
Audra McDonald in Gypsy. Photo: Julieta Cervantes
When considering a classic like Gypsy, now being thrillingly revived at the Majestic Theatre on Broadway, it’s almost impossible to avoid discussing it in the context of its remarkable history. Since its 1959 opening starring the late, great Ethel Merman, it has been celebrated in five memorable Broadway revivals (plus one in London) each reinforcing its towering position in the canon of American musicals. But the current revival—a blessed collaboration between Arthur Laurents (book), Jule Styne (music), and a twenty-six-year-old Stephen Sondheim (lyrics)—elevates Gypsy to an even greater height, thanks to its remarkable leading lady, Audra McDonald, and her director, George C. Wolfe.
Inspired by the memoirs of stripper Gypsy Rose Lee, Gypsy tells the story of a pair of sisters (Louise and June) growing up in Seattle under the domination of their ferocious “stage mother,” Rose, who relentlessly drives them into show business at a tender age, whether they like it or not. Set in the 1920s and ’30s, it reflects a period of change, with the decline of vaudeville and the rise of burlesque, as the Depression takes its toll on everyone and everything. But the unstoppable Rose enlists an impressionable candy salesman (the lovable Herbie) to become the girls’ agent and tour them with a motley company of child performers all over the country. After years of frustration, the younger June (Rose’s favorite) escapes her mother’s domination by running off with Tulsa, one of the dancers. (The real-life June later became the actress June Havoc.) But Louise, the older, overlooked sister, remains submissive until Rose unknowingly books a venue that turns out to be a strip joint. There, Louise accidentally finds her own path to fame and finally frees herself from maternal bondage.
It takes a “showbiz” director with skill and flair to bring Gypsy to life—and George C. Wolfe (veteran director of Angels in America and winner of six Tony Awards) infuses this electrifying revival with style, speed, and pounding energy on Santo Loquasto’s fluid set, featuring a thrust stage that provides the performers with opportunities to shine (under the lighting by Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer). Wolfe has assembled a stellar cast, featuring Danny Burstein as the amiable, gullible Herbie; Jade Smith (in the performance I saw) as a dynamite Baby June, Jordan Tyson as an older June, and a supple Joy Woods as Louise, making a bravura transformation from awkward teenager to stunning stripper.
Still, as we all know, the show belongs to Rose. From the moment she enters down the aisle calling “Sing Out, Louise,” Audra McDonald owns and commands it. She follows in a long line of starry Roses—beginning in 1959 with Merman, for whose brassy, “big belting” vocal style the role was written. Angela Lansbury played Rose in the first revival in 1974. Next came Tyne Daly’s Rose in 1989, followed by Bernadette Peters’s in 2003. In 2008, at the age of 90, author Laurents directed Patti LuPone in the role.
In each of those revivals, critics were quick to praise the respective Roses and their distinctive interpretations, rather than comparing them to the incomparable original. But, like former New York Times critic Frank Rich, I had the great fortune of seeing Merman in the original production when I was a child—and, also like Rich, I fell in love with the theater for life. (Merman also sang in my parents’ living room—but that’s a story for another time.) So for me, Merman’s performance has always been definitive, though I’ve found much to admire in each subsequent Rose.
However, Audra McDonald’s performance is so powerful, so deep, so magnetic, that it inspired me to see Rose in a new light. She has always been described as the archetypal stage mother—ambitious, relentless, and overpowering, single-mindedly driving her offspring to perform and achieve, without caring about, or even seeing, the devastating effects of her aggression. But with McDonald’s interpretation, I wasn’t as concerned with the psychology of this complex mother who drives her children toward what she wants for herself: attention, recognition, fame, praise. McDonald plays all those complexities, and far more. She transcends the psychological by elevating her Rose to the level of the mythological. She’s a force—and I mean A Force, a larger-than-life protagonist endowed with a superpower.
That superpower is her voice. Unlike any of her predecessors, McDonald has a voice with the richness and magnitude of an opera singer, as well as control, range, and technique (remember her performances in The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess and Master Class on Broadway). Together with her superb powers of dramatic interpretation, she leads the show absolutely and triumphantly. She elevates it to soaring heights in “Everything’s Coming Up Roses,” the thrilling conclusion to Act I when she tells a stunned Louise that she is now The Star. She plunges the show to tragic depths at the end of Act II with the famous “Rose’s Turn,” as she realizes that she’s lost both her daughters and Herbie as well. “This time, for me!” she gasps, as her great voice crumbles with the recognition that she has always wanted the fame for herself—but will never achieve it.
The triumph of this current revival is the marriage of McDonald and her remarkable voice with Gypsy’s memorable score, considered one of the greatest in American theater history. With her in command, the musical soars. And what variety she offers! “Some People,” her powerful opening number, blows everyone off the stage. But then she shows a tender side, in numbers like “You’ll Never Get Away From Me” with Herbie, and a buoyant side in “Together, Wherever We Go” with Herbie and Louise.
Indeed, the entire score is a joy to hear (orchestrations by Sid Ramin and Robert Ginzler; additional arrangements by Andy Einhorn), from the smashing overture (with its famously flashy trumpets) to its heartbreaking conclusion. The exuberant young ensemble (choreographed by Camille A. Brown and colorfully costumed by Toni-Leslie James) provides delightful entertainment, as they morph from child performers to young adults, singing and dancing the same kitschy number that Rose directed over and over. A stand-out is Kevin Csolak as Tulsa, dancing his heart out in “All I Need Now Is the Girl.” And a trio of strippers (Lesli Margherita, Lili Thomas, and Mylinda Hull) brings the house down with the sensational “You Gotta Get a Gimmick.”
In the end, with her larger-than-life performance, McDonald shows us that what Rose is to musical theater, Medea and Phaedra are to the classics and Tosca and Aida are to opera. It’s no accident that the name of the theater where Gypsy is playing describes the role and McDonald in it: “majestic.”