Touring 'Chicago' a musical tailored to our times

What’s advertised at the beginning of “Chicago,” on stage at the Marcus Center through Sunday, is “a story of murder, greed, corruption, violence, exploitation, adultery and treachery — all those things we all hold near and dear to our hearts.”

Is it any wonder this great, prophetic piece by Bob Fosse, John Kander and Fred Ebb is now the longest running American musical in Broadway history? 

The older “Chicago” gets, the more accurately it describes the way we live now.  An indictment of our fatuous and amoral obsession with celebrity, “Chicago” plays us for what Velma calls us at the top of Act II: “suckers,” who would willingly trade our obscure lives for a bit of the onstage fame she and Roxie enjoy.  No matter how fleeting.  And no matter what we must do to get there.

What Roxie, Velma and the women performing a delicious “Cell Block Tango” do is plug the men whose real crime is failing to give them the attention they crave.  The enthusiastic opening night Marcus audience dutifully stepped into the breach, showing the love to this production’s two central heroines and the surrounding cast.

“Chicago” veterans Terra C. MacLeod and Dylis Croman look for that love in strikingly different ways.

As Velma, MacLeod — who can really dance — channels the corrosive cynicism at the heart of this show; from her opening rendition of “All That Jazz” to curtain, she’s snarky and hard-edged.  This Velma is also just a wee bit desperate, especially after Roxie steals the limelight. 

Croman plays pixie cute in her blithely narcissistic rendition of Roxie, who presents here as more entitled and less hungry, more aware of her own charm and less concerned that she’ll be reduced back to rube status on the morrow. 

That’s consistent with a production — offering plenty for a good time, while rarely achieving more — which isn’t nearly as edgy as this musical should be. 

The ensemble is competent, but it rarely cuts; Fosse’s trademark moves have rarely struck me as so stylized. The low-stakes, low-energy dancing in this production is pretty, but it delivers little of the abrasive, in-your-face aggression that can make “Chicago” so thrilling. 

Does it matter?   

What Fosse saw 40 years ago is even truer now: we’re easily dazzled even when we don’t get much razzle.  The Marcus audience was cheering for Eddie George as soon as he first appeared; wowed by the presence of a former NFL star, questions regarding whether George could sing and act became secondary (for the record, his singing is passable but he’s bland as an actor).

No wonder Roz Ryan’s alternately bored and sneering Mama Morton seems to be talking to us as well as her jailbirds when she promises to help them climb the ladder — while simultaneously singing “up yours.” 

“Chicago” continues through Sunday at the Marcus Center, 929 N. Water St.  For tickets, go online at marcuscenter.org.  Read more about this production at TapMilwaukee.com.

PRODUCTION NOTES

Frames: This touring production preserves the tradition of placing the “Chicago” orchestra – brassy and boss at Tuesday’s opening – at center stage, where it’s then surrounded by a frame of lights that’s then itself framed, as part of a scenic design underscoring how fully everything is a projected image.  In the world of Fosse, there is no there, there.  Everything is always already a performance.

Performing the Self: “We all have to put on to make it through the day,” Fosse said, one year before a massive heart attack felled him on a Washington street, ending his life even as his revival of “Sweet Charity” was opening.  That mantra is reflected in “Chicago,” which isn’t primarily about 1920s murderers, but about performers, who will kill to stay in an act and become celebrities. At which point they can mock the suckers who watch their routine and cheerfully buy their lies. 

The Politics of Performance: Is it any wonder, in this context, that the great Gwen Verdon once described “Chicago,” in which this onetime Fosse spouse starred as the original Roxie, as “Bob’s response to Watergate”?  “This show is my image of America right now,” Fosse said as “Chicago” prepared to open, less than one year after Nixon resigned. 

“Chicago” and “A Chorus Line”: What Fosse gave us in “Chicago” is less chronicle than prophecy: Its spot-on focus on the cult of personality better describes a phenomenon like Trump than someone like Nixon.  It’s partly because “Chicago” was so ahead of its time that it fared so poorly when it went up against “A Chorus Line” at Tony time in 1976.  Michael Bennett’s show was up for 12 Tony Awards; “Chicago” was up for 11.  “A Chorus Line” won nine.  “Chicago” didn’t win any. 

“A Chorus Line” has a big, sentimental heart; “Chicago” casts suspicion on the very idea of heart.  Despite its devastating close, “A Chorus Line” honors and channels the American Dream.  “Chicago” laughs at it.  “A Chorus Line” is nostalgic. In the song “Class” – rendered by MacLeod and Ryan with just the right balance between snark and sentiment on Tuesday night – “Chicago” mocks nostalgia. 

“ ‘A Chorus Line’ is a great concept for a musical,” Fosse once opined in an interview.  “But if you see it again, watch how much they sing and talk about dancing and how little they do.”  Fosse’s technical focus in offering this observation isn’t entirely fair to what Bennett made; “A Chorus Line” is a beautiful, moving tribute to all that dancers (and, by extension, all actors) sacrifice in pursuit of dreams that help them make sense of (and give from) themselves.  All the same, “Chicago” not only captures another side of theater artists and their profession, but also paints on a bigger canvas, while smartly joining hard-hitting Brechtian commentary with a cleverly conceived tribute to various vaudeville stars, including Texas Guinan (Velma), Helen Morgan (Roxie) and Sophie Tucker (Mama). 

Theater artists will always love “A Chorus Line” more, sometimes for the same self-referential, narcissistic reasons that “Chicago” ruthlessly skewers.  But while “A Chorus Line” is more original – “Chicago” owes a huge debt to “Cabaret” and “Follies” – I’d argue (and frequently have) that “Chicago” is the better show.

Amos and Us: Tuesday’s audience loved Paul Vogt as Amos Hart, Roxie’s hapless hubby.  Vogt fully earned the adulation, with a nuanced rendition of “Mister Cellophane” during which he somehow managed to be both invisible and, by song’s end, noticeably aggrieved. Invisible and angry: That’s sort of the way many of us feel, which may be among the reasons why Vogt’s portrait of this anonymous and ordinary everyman – so unlike the celebrities around him – was such a hit.  Amos speaks to the abiding sense most of us have that much as we’d like to be a Roxie or a Billy, we’re most likely to live and die as comparative nobodies, ignored by the larger-than-life somebodies who continually play us for the losers we keep getting told we are.  No wonder politicians like Donald Trump and Marine Le Pen are doing so well; they adeptly play a collective rage felt by people who rightly surmise they’ve been ignored.