From: adolphso@mizar.usc.edu (adolphson)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.theatre
Subject: "Company" in concert
Date: 24 Jan 1993 16:30:51 -0800
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
NNTP-Posting-Host: mizar.usc.edu

The Long Beach Civic Light Opera's AIDS benefit concert
yesterday -- "Company" performed in concert by the original
cast (with the exception of the late Charles Braswell) -- has
to have been one of the most exciting nights I've ever spent
in the theater.  The concert was hosted by Angela Lansbury and
narrated by George Hearn, and when it was all over Stephen
Sondheim, Harold Prince, and George Furth were brought on
stage to say a few words.  That was all exciting enough, but
the concert!  It was an evening of highlights.  Everyone
without exception sang better last night than they had on the
original cast album.  

I don't know where to begin.  The first number to stop the
show was the opening number, "Company".  Although this wasn't
a staged performance, the cast endeavored to incorporate as
much of the original stage movement and business as possible.
When they first reached towards Robert in this first song, the
audience went wild.  "You Could Drive a Person Crazy" was the
next number to stop the show.  Although Susan Browning is
*much* too large these days to do much dancing, she gamely
joined Pamela Myers and Donna McKechnie.  They were superb. 
Dean Jones sang "Someone Is Waiting" with his curiously
affecting voice and received a huge ovation.  And that was
followed by Pamela Myers' "Another Hundred People".  Myers
sounds better now than ever before, and she's rethought the
song a bit and was absolutely devestating.  And then the end
of the first act, "Getting Married Today" was *brilliant*. 
Teri Ralston sounds like a dramatic soprano and was hilarious,
and I've *never* heard Beth Howland sing the song with this
rhythmic authority.  Fabulous.

The second act opened with an almost fully staged version
(complete with tap shoes, canes, and other props) of "Side by
Side by Side"/"What Would We Do Without You".  The audience
erupted one more.  The largest ovation of the evening -- and
one of the largest I've ever witnessed for *anyone* -- came
for Donna McKechnie's "Tick-Tock".  Although she didn't have
Boris Aronson's set to dance around, and although she isn't as
free in her dancing as she was 25 years ago, McKechnie was
absolutely dazzling.  After about 5 minutes of cheers from the
audience, Susan Browning and Dean Jones sang a haunting yet still
funny version of "Barcelona" that once again brought down the
house.  And then there was Stritch singing "The Ladies Who
Lunch".  I was worried that she would go overboard and do her
shtik, but she didn't.  It was a superbly acted -- and
superbly *sung* -- version of the song.  (Although she dropped
a beat near the end, the gifted conducter (John McDaniel)
managed, somehow, to get the orchestra -- and they used the
original orchestrations, by the way -- back into synch with
Stritch almost instantly.  And then there was Dean Jones'
"Being Alive".  No one else comes close to Jones on "Being
Alive", and his performance of it last night was electrifying. 
The Finale was encored twice, and then there were short
speeches, remembrances of Michael Bennett, Larry Kert, and
Fritz Holt, three men associated with "Company" who have died
of AIDS and to whom this performance was dedicated, and then
the curtain came down for the last time.

I'm sorry this event was left to Long Beach to put on, for if
it had been done in New York it would have been videotaped
and, no doubt, recorded.  But I don't imagine I'll soon forget
how fabulous it all was.

Arne