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Review: Spot-on performances make Stage West's 'Oklahoma' a joy

 
Published Feb. 18, 2015

I suppose you have to have recently seen the profane musical The Book of Mormon, the eye-popping spectacle of The Phantom of the Opera or the for-their-time daring Full Monty or La Cage aux Folles to realize how much musical theater has changed since the heyday of Rodgers and Hammerstein's 1943 classic Oklahoma.

To be sure, Oklahoma was groundbreaking but in structure and form. Oklahoma took integration of music and plot giant leaps forward, with Hammerstein's lyrics advancing the plot as much as his dialogue, instead of the until-then traditional tacked-on feeling dominating (mostly forgettable) musical theater.

Still, to today's theatergoers, Oklahoma, with its straightforward, linear plot, lengthy scenes, squeaky-clean dialogue and just a hint of "forbidden" love, may seem a tad tedious, especially when its many-versed songs, reprises and a couple ho-hum dance sequences stretch its run time to a fanny-numbing three hours. (Some of that could be shortened by upping the tempos, especially in Act 1.)

Even so, Stage West Community Playhouse's production of this beloved classic is pure joy, thanks to charming performers and spot-on performances, several terrific laugh lines and those gorgeous songs — Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin', The Surrey With the Fringe on Top, People Will Say We're in Love and, of course, the high-energy title song, sung with gusto by the entire cast, accompanied by music director Carol Ballard's well-balanced seven-piece orchestra.

Whether by chance or by choice, director Dalton Benson's decision to cast the two main romantic couples with two married couples — a dependable Brian Beach and the vocally gifted Sharyn Beach as leads Curly McLain and Laurey Williams and impressively talented Stage West newcomers Richard Krasowski and Kathy Krasowski as the comically no-nonsense cowhand Will Parker and the flirtatious Ado Annie — make their romantic scenes unselfconsciously ardent.

A trio of featured performers are icing on the cake. Multi-HAMI winner Lynda Dilts-Benson creates an unforgettably hearty and hardy Aunt Eller, tough as nails and soft as a cream puff. Aunt Eller is decades ahead of her time when it comes to tolerance and understanding, but she fits in 1906 Oklahoma just fine, too.

Equally impressive are Douglas Doidge as Jud Fry, Aunt Eller and Laurey's farmhand, and Sam Petricone as the peddler/seducer Ali Hakim.

Jud is meant to be a menacing and dangerous villain, but Doidge's nuanced interpretation of him makes the character seem sympathetically vulnerable and sad at the same time. The character Ali Hakim seems to have been created to showcase Petricone's considerable talents.

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The sizable ensemble does impressive vocal work, with even the smallest speaking role right on cue.

Opening night was bedeviled by those squeaking microphones (please turn up Ado Annie's body mike) and a couple of missed spotlight cues. But the new cloth panels on the theater's side walls are a welcome addition. Lynda Dilts-Benson's set designs move the action right along, though that main curtain still swings shut too often, and some of the set trolleys seem unnecessarily overdone.

That said, Stage West's Oklahoma does what it was meant to do: entertain and delight with fine songs and rich characters. Although I always wonder, where are the Indians in the Indian Territory, and why aren't they a bit of concern for anyone?