A Show For All Seasons

Falsettos opens JETs mainstage on a new note.

SUZANNE CHESSLER SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

T

he season opener of JET (Jewish
Ensemble Theatre) opens a new
production path for the profes-
sional stage company — a musi-
cal one.
Falsettos, a Tony Award-winning play
expressed in song rather than dialogue,
runs Sept. 3-Oct. 5 at the Maple-Drake
Jewish Community Center.
"This is not an operetta," said Nicholas
Calanni, who is directing the production.
"Just because it's all sung does not make
it operetta. It is more in the vein of mu-
sical comedy or musical drama. It's out of
the Sondheim tradition."
Falsettos is about Marvin, who has a
wife, a son preparing for his bar mitzvah
and a gay boyfriend.
"The characters are fascinating, and
the subject matter is contemporary and
something that needs to be said," said
Calanni. "I find the characters fascinat-
ing because they're honest. They get them-
selves into problems, but there's a real

depth, interest and intelligence to the ing to recordings of the score every day for
they would know what I was thinking con-
show. The more I work with it, the more several months.
cerning the sets, costumes and props."
I find in it, even though it's very furmy and
"After a while, I sat down and method-
Calanni, who had a New York casting
satirical.
ically decided what I wanted to do and how
"This is about new family values, and I was going to block it and choreograph agency for four years, believes that se-
it's a very moral show as far as I'm con- each scene," he said. "I wrote my ideas for lecting the right actor for each part is a di-
rector's most important responsibility.
cerned. It really is about finding family, the full production team so
Each cast member must
although in this case it's not a tra-
match the director's vision.
ditional family. The piece is very
Jeff Nahan, who found-
moving, funny and sad, and all the
ed the Actors' Alliance The-
buttons are pushed."
atre Company, was cast as
This will be the fifth play Calan-
Mendel, the psychiatrist.
,,,,Shit/ a Que en, Rebecca Richie's
ni has directed for JET. Two
"This play really has a
*comedy b aout h:rt
t ysome
others that also dealt with rela-
great sense of humor about
tionships were Sight Unseen and trying to find their "moorinp .' through
itself," he said. "It's almost
Torch Song Trilogy. Man in the the vicissitudes of life, (Nov. 2C-ILL:;.
farcical. The characters are
Glass Booth, which was JET's first 311
very intense, and that
production, and The Merchant had
= Sicles,Ronald Harwood's play
makes for great theater.
political themes.
about an American Army major try-
"I think music and
Calanni, who has directed 25 ing to nail Wilhelm Furtwangler, the
singing bring passion and
plays in all since earning his mas- German maestro conductor, as a Na zi
energy to the story," said
ter's degree in that field from collaborator. (Feb. 11-March 8)
Nahan, who has
Wayne State University, became
Director Nicholas
directed new play
familiar with Falsettos by listen- *77w Cemetery Club, Ivan Menchell's comedy about three
Calanni: Falsettos'
readings for JET.
widows and the possibilities for, romance in the autumn
characters are
"fascinating because "The audience
of their lives. (April
will hear music
they are honest."
22-May 24)
from all different
JET's Festival of styles, and that makes for more in-
New Plays runs terest."
May 27-June 28.
Nahan believes he has the best
For season ticket part in the play, his first acting ex-
information, call perience with JET. "Mendel gets to
be many different characters de-
(248) 788-2900.
pending on what other character has
his attention." O

The musical Falsettos is based on the play Falsettoland,
which completes William Finn and James Lapine's Mar-
vin Trilogy, three one-act chamber musicals about the ad-
ventures of a charming, spoiled, neurotic hero named
Marvin, who discovers that he is gay in the first of the tril-
ogy, In Trousers.
He leaves his wife and son for a male lover in the sec-
ond musical, March of the Falsettos, and facing the specter
of AIDS and the loss of his lover, finally grows up in Falset-
toland, the final part of the trilogy.
Frank Rich wrote in the New York Times about tak-
ing his two sons, ages 8 and 11, to see Falsettos.
"Falsettos offers such traditional family tableaux as a
Little League baseball game and a bar mitzvah. It is set
in an America where, as one song has it, "the rules keep
changing and 'families aren't what they were.'
"What did my boys take away from Falsettos? They liked
the acting, the story, the jokes and the music. But they also
responded to the show's family values."

8

,,,,,,

John Sartor, Brian Schulz, Milica Govich and, seated, Nicholas Cornfield rehearse forJET's production of Falsettos.

fi*Falsettos runs Sept. 3-Oct. 5 in the Aaron DeRoy The-
atre at the Maple-Drake Jewish Community Center.
Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday performances are at
7:30 p.m. Saturday performances are at 8 p.m., and Sun-
day matinees are at 2 p.m. For more information and tick-
ets, call (248) 788-2900.