From Los Angeles Times - 5/11/07

'No Strings' at a tempo change
Scott Bakula leads a fine cast, but time has changed while this 1962 Richard Rodgers show stayed the same.

By F. Kathleen Foley, Special to The Times

Those familiar with Scott Bakula before he achieved wider renown in such television shows as "Quantum Leap" and "Star Trek: Enterprise" are well aware that he has his roots firmly in musical theater. In "No Strings," the vintage musical that features music and lyrics by Richard Rodgers and book by Samuel Taylor, Bakula gives heartening proof that his musical talents are undiminished. The congenial and smooth Bakula strikes real sparks with his beautiful costar, Sophina Brown, a powerhouse performer with a bright future.

In fact, the show's current revival, a Reprise production at UCLA's Freud Playhouse, is chock-full of capable pros who know their way around the footlights. Sadly, however, their efforts are mostly a hard sell in a poor market.

"Strings" is set in Paris, where Pulitzer-winning writer David Jordan (Bakula) meets and falls in love with gorgeous top model Barbara Woodruff (Brown). Both are Americans, but David is a white guy from coastal Maine, whereas Barbara is a black woman from uptown Manhattan — "way uptown." For David, years on the European party scene have sapped his ability to write. For Barbara, Paris has been a revelation of all life can offer. But when David decides to return to Maine to revive his stalled talent, he realizes that Barbara would be ostracized in his insular (read that "racist") hometown.

When first produced in 1962, the sheer novelty of an interracial love affair was obviously sufficient to buoy the show and its stars Diahann Carroll and Richard Kiley into a respectable run. Now Taylor's book seems merely quaint, especially a somewhat preposterous plot point about Barbara's relationship with wealthy Frenchman Louis dePourtal (Joseph Culliton). (As we are carefully informed, Barbara has never actually had sex with Louis, despite his ever-hopeful wheedling. No soiled dove, she.)

When coupled with Rodgers' score — which, with the exception of the lovely "The Sweetest Sounds" number, is notably undistinguished — the result is a bit syrupy and plodding. Oh, Bets Malone has some solid innings as Comfort O'Connell, a feisty rich girl from Tulsa, Okla., who is partying her way across the continent, while Ruth Williamson is bracingly acerbic as a fashion editor who has befriended Barbara. And when it comes to lush sounds, the onstage orchestra, under the sound guidance of musical director Gerald Sternbach, delivers.

However, choreographer Christine Kellogg's meager dance sequences seem more vestigial than crucial, while director Kay Cole's scattershot staging is hugely problematic, especially her work with the ensemble cast, which trundles on and off without motivation or finesse. The ensemble remains frozen in clumsily composed tableaux behind much of the action — a hyper-stylized device at sad odds with this otherwise small and modest tale.

Famed costume maven Bob Mackie and his co-designer Joe McFate bear some of the blame for the stylistic awkwardness. Despite some genuinely gorgeous gowns in the second act, the bulk of Mackie and McFate's first act costumes are so hideously garish, they are a constant distraction. We're used to all the feathers and furbelows in Mackie's oeuvre, but the ensemble's outlandish outfits draw focus away from the central actors, who might as well be performing in front of a zoo exhibit.

'No Strings'

Where: Freud Playhouse, UCLA, Westwood

When: 8 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays

Ends: May 20

Price: $70 and $75

Contact: (310) 825-2101

Running time: 2 hours, 20 minutes
 

Copyright © 2007 Los Angeles Times. All Rights Reserved.

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