Copyright 2001 by Edward Willett

Those people who don't like musicals (and amazingly enough there are such benighted people) sometimes complain that they're too "treacly" or "cloying" or "happy." Those people have never seen Chicago.

But they're going to have their chance, and so are you: Chicago is coming to the Centre of the Arts on July 5 & 6, as part of the Centre's Best of Broadway subscription series.

I've never had the pleasure of seeing it myself, but I've listened to the soundtrack on many a long drive, and I urge you to go--especially if you a musical like, say, The Sound of Music, sets your teeth on edge.

Chicago is not a new musical; in fact, it's more than a quarter of a century old at this point. It originally played on Broadway in 1975, with Gwen Verdon in the starring role; unfortunately, she fell ill soon after it opened, and Liza Minelli took over. It went on to run 898 performances, and although it failed to win any Tony Awards (although it was nominated for 11), that failure had more to do with the fact that 1975 was the year of A Chorus Line than any shortcomings in the show.

A revival opened on Broadway on November 14, 1996 and is still running. It originally starred Bebe Neuwirth (Frasier's wife on Cheers). A couple of years ago Chicago was playing in Toronto with, among other people, Alan Thicke (yes, Alan Thicke) in the cast--which was unfortunate from Regina Lyric Light Opera's point of view, which fully intended to stage Chicago itself, but wasn't able to get the amateur rights.

The focus of all this attention is a musical that has a lot of pointed comments to make about crime and celebrity in North America, ostensibly in the 1920s, when the story is set, but equally so, if not more so, in the 1970s, when the musical opened, and in the dawning years of the 21st century.

The setting is Chicago during the days of Prohibition. When Roxie Hart's lover leaves her, she shoots him, and encourages her weak husband to take the blame. He starts to, but then realizes that he knows the dead man, and so did his wife, and that she lied to him about the man being an intruder. Roxie goes to jail, where she meets a number of other murderesses, who, in a very funny number called "He Had it Coming," explain just exactly why they did what they did--and why they shouldn't be blamed for it (sample line: "So I said to him, 'If you snap that gum one more time...' And he did. So I took down the shotgun and a fired two warning shots...into his head.")

One of the murderesses is Velma Kelly, who killed her husband and her sister, her partner in an acrobatic Vaudeville act, when she returned to their hotel room after fetching some ice to find her the two of them performing an acrobatic act of their own. That had made her famous; now Roxie is even more famous, which Velma hates, especially when Roxie pretends to be pregnant to get out of jail.

But by the end of the musical, both of them have been set free, with the help of a slick lawyer (the part played by Alan Thicke in the Toronto production) and have formed a new Vaudeville act, parlaying the murders they committed into fame and fortune.

Even if you've never heard of Chicago, you may have heard some of the songs: "All That Jazz" and "Give 'Em the Old Razzle-Dazzle" are probably the best-known. The music is by John Kander and the lyrics by Fred Ebb (the same team behind Cabaret, another musical that no one could accuse of being saccharine), and the book by Ebb and Bob Fosse, who also choreographed the original production. The whole thing is staged as if it were a Vaudeville act, and the music reflects the musical styles of the 1920s.

The mixture of jazzy music, razor-sharp wit and biting social commentary is delicious, the dance numbers are reportedly spectacular, and you won't see a single singing nun (the closest thing to one is Little Mary Sunshine, the pollyannish reporter who takes the cover story laywer Billy Flynn comes up with for Roxie at face value, and if you look closely at her you'll see that "she" would never be welcomed in a convent).

But despite the fact that Chicago is a musical for people who don't like musicals, it's also a musical for people to do.

Like me.

Posted September 22, 2004