No Tricks, Just Talent
unlikely property to adapt into a Broadway musical. A two-plus hour movie about
teen con man Frank Abagnale Jr., who successfully impersonated a Pan Am pilot,
a pediatrician and a lawyer, and stole over $2 million in check fraud before
the age of 19, the story has too many characters, too many locales to seem
appropriate for a musical. But never underestimate bookwriter Terrence McNally,
who has fashioned a razzle-dazzle show out of those potential negatives, aided
by director Jack O’Brien’s breezy direction, Jerry Mitchell’s usual sexy
choreography and a clever, winking set design from David Rockwell that allows
plenty of room for all of those locales.
McNally transforms the
cat-and-mouse tale of the movie, in which FBI agent Carl Hanratty zealously
tracks the impish Frank before finally capturing him, into an ersatz Dean
Martin variety show. Telling the story in a series of production numbers, with
Frank standing in for Dino (complete with his own Golddiggers), frees up both
McNally and O’Brien to keep the plot moving while allowing their cast of
Broadway pros to put to shame all those TV and movie stars encroaching on the
Broadway musical.
Foremost among those pros
are stars Aaron Tveit and Norbert Leo Butz, as Frank and Hanratty,
respectively, while the chorus is sprinkled with beloved hardworkers like
Rachelle Rak (in an all-too-brief turn as a former Playboy Playmate turned
hooker) and Linda Hart. To watch Tveit plant his feet and hit a soaring high
note on the penultimate song, “Good-Bye,” or Butz manage to simultaneously turn
in a stellar song-and-dance routine as the slovenly agent while realistically
staying in character is to show up the efforts of Daniel Radcliffe in How to Succeed in Business as just what
they are: efforts. There may be no real reason for workaholic Hanratty to
suddenly start singing, but if a star of Butz’s caliber is letting loose with
his moves and that voice, you’re not going to question the motivations behind
it for long.
While the show soars,
however, the score from Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman is little more than
workmanlike. You won’t find any new favorites here; the songs have the
perfect-pastiche feel of someone scanning through radio stations in the ’60s
without any of the memorable charm that turned those songs into classics. We
get everything from ring-a-ding-ding finger snappers to girl-group earnestness,
but nothing will stay in your head for very long—although the songs are highly
enjoyable while they’re being delivered by Tveit and Butz, and by Tom Wopat, in
gorgeous voice here as Frank Sr.
In the thankless role of
Frank’s fiancée Brenda, however, Kerry Butler overcompensates for her limited
stagetime by shamelessly oversinging her one solo, “Fly, Fly Away.” Butler,
best known for her starring turn in Xanadu,
is one of the more uncategorizable leading ladies working right now. But
although she’s pretty and blonde, she’s too weird, too slightly dazed for a
role as conventional as the sweet and nave Brenda, which turned a young Amy
Adams into Hollywood’s next big thing in the film. Her sincerity here feels
satirical, making Brenda seem more suited for the complex and lying Frank than
she should.
But this isn’t a show about
the women in Frank’s life; this is, first and foremost, an excuse to see two
stage actors having the time of their life (and, most likely, earning Tony
nominations). As such, in a season filled with workmanlike revivals and
disappointing star turns, catch Catch Me
If You Can while you can. Your faith in talent over name recognition will
be restored.
Catch Me If You Can
Open run, Neil Simon
Theatre, 250 W. 52nd St. (betw. B’way & 8th Ave.), 877-250-2929;
$69.75–$134.75.