Review Roundup: IN YOUR ARMS at the Old Globe Theatre

The Old Globe just opened its 2015-2016 Season with IN YOUR ARMS, a World Premiere dance-theatre musical featuring direction and choreography by Tony Award winner Christopher Gattelli (Newsies, Godspell, Lincoln Center Theater's The King and I and South Pacific) and original music by Tony Award winner Stephen Flaherty (Ragtime, Once on This Island; two-time Oscar nominee for Anastasia).

Co-conceived by Gattelli and Jennifer Manocherian, with lyrics by Flaherty's longtime collaborator, Tony and Emmy Award winner Lynn Ahrens, on the title song, IN YOUR ARMS features 10 dance vignettes written by an incredible and diverse lineup of theatre powerhouses, including Douglas Carter Beane, Nilo Cruz, Christopher Durang, Carrie Fisher, David Henry Hwang, Rajiv Joseph, Terrence McNally, Marsha Norman, Lynn Nottage, and Alfred Uhry. Among the full company, the stars can claim 18 Tony Awards, 4 Pulitzer Prizes, 6 Pulitzer finalist distinctions, 3 Emmy Awards, and 2 Academy Awards -- to list all their honors would take several pages.

Let's see what the critics had to say...

Bob Verini, Variety: At century's end, director-choreographer Susan Stroman and librettist John Weidman developed three stories-in-dance to preexisting recordings, and the resulting show,"Contact," glided away with Tony Awards. Now Christopher Gattelli ("Newsies") ups the ante by wangling romance scenarios from 10 luminaries, as well as a live original score by Stephen Flaherty, but future prospects don't seem nearly as stellar. The Old Globe's world premiere portmanteau "In Your Arms" proves a thin, patchy affair, yearning to soar while remaining doggedly earthbound.

Charles McNulty, LA Times: "In Your Arms" doesn't amount to significant drama or momentous dance. But as a hybrid of the two, it is a professional and polished work of commercial entertainment. Broadway no doubt beckons. Those who prefer their choreography more abstract and their theater less middlebrow will have to look elsewhere. But theatergoers of a romantic bent will have a hard time resisting this handsome theatrical gift set.

James Hebert, San Diego Union-Tribune: It's a surprise these scribes knew how to move at all, freighted as they are with prize hardware, including a couple of Pulitzers and numerous Tony Awards. But the playwrights, the show's similarly illustrious creative team and an ace cast of 22 have taken the concept and run (and waltzed, and tapped, and jitterbugged) with it. The result is a 105-minute, intermission-free piece that sweeps through a satisfying variety of styles and ideas. As disparate as the show's settings and emotional tones can be - a tense encounter in the African desert one moment, a cheeky burlesque on silent movies the next - Gattelli (a Tony-winner for "Newsies") and the company manage to transition among them with admirable deftness.

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