Review - Shrek: Come Look At The Freaks

Wipe off the green makeup, bulldoze the castle and get rid of the tap-dancing rats- no, keep the tap-dancing rats - and Shrek, despite its fairy-tale setting and gentle lesson about embracing the qualities that make us different, reveals itself as just a good ol' musical comedy. And a darn enjoyable one at that. Of course, whether you find it sophomoric or smartass might depend on your reaction to fart jokes, anachronistic contemporary references and visual quotes from classic musicals, but director Jason Moore has his terrific cast performing their goofy antics with slick professionalism. Add some very humorous puppetry and bright, catchy tunes and you've got a fun night out.

For the few like me who haven't seen the movies nor read the book, the title character is a big green ogre who, in what may be the funniest child-abandonment scene in recent musical theatre history, is left to fend for himself by his parents at age seven. With others around him repulsed and frightened by his looks, Shrek has spent his adult life in solitude, living at a swamp on the outskirts of Castle Duloc. But when the evil Lord Farquaad, in an attempt to rid the monarchy of anyone who isn't perfectly attractive, banishes a gang of storybook characters (Pinocchio, The Gingerbread Man, Peter Pan, The Three Bears, et. al.) to the swamplands, Shrek agrees to rescue the beautiful Princess Fiona from the dragon-guarded tower she's been trapped in since childhood and bring her to be Farquaad's bride in exchange for having his new neighbors relocated. You know where this is heading, don't you?

Jeanine Tesori's music may not be the most complex of her Broadway offerings, but she gives us a spirited hodge-podge of light pop and traditional showtune and that works especially well with the breezy quirkiness coming from the pen of bookwriter/lyricist David Lindsay-Abaire. Their best work is a sharp spoof of Jimmy Dean's country-western hit "Big Bad John" that tells the story of Lord Farquaad's parentage and a rousing anthem for social outcasts where the fairy tale folk proudly proclaim, "Let your freak flag fly!" (Sadly, instead of using catchy tunes like "Big Bright Beautiful World" and "What's Up, Duloc?" for the audience's exit music, the decision was made to play "I'm A Believer," the Monkees hit that ended the first Shrek film.) As in his plays like Fuddy Meers and Kimberly Akimbo, Abaire's book (which I'm told borrows significantly from Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, Joe Stillman and Roger S.H. Schulman's original screenplay) draws affectionate laughs from the characters' oddball qualities.

Set, costume and puppet designer Tim Hatley dresses the production with the right mix of fairy-tale beauty and farcical edge, giving the actors well-detailed cartoon costumes that don't restrict their ability to perform. For example, Brian d'Arcy James may be engulfed in padding with his face augmented by fake jowls, a bulbous nose and a bald headpiece, but the actor's performance remains physically flexible and loveably expressive. Though d'Arcy James is an accomplished stage actor, it's still surprising how marvelously human a performance he can give, growing from a lonely creature satisfied with his solitude, to someone who has finally been the recipient of friendship and love and is ready to love in return. And Tesori gives him ample opportunity to show off his soaring leading man high baritone. Daniel Breaker takes on the standard "wacky sidekick" role as a character aptly named Donkey and counters d'Arcy James' stony Shrek with enjoyably goofy silliness. Their thick comic chemistry is somewhat reminiscent of Jackie Gleason and Art Carney.

As Princess Fiona, Sutton Foster makes dorkiness cool and delivers her best Broadway performance to date. Her cleverly conceived entrance begins with a little girl Fiona (Leah Greenhaus and Rachel Resheff alternate performances) optimistically singing of the future day when she'll be rescued from her tower. Teen Fiona (Marissa O'Donnell) sings the next refrain that starts hinting at the character's mounting impatience and by the time Foster comes on to finish the number, Fiona has grown into a neurotic hot mess, sick of promises of storybook endings. Her second act song and dance with an ensemble of woodland creatures (choreographed with corny gusto by Josh Prince) is thus far the daffiest, funniest bit of the current Broadway season.

Christopher Sieber is a flashy bundle of sneering arrogance as the evil Farquaad, a role that requires him to spend almost all his stage time on his knees to accommodate a costume that makes him appear to be a little person. Though it would be nice to see an actual little person play the role, Moore and Prince get some good laughs out of staging that takes advantage of the difference between the height of the actor and the height of the character. As Pinocchio, you might say John Tartaglia is the leader of the geek chorus of storybook characters (Shrek's chorus is the funniest collection of character acting singer/dancers in town), utilizing a voice that sounds a bit like Raul Esparza's Taboo take on Philip Sallon trying to imitate Miss Piggy. His physically wooden performance is just swell, as are his other appearances; first as a game show host styled Magic Mirror (accomplished by attaching computerized whatnots to his face backstage) and then as the puppeteer of a sweetly lovesick dragon.

Like its title character, Shrek is a little crude but never insincere in its rousing desire to entertain. Some of the show may seem recycled to the movie-going public, but it was fresh, lively fun to me.

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