Mel Adroit

Its madcap mounting of Mel Brooks’ The Producers, now at the New York State Fairgrounds’ New Times Theater, is not just the biggest game in town, it’s the only
musical outside the college and touring companies between August and
December. To get this show on the boards there’s been a lot of kissing
and making up and burying of hatchets, so that elements of four rival
companies contribute to what we see. If Lightcap can get The Producers up and running, President Obama can expect to start receiving bouquets from Rush Limbaugh.

Given that The Producers is the
biggest Broadway musical of the decade and this is the first Syracuse
production of it, audiences enter the theater well-prepared for what
they’re going to see. In part that’s because Brooks’ original movie
version (1968) has been kicking around for 40 years, and we’re already
familiar with the outrageous premise and many of the gags. The
unexpected part of the show is that although it was written for the
screen, with lots of hard-to-mount scenes like the episode in the
pigeon roost, it now feels better-suited for the spontaneity and
split-second timing of live theater. Despite Brooks’ long career in
television and movies, his rooting is in now-extinct forms of
vaudeville and burlesque. Little wonder that the dismal Nathan
Lane-Matthew Broderick film version (2005) was such a failure. Anyone
with a still-active funny bone would rather see the Talent Company
edition.

Flop sweat: From left, Joe Spado, Ryan Boyle and Katie Lemos in the Talent Company’s The Producers.

Producer Lightcap and director Dan Tursi
made important decisions up front for this blowout show of the season.
Following Brooks’ dictum, “If you’ve got it, flaunt it,” when the
Little Old Ladies’ chorus comes out for their big number, “Along Came
Bialy,” they’re leaning on four-legged aluminum walkers. In the
courtroom scene the stenographer types on a genuine recorder. And note
Jeanette Reyner’s costumes for the showstopping “Springtime for
Hitler.” The mannequin’s heads sport those celebrations of Germanic
culture: the beer stein, the pretzel and the sausage.

Taking the leads are a reliable veteran
and a green newcomer. Joe Spado puts his own spin on the senior role of
Max Bialystock, shaking off any allusions to Zero Mostel or Nathan
Lane. Along with enjoying a better singing voice than either Mostel or
Lane, and flawless timing for the endless gags, Spado limns Max with an
unexpected pathos, revealing a vulnerable center under the brash
exterior. Despite his well-deserved SALT Award for The Full Monty he’s never been better.

Contrasting as a beetle-browed
accountant Leopold Bloom, Max’s opposite number, is Ryan Boyle, who
offstage is a cantor, soloist and choir section leader at DeWitt’s Holy
Cross Church. People who remember only the 1968 movie are surprised
that the Bloom of the musical has developed into a more complex
character. Boyle’s Leo is more neurotic than the Gene Wilder character,
but also more ambitious, as seen in his big first-act number, “I Wanna
Be a Producer.” In the second act Boyle’s Leo morphs into an
unexpectedly romantic character and then even more of a cutthroat than
his mentor Max. The newcomer glides over this arc with confidence.

Director Tursi cast himself as the
self-obsessed director Roger DeBris whom Max and Leo hire to destroy
what they hope will be the flop musical Springtime for Hitler. With
him is Tursi’s longtime colleague from the Rarely Done company, Jimmy
Wachter, as DeBris’ servant and sidekick Carman Ghia. In the past 10
years the American theater has not come up with two more over-the-top
roles, including the deranged family members of Tracey Letts’ August Osage County. Wachter’s
Carman is more physical, with the exaggerated flourishes of a male
Isadora Duncan. His hands get laughs. Dark-browed and thundering,
Tursi’s DeBris has some of the most bizarre lines in the show. He says
of Leo’s personal fragrance, “I’d love to bottle you up and shove you
into my armpits every morning.”

Breaking way, way out of type as buxom,
blonde Ulla is comely Katie Lemos, a veteran opera performer last seen
locally as the plaintive romantic lead in Appleseed Production’s The Spitfire Grill,
directed by her mother Sharee Lemos. This is a tougher role than
remembered, as Ulla has some of the most athletic dance numbers,
including the splits, and her facility with gags has to be equal to the
guys. A brunette offstage and a bit shorter than other Ullas, Lemos
holds some characterization in reserve for plot twists in the second
act. Maybe it takes a Scottish-Portuguese girl to make a funny Swede.

In a show with this much energy and
noise, no one is going to be a scene-stealer, but David Witanowski
exceeds expectations as the nutcase Nazi Franz Liebkind, playwright of
the world’s worst script. Witanowski, artistic director and eponym of
the Wit’s End Players company, often casts himself in unrewarding
character roles. Liebkind has some of the worst lines, and he’s the
scariest character in The Producers. Rising to the
challenge, Witanowski strikes sparks where every previous player has
fallen flat. Funny what good timing can do to a line like, “ . . . you
know who.”

In a second instance of casting modesty,
Talent Company producer Chris Lightcap shows up as the physically needy
senior-citizen backer of Max’s shows, Hold Me-Touch Me. Under her gray
curls and polka-dot granny dress, Hold Me craves to play intimate games
like, “The Virgin Milkmaid and the Well-Hung Stable Boy.” Lightcap’s
Hold Me pops up again in the middle of a furtive love scene, and as a
jury member in the courtroom scene.

Choreographer Michael Groesbeck delivers
managed chaos when DeBris takes over the lead in “Springtime” and
surprises with numbers neglected in other productions, like “Prisoners
of Love” in the second act. Nadine Cole’s musical direction makes
Brooks’ score sound like music of a better composer. Cindy Shippers’
lighting and Tony Vadala’s sound design enhance Stephen Beebe’s
light-footed set. And director Tursi plucks laughs from at least a
dozen supporting players in multiple roles, starting with Dorothy
Lennon as an obtrusive bag lady, Peter Irwin and Stephond Brunson.

When Mel Brooks rewrote The Producers
in 2001 he wanted a knock-your-eyes-out show that would bring people to
Broadway and could not be replicated in the provinces. The Talent
Company challenges that notion. Once again the phrase for this month
is, “Yes we can.”    

This production runs through Dec. 7. See Times Table for information.