theatre review COMPANY, the Film of the NY Philharmonic concert

In April 2011, the New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert production of Company.  With Neil Patrick Harris in the lead role of  Bobby, the Lonny Price directed concert was filmed and is now being shown for a few performances in movie theatres around the country.   The first performance was last night.  Check this link for future performances.

Christina Hendricks and Neil Patrick Harris

I didn't get a chance to see the concert live during one of the four sold out performances last April, and I had heard some very mixed reviews about the production, even in the NY Times, that mainly spoke about how under rehearsed the show was.  So, I was a little concerned with how the filmed version of the concert would be, fortunately the movie that I saw last night was of a completely polished production.  I do know that the Times saw the concert at the first of it's weekend long performances, so perhaps the cast pulled it together before they were filmed, or possibly the film used the best moments from the performances that were shot.  No matter what, the end result is of a great show with an almost perfect cast and if it was edited from several of the performances, it doesn't show it, instead coming across as a seamless film of the full show.  And, the concert presented the complete book of the show, not a truncated one, and even includes the second act dance sequence "Tick Tock" that has often been eliminated from recent productions of the show.

Patti LuPone making "The Ladies Who Lunch" her own.

The plot of the show focuses on the 35 year old single man Bobby who, unable to commit to marriage or even a relationship, reaccesses his life by looking at his relationships with his five married couples and his various girlfriends.   With a book by George Furth and a score by Stephen Sondheim, the musical features some hilarious vignettes with the married couples as well as such Sondheim gems as "The Ladies Who Lunch," "Being Alive," and "Another Hundred People."

The cast for this concert includes several knockouts including Katie Finneran as Amy the nervous bride, Martha Plimpton as Sarah, the wife who gets into verbal and physical assaults with her husband, even though she loves him dearly, Christina Hendricks as April, the ditsy flight attendant and Patti LuPone as Joanne, the older woman who's been married several times and has no problem commenting on the people she encounters until she realizes that she is just like all of the ladies she despises.   Company is a show that allows the female characters to shine more than the male ones, even in the dialogue scenes, so it is nice to see that Price has assembled a nice calibre of actresses to play these parts.

Katie Finneran as "Amy"

And while Company is a show that focuses on Bobby, and even though he is always on the stage, he is more of an observer of the situations he encounters with his married friends.   Harris manages to make Bobby multi layered with a range of personal understanding and growth as he witnesses the events that happen around him.  The fact that the filmed version of the concert allows for multiple close-ups makes this version a much more intimate one than seeing it "live" in the theatre, even if you are in one of the first few rows.  I think this is a huge advantage as I've seen many productions of this show before and this is really the first one where I think the scenes with the couples seemed to flow better and the various songs really got their points across, all due to the ability to really see the emotions displayed on each of the actor's faces.  Price directs the film of the concert with much clarity too, allowing him to focus on various points of the action that might be missed in a theatre, especially in the large Avery Fisher Hall at NY's Lincoln Center where the concerts took place.

Plimpton and Colbert

If this production and cast were on Broadway last year I'm sure that both Finneran and LuPone would have received Tony nominations, maybe even Plimpton and Hendricks as well.   They all nail their characters, their songs and I'm truly hoping this concert will be released on dvd so their performances will live on forever.

As far as the men in the cast, the addition of Jon Cryer and Stephen Colbert adds some familiar tv names, and they are both fine in their performances.  Colbert has more to sing than Cryer, but they both manage fine with the material.   Craig Bierko, Aaron Lazar and Jim Walton add some Broadway clot to the supporting male cast and while Bierko and Lazar are perfect in the small amount of material they have to deliver, Walton really stands out in both his featured parts in the songs he is included in as well as how he perfectly holds his own with LuPone as his wife in the final book scene.

The cast also includes Jill Paice and Jennifer Laura Thompson as two of the wives, and they are perfectly fine and comical with how they deliver the material.  Anika Noni Rose is one of the girlfriends who gets to sing "Another Hundred People" which is unfortunately only delivered in a servicable way, though she is very good with the dialogue scenes.  Chryssie Whitehead is the other girlfriend who gets some solo moments in the "Tick Tock" dance sequence, though unfortunately the choreography is minimal at best.   My only other complaint is that the lighting for the concert is done in such a way that the orchestra is always visible behind the actors even during the dialogue scenes.  This is somewhat dsictracting as with the many close-ups used in the film you not only get to see the emotions on the actor's faces but the members of the orchestra as well.  I wish Price had lite the concert in such a way that the lighting could be lowered on the orchestra during these moments as to not possibly distract from the material.

Paul Gemignani conducts the 35-piece Philharmonic orchestra, using the original orchestrations from the original Broadway production.    Get yourself to the movie theatre this weekend to catch one of the performances of this well directed and cast film of Company.

Christina Hendricks as April, Craig Bierko as Peter, Jill Paice as Susan, Jon Cryer as David, Jennifer Laura Thompson as Jenny, Jim Walton as Larry, Neil Patrick Harris as Bobby, Patti LuPone as Joanne, Stephen Colbert as Harry,  Martha Plimpton as Sarah, Aaron Lazar as Paul, Katie Finneran as Amy, Anika Noni Rose as Marta and Chryssie Whitehead as Kathy.

Highlights from the production -

The cast performing "Side by Side" -

LuPone singing "The Ladies Who Lunch" from the Sondheim 80th Birthday concert at the NY Philharmonic one year before she starred in the Company concert there -