts the rise of the Third Reich as seen through the veil of a seedy nightclub… ‘Cabaret’ is perhaps the musical for this moment in U.S. history, when similar forces numb us into complacency and confusion while hate rises again.” This is not a show for children.
The story centers around the notorious Kit Kat Klub and star entertainer Sally Bowles, certainly a character your traditional mother would consider a “bad girl.” Other characters include her love interest, an American writer; the long suffering and very practical Fraulein Schneider, who runs a boarding house where some of the characters live; Herr Schultz, her Jewish suitor; Fraulein Kost, who has a penchant for sailors; and frequent visitor Ernst Ludwig, an opportunist and Nazi party supporter. Presiding over it all is the club’s ever-present, exciting, devious MC, who acts somewhat as narrator, played by Gavy Kessler.
“[My character] sets the tone of darkness that goes from sexy to scary,” Kessler said. “It’s definitely a dream role, and there have been two really iconic versions of it.”
Aiden Flower Des Jardins, who plays Sally Bowles, said, “I love Sally Bowles. She’s definitely ‘out there.’ If I’m doing my job right they’ll see me as a sympathetic character who is doing her best to find the life she wants. She is determined to find a glamorous life against all odds.”
Jeanie Levesque, who plays Fraulein Schneider, said, “It’s a pleasure to have a script in a musical where the characters are so well drawn. It’s a history lesson, a cautionary tale, and a story about broken relationships.” Jardins loves playing this conflicted character who must make a life-altering choice.
Costumes are designed by Sandy Klein and executed by a volunteer team of seamstresses and costumers. Klein said people went to the very liberal Weimer Germany because they could live their chosen lifestyle. She compares it to Bellows Falls, where she sees people of different lifestyles drawn together in the creative world.
“I consider the artist relationship between me, the designer and the actors themselves,” she said.
Klein looked at the dancers as all creative and each taking responsibility for their look. For example, Texas has the look of a cowgirl.
Morganna Ekkins, who plays Texas, said: “Every girl is poking fun at some kind of fantasy, and each has created her own fantasy.”
Eliza Kline, who plays Frenchie, said: “The attitude is what’s on the forefront for me, the sassy, the mean side of the character.”
Meredith Pelton, who plays Rosie, said: “I’m having a blast being in the show. I’m finding the Kit Kat Club dance routines the hardest I have ever had to do in a production.”
Annesa Hartman, one of the choreographers and one of the dancers herself, Fritzie, said: “The dancers show us the tension between individualism and collectivism… It made me realize how important the role of the dancers are in the show… not just eye candy… The movement is raw, uninhibited, deliberately awkward — all of which is far more challenging to pull off than a swanky, upbeat dance number.” These dancers are typical of the versatile cast Stern has assembled who are called on to act, sing, dance, move set pieces, and “do it all.”
Stern is using jackknife rooms, platforms that roll in and out, to create his signature seamless transitions between settings. True to Main Street Arts form the cast and large crew of “Cabaret” is again creating a technical extravaganza with lighting and moving stage parts that has earned them a regional reputation for excellence over the past few years. Tickets are on sale at Village Square Booksellers in Bellows Falls or through www.mainstreetarts.org or by calling (802) 869-2960.
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