STAGE REVIEW : Sanitized ‘Show Boat’ Still Steams Along

Few shows in the annals of the American musical have engendered as much excitement, as many unforgettable songs or as much scholarly debate as “Show Boat.” Since the original score and orchestrations were lost for more than 50 years, what is or is not an authentic piece of Jerome Kern’s and Oscar Hammerstein’s original 1927 Broadway musical has fueled contentious scrutiny.

What “Show Boat” is, is a brilliant hybrid, born on the cusp of the fading European operetta and heralding the emergence of the full-fledged American musical.

It dealt with unprecedented themes (discrimination and miscegenation) and required one of the earliest interracial casts. And it has triumphed over changes of the last six decades, buoyed by its elegance and the magnificence of its songs. What a collection: “Make-Believe,” “Ol’ Man River,” “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” “Bill,” “Why Do I Love You?”

The joys of this musical will endure well beyond the 1926 Edna Ferber novel on which it is based--and so, no doubt, will the disputes. How much you like Opera Pacific’s version of “Show Boat” at the Orange County Performing Arts Center will depend on how knowledgeable you are about the history of the 63-year-old show and how much authenticity matters.

This “Show Boat” is a well-sung, vigorous and attractive production, calculated to be untaxing (which should not equate with unmoving) entertainment. It has an undiminished supervaudevillian in Eddie Bracken as the show’s comic centerpiece, Cap’n Andy; a vocally powerful yet physically dainty Magnolia in Patti Cohenour; a glamorous, seductively understated Gay Ravenal in Ron Raines; a properly flinty Parthy Ann in tall Claudia Wilkens; an ample, open-throated Queenie in short Consuelo Hill; and a loose-as-a-goose, lively Frank Schultz, the buck and wing man, in Keith Savage.

Other choices are more equivocal. Lubitza Gregus’ hounded Julie has the restive darkness of a tormented woman, but not always the vulnerability that should go with it. Jeanette Palmer plays Ellie May as a dumb and giddy blonde, but forgets the serious subtext that makes her yearn to become a tragedian, even if she can’t hack it. The casting of Michel Warren Bell as Joe, however, is the thorniest. Bell can deliver a song and a half (“Ol’ Man River”), but he is too urbane and young to make us believe he’s been towing barges or lifting cotton, let alone “tired of livin’ and skeered of dyin’.”

This is where opera company stagings of musical theater hit their major snag: in the casting of accomplished singers who are less adept as actors. (The L.A. Opera “Oklahoma!” is a recent case in point.) Few here need body mikes, but all get them, often to wretchedly cavernous effect.

This “Show Boat” revival is based on director Michael Kahn’s 1982 Houston Grand Opera production and, under current director Mike Phillips, claims to be offering the “original full score.” Original, yes; full, no.

The orchestrations are lush and lilting, but several numbers and/or half numbers have been dropped, as well as some characters (Rubber Face, Old Sport, the faro dealer, who can’t be there since his scene is gone too).

Vanished is Gay Ravenal’s “Till Good Luck Comes My Way,” which firmly establishes him as a gamblin’ man, and parts of the opening sequence of Act II, which takes place at the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893. (That date is correct in the program, but shown as 1892 on Helen Pond’s and Herbert Senn’s set, originally designed for Houston Grand Opera. You’d think there would have been time to fix it.)

Gone too is the second-act scene in the lobby of Chicago’s Sherman House, where Parthy and Cap’n Andy have come in search of Magnolia and Gay--and where Cap’n Andy meets his three coquettes (two at Opera Pacific). Instead, we’re back on the top deck of the Cotton Blossom in a scene originally written for the 1936 “Show Boat” film. It gets us to the same place in the end, but not via the 1927 route.

More important than achieving the exact letter of the original, is not falsely claiming to do so--and working harder at achieving its spirit. This is 1990, after all, and some streamlining can make sense. What does not make sense is Opera Pacific’s bowdlerizing--as have countless other productions--of the word “nigger” from the lyrics of “Ol’ Man River” on the grounds that it is “insensitive” and has lost its “shock value.” The treatment of blacks in 1927 was not nice. Eschewing the word is truly offensive, since it sanitizes a version already too squeaky clean by the glossing over of the harsher aspects of black life--aspects that the 1927 show had the honesty and guts to explore.

At the Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa, Tuesday through Sunday, 8 p.m., with matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2. $17-$60; (714) 740-2000 or (213) 480-3232.

‘SHOWBOAT’

Opera Pacific’s revival of the 1927 musical by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II. Director Mike Phillips. Scenic designers Helen Pond, Herbert Senn. Lighting designer Duane Schuler. Costumes Molly Maginnis. Hair and makeup Elsen Associates. Sound Abe Jacob. Conductor Jim Coleman. Choreographer Mary Jane Houdina. Cast Consuelo Hill, Paul Grant, Don Alan Croll, Richard Overdorf, Claudia Wilkens, Eddie Bracken, Lubitza Gregus, Jeanette Palmer, Ron Raines, Mark Voland, Patti Cohenour, Michel Warren Bell, Keith Savage, R. E. Goodwin, David Mahler, Daniel Bridston.