Playbill – Let 'Em Eat Cake

Thursday Evening, November 21, 2019, at 7:00 Isaac Stern Auditorium / Ronald O. Perelman Stage presents 78th Concert Season Let ’Em Eat Cake Music by GEORGE GERSHWIN Lyrics by IRA GERSHWIN Book by GEORGE S. KAUFMAN and MORRIE RYSKIND Concert Script Adaptation by Laurence Maslon MasterVoices Orchestra of St. Luke’s Ted Sperling, Conductor and Director PLEASE SWITCH OFF YOUR CELL PHONES AND OTHER ELECTRONIC DEVICES. Andrew Palermo, Musical Staging Tracy Christensen, Costume Coordinator Maarten Cornelis, Lighting Designer Scott Lehrer, Sound Designer Gregory R. Covert, Stage Manager Bryce Pinkham John P. Wintergreen performance underwritten by Frank Skillern Mikaela Bennett Mary Wintergreen performance underwritten by Sarah Billinghurst Solomon David Pittu* Kruger performance underwritten by the Faith Geier Artist Initiative Kevin Chamberlin Alexander Throttlebottom performance underwritten by The Roger Rees Fund for Musical Theater Christopher Fitzgerald Narrator/Tweedledee performance underwritten by the Hargrove Pierce Foundation Fred Applegate Francis X. Gilhooley Bill Buell General Adam Snookfield, U.S.A. Chuck Cooper Matthew Arnold Fulton Lewis J. Stadlen Louis Lippman Stephen Eisdorfer Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Edsel Romero* Lieutenant Madelyn Miyashita Nursemaid Supreme Court Justices: Lowell Accola, Jan Constantine, Ron Lee Meyers, Ken Moore, Vivianne Potter, Robert P. Rainier, Lisa Rubin, Mark Spergel Diplomats: Colton Beach, Jose Guzman, Robert A. James, Bruce C. Johnson, John Patrick Sabatos, Mark Sullivan, Ronny Viggiani, Stephen Weber, Edward Yim Interpreters: Miriam Baron, Gerilyn Brewer, Nicole Coffaro, Mary Fan, Becca Hare, Joan B. Harris, Nina Hennessey, Paula Mermelstein, Jill Melanie Wirth Fashion Show Models: Jennifer Molly Bell, Lauren Tucker Cross, Lindsey Gaynor, Lauren Jiang, Samantha Kahn, Madelyn Miyashita Fashion show wardrobe courtesy of Rent the Runway. *Faith Geier Artists Tonight’s performance will be performed with a 15-minute intermission. Supertitles are provided by Digital Tech Services, and are underwritten by Susan L. Baker and Adèle K. Talty. Let ‘Em Eat Cake (Concert Version) is presented through special arrangement with Music Theatre International (MTI). All authorized performance materials are also supplied by MTI. www.mtishows.com This performance is funded in part by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation; The Geier Foundation; the Ira and Leonore Gershwin Philanthropic Fund; the Hargrove Pierce Foundation; and The Roger Rees Fund for Musical Theater, as well as: Let ’Em Eat Cake ACT I Overture Tweedledee for President (Ensemble) The Supreme Court (Supreme Court) Union Square (Kruger and Ensemble) Comes the Revolution (Throttlebottom and Ensemble) Mine (Wintergreen, Mary and Ensemble) On and On and On (Ensemble) Finale Act I: I’ve Brushed My Teeth (Lieutenant, General Snookfield) On and On and On (reprise) All the Mothers of the Nation (Mary and Women of the Ensemble) Let ‘Em Eat Cake (Wintergreen and company) Intermission ACT II Opening Act II: Blue, Blue, Blue (Wintergreen and Ensemble) The League of Nations (Mary, Wintergreen, Kruger, Diplomats, Interpreters, Army) Up and At ’Em (Supreme Court and Ensemble) The Trial of Throttlebottom (Company) The Trial of Wintergreen (Company) Hanging Throttlebottom in the Morning (Lieutenant and Ensemble) Finale Ultimo (Entire Company) Notes ON THE PROGRAM 1933 was not a good year. In the recognized. During the run of Of Thee depths of the Great Depression, one I Sing, Throttlebottom had become so out of every four adults was out of beloved by the public that his name work. A series of vast dust storms entered the language as a synonym for devastated the heartland of the United a harmless incompetent in public office. States. In Germany, Adolf Hitler became Chancellor. (On the plus side, Wintergreen and his confederates are Prohibition was finally repealed.) voted out of office in favor of John P. Tweedledee. After the Supreme Court Against this dark background, the refuses to throw out the election results, creators of the Pulitzer prize-win- the politicians open a shop selling blue ning musical Of Thee I Sing—George shirts designed by Mary Wintergreen. Gershwin, music; Ira Gershwin, lyrics; When the business fails, they decide and George S. Kaufman and Morrie to start a revolution. The one thing Ryskind, book—decided to write a they have a lot of is blue shirts, and sequel. The original show had sati- Wintergreen explains, “You can’t have rized the American political system, a revolution without shirts.” (In 1933, telling the story of John P. Wintergreen, it was not yet clear how terribly unfun- who runs for president of the United ny the brownshirts of Germany and States—and wins—on a platform of the blackshirts of Italy would prove to Love, promising to marry the winner be.) With the help of the army (who of a national beauty contest. Although has been bribed by being offered the it contained some biting and cyni- war debt), Wintergreen seizes President cal satire, the show had maintained a Tweedledee and declares a dictator- lighthearted mood. Let ’Em Eat Cake, ship of the proletariat. He is in turn mirroring the year of its birth, would deposed by the radical rabble-rouser prove to be much darker and more Kruger. Before the end of the eve- problematic. Like its predecessor, it sat- ning, the audience will see the Supreme irized politics and the Supreme Court. Court in chains, most of the main To this it added commentary on the characters condemned to be executed, army, Fascists, radicals, the League Throttlebottom with his head in the of Nations, businessmen, fashion, and guillotine, and the military threatening even baseball. to take control of the country. Let ’Em Eat Cake featured many ele- Musically, the show was very ambi- ments that were familiar to audiences tious. As he would in his next score, from the earlier musical. It reprised Porgy and Bess, George Gershwin was “Wintergreen for President,” “Of Thee aiming at a creation which used the I Sing,” and the theme song of the language of Broadway but the formal Supreme Court. And many charac- complexity and structure of an opera. ters returned, reenacted by the same Music and dialogue were integrat- actors who had starred in Of Thee I ed, and the music carried the action. Sing—President and Mrs. Wintergreen, He drew on wide-ranging influences the Supreme Court, and especially including Handel, Schubert, Gilbert Alexander Throttlebottom, the hap- and Sullivan, military marches, Yiddish less vice president whom no one ever music, and the blues. The opening number was a reprise of “Wintergreen and mirthless, and considerably less for President” from the earlier musical. amusing. It is not the hearty, guffaw- This song already had incorporated ing burlesque that began the legend.” “Tammany,” The Sidewalks of New Beyond the dark subject matter, there York” and “A Hot Time in the Old were several complaints. There was no Town.” Tweedledee’s campaign song love interest. The second act was staged made use of “Dixie,” “The Battle Hymn entirely in shades of blue—and while of the Republic,” “Hail Columbia,” this elegantly reflected the plot, it was and “Over There,” as well. And these tedious to look at. two complex songs were juxtaposed against each other in counterpoint. The main problem, however, was the sophistication of the music. Reviewers Of Thee I Sing had already featured didn’t quite know what to make of it. an unusual amount of counterpoint, “For all I know,” said the critic John but Let ’Em Eat Cake took this much Anderson, the music “may be great further. Gershwin said, “I’ve written stuff, but you can’t wet a whistle with most of the music for this show contra- it, or take it out for dancing in the puntally, and it is that very insistence streets.” The Catholic World suggested on the sharpness of a form that gives that the musical would be more appro- my music the acid touch it has—which priately reviewed by a music critic rath- paints the words of the lyrics, and is in er than someone from the drama desk. keeping with the satire of the piece.” Explaining his reliance on counter- After ninety performances, Let ’Em Eat point by turning to its greatest creator, Cake closed, and it was never revived. he added, “I feel that Bach will still Only one piece, the love song “Mine,” live when everyone later than Bach earned a place outside the show; it was has been centuries forgotten—because recorded by Judy Garland and Bing there is the logic and the wit and the Crosby. (This song derived from an solidity of scientific form in everything exercise Gershwin had written when he wrote.” he was taking lessons in counterpoint.) For years much of the music and book When the show opened out of town in were believed to be lost, although there Boston, it was one of the year’s hottest were a few attempts at reconstruction, tickets: a pair of opening night tick- but in 1978 the composer’s handwritten ets sold for the huge sum of $17.50. notes were discovered in the Library An estimated two hundred audience of Congress. From this, the Broadway members came up from New York for scholar John McGlinn reconstructed a the occasion. Reviews were warm. The detailed vocal score, which was then Traveler called it “a brilliant successor orchestrated by Russell Warner, draw- to its famous predecessor,” and added ing on the memories of people who had “the smart audience ate every crumb been involved in the original production. with enthusiastic relish.” Conductor Michael Tilson Thomas It opened in New York on Oct 21, became an advocate of the work, which 1933. The New York reviews were he conducted in a concert performance more mixed. New York Times critic in 1987 at the Brooklyn Academy. Brooks Atkinson praised it as, “a wild, “Let ’Em Eat Cake has operatic dimen- taut, witty, pessimistic bludgeoning of sions,” he said.

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