Theater Review : It Sounds Like a ‘Beauty’ : Cast and Music Live Up to Disney Magic, but Sets and Special Effects Fall Short

Froufrou it may be at times, but “Disney’s Beauty and the Beast,” which opened Wednesday night at the Shubert Theatre, has a cast to die for and a smashing score. And Disney does not want you to forget who the producer is--the show always carries that cumbersome company brand in front of its title as well as in some of its theme-parkish effects and cheesy painted backdrops. But, make no mistake, “Beauty and the Beast” is at heart a Broadway musical, in the very best sense.

Disney may have lost Jeffrey Katzenberg, the man who first had the brilliant idea of hiring Alan Menken and Howard Ashman to write animated movie musicals. But Disney did something right here: It has delivered to Los Angeles virtually the entire, excellent Broadway cast. Susan Egan is a natural beauty as Belle, the book-loving heroine stuck in a small town. She exudes freshness and intimacy in a theater that is, frankly, too large. Egan’s Belle reminds you that no matter how cartoonish and even cliched the show may be, this is a story about a girl you can care about.

*

Composer Menken and lyricists Ashman (who died in 1991) and Tim Rice have sketched an endearing character in song. Menken and Ashman in particular were masters of the “I Want” number, a genre in musical comedy that binds you to its open-hearted singer by communicating his or her soaring dreams.

As stated in “Belle,” the show’s first song (after a prologue), the heroine’s dream is simple but sweeping--”I want much more than this provincial life,” she cries, as the townspeople swirl around her, busy with their humdrum everyday errands. Belle, the out-of-place intellectual, is untouched by any impulse toward superiority. Her creators have struck just the right note for her, and Egan never hits a false one.

As the Beast, Terrence Mann is as majestic as Simba and as sweet as Bert Lahr’s Cowardly Lion. (Having originated the role of Rum Tum Tugger in “Cats,” he has some experience acting under matted fur.) But his Simba side is not helped by some of the show’s effects. When the Beast is mad, for instance, his huge growl seems to be piped in from the direction of Anaheim.

Burke Moses turns in a real star performance as Gaston, the villain with the physique of a super-hero and the brain of a Medfly. His rich voice is terrific and his preening spectacular as he obliviously woos the apathetic Belle.

Gary Beach’s Lumiere, the droll human candelabra whose upheld arms are flaming wicks, is delightful. When he emcees the big act-one production number, “Be Our Guest,” he throws in a little Chevalier, a little Jolson, a little Gleason, and all of it is top-drawer.

That number, an homage to Busby Berkeley by way of Las Vegas, typifies this musical’s touching, sometimes overwrought, eagerness to please. On come the dancers in Ann Hould-Ward’s fanciful and witty costumes--sashaying and tumbling across the stage is a corkscrew, a dinner bell, salt and pepper shakers, a welcome mat, a set of glittering utensils and, the piece de resistance, a phalanx of chorines who descend a staircase made of stacked saucers, each one wearing a spinning plate for a tail feather and an adorable bonnet of stacked teacups.

The extravaganza is marred somewhat by set designer Stan Meyer’s questionable taste. “Be Our Guest” is encased in a three-tiered arch lined with upside-down hearts and lights; it overreaches, stretching fun into tacky. The physical production is in fact beleaguered throughout with painted backdrops that are resolutely amateurish and not fun to look at.

The Beast’s palace, for that matter, can’t hold a candle to the last mansion onstage at the Shubert--Norma Desmond’s much more solid-looking gilt drawing room from “Sunset Boulevard.” The Beast’s digs also feature another cheesy painted backdrop. It seems a little ungrateful to complain, but the show cost $12 million and should look better.

The same can be said for the special effects, which are absolutely theme-park solid, but without real theater finesse or artistry or beauty. The dancers who play scary forest wolves look as if they’ve wandered on from the set of “Cats” in costumes that have seen better days. Matt West’s choreography is serviceable but, except in spots, not terribly inventive.

Despite some of the disappointments of the physical production, director Robert Jess Roth must be credited for delivering a show that is as human as it is animated.

It must be said, not all of the score is great. As Belle’s father, Tom Bosley sings a real clunker, “No Matter What.” For the most part the songs written by Menken and Ashman are the jewels of the piece, with one notable exception.

“Home,” the Menken/Rice number that Belle sings when she is first locked up in the Beast’s palace, is a wonderful ballad of the heroine’s loneliness and personal fortitude. Faced with imprisonment, she rises above her gloom with the conclusion that, “Nothing lasts; nothing holds all of me.” The song is lovely.

At the close, in one of the show’s better effects, the Beast is levitated and becomes a man, or, rather, Terrence Mann. In this regard the show goes the film one better--thank God Belle doesn’t wind up with the young Fabio look-alike that the movie gave her. This Beauty deserves more than that and she gets it here. Now if only they’d repaint those backdrops. . . .

* “Disney’s Beauty and the Beast,” Shubert Theatre, 2020 Avenue of the Stars, Century City, Tuesday-Friday, 8 p.m., Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m., Sunday, 1 and 6:30 p.m. $25-$65. (800) 447-7400. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Terrence Mann: Beast

Susan Egan: Beauty

Jamie Torcellini: Lefou

Burke Moses: Gaston

Tom Bosley: Maurice

Fred Applegate: Cogsworth

Gary Beach: Lumiere

Heather Lee: Babette

Beth Fowler: Mrs. Potts

Mary Jo Catlett: Madame de la Grande Bouche

Jeremy Lelliott: Chip (Wed., Fri., Sat. mat., Sun. eve.)

Adam Wylie: Chip (Tues., Thurs., Sat. eve., Sun. mat.)

A Walt Disney production. Music by Alan Menken. Lyrics by Howard Ashman and Tim Rice. Book by Linda Woolverton. Directed by Robert Jess Roth. Sets by Stan Meyer. Costumes by Ann Hould-Ward. Lights by Natasha Katz. Illusions by Jim Steinmeyer and John Gaughan. Orchestrations by Danny Troob. Music direction by Jeff Halpern. Choreography by Matt West. Production stage manager Pamela J. Young.