Review: Jewish Arts Collaborative Brings Broadway to Natick with Seth Rudetsky & Judy Kuhn

Seth Rudetsky & Judy Kuhn: A Broadway Cabaret and Conversation

Presented by Jewish Arts Collaborative, Made possible with support from a MetroWest Strategic Grant from Combined Jewish Philanthropies, on Thursday, April 20, 2017, at The Center for Arts in Natick (TCAN), 14 Summer Street, Natick, MA; www.JArtsBoston.org, www.natickarts.org

Broadway came to Natick last night as the Jewish Arts Collaborative presented Seth Rudetsky & Judy Kuhn: A Broadway Cabaret and Conversation at The Center for Arts in Natick (TCAN). As promised by JCA Artistic Director Joey Baron in his introduction, the evening was fun (with a capital "F") as these two veterans of the Great White Way regaled the sold-out house with backstage stories, Rudetsky's masterful musicianship, and Kuhn's gorgeous vocalizing from her considerable musical theatre canon.

Rudetsky must be one of the busiest people in showbiz as he plies his numerous trades of pianist, actor, Playbill columnist, and radio host of Sirius/XM's On Broadway. With his husband James Wesley, he co-produces the online-streaming Concerts for America to benefit a broad range of non-profit organizations. In his spare time, he travels around the country doing master classes and programs like this with various Broadway artists. He appears as comfortable on stage schmoozing with the audience as he might be hosting a gathering in his own home. On this night, he was totally in his element performing for a group that skewed Jewish and was extremely knowledgeable about Broadway trivia.

Kuhn is a four-time Tony Award nominee with an impressive resumé of roles on Broadway, including the most recent revival of Fiddler on the Roof, the 2015 Best Musical Fun Home, Chess, Les Miserables, and the short-lived (but fondly remembered by this audience) Rags. She acknowledged that she is Jewish, but hastened to add that she is very secular. That being said, Kuhn shared the meet cute story of going on a blind date with her now-husband when she was in Boston for the pre-Broadway tryout of Rags in 1986. They were set up by a persistent friend, a Jewish mother sort of story for the ages, and the audience loved hearing it.

However, what the audience loved hearing the most was the playlist carefully curated by Rudetsky and Kuhn to connect with their hearts, minds, and funny bones. Foreshadowing what to expect from the next ninety minutes, they opened with Cy Coleman's "The Best is Yet to Come," followed by a lovely interpretation of "Hello, Young Lovers" from The King and I, a selection from Kuhn's cd "Rodgers, Rodgers & Guettel" (dedicated to the music of the three generations of Richard, Mary, and Adam). Shifting gears, she sang the sultry "Blame it on the Summer Night" from Rags, which she claims is the best score written by Joseph Stein (Fiddler), despite the fact that the show only ran for four performances on Broadway.

That disappointment allowed her to be available to play Cosette in Les Miserables, so things turned out okay. For the 10th Anniversary Concert, Kuhn took on the role of Fantine (playing her own mother, as it were) and shared with us her goosebumps-inducing rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream." After that highly-emotional delivery, Rudetsky brought it down a notch with the novelty tune "Sara Lee," and he was quick to point out it was written by a Jewish composing team, Kander & Ebb. Kuhn had a chance to show her comic chops in a Jule Styne/Frank Loesser song written for the 1942 movie Sweater Girl ("I Said No"), and was delightfully giddy singing about "Ice Cream" from her star turn in the 1993 revival of She Loves Me.

Giving Kuhn another breather, Rudetsky garnered raucous applause after playing George Gershwin's masterpiece, Rhapsody in Blue. Moments later, he joined Kuhn for the famous Tevye/Golde duet, "Do You Love Me?" (Fiddler on the Roof), and although her characterization ran circles around his, the guy can sing a little. The penultimate song was "The Colors of the Wind" from the animated Pocahontas (or, as Rudetsky called it, Kuhn's "Disney paycheck"), and the encore selection came from Fun Home. Kuhn noted that it was two years ago that they opened on Broadway and how special an experience it was for her. Although she played the character of the mother in the show, she chose to sing "Ring of Keys," Small Alison's song of awakening. As Kuhn said, everyone has had a ring of keys moment in life, and then she went on to show us exactly what that felt like for a ten-year old girl. Brava!

[The Jewish Arts Collaborative explores and presents the rich, diverse, and creative world of Jewish arts and culture-past, present, and future-to the widest possible audience, in venues across Greater Boston. Through a broad range of programming spanning the traditional to the innovative, we present the finest local, national, and international talent creating artistic work with a distinctive Jewish voice.]

Photo credit: Jordyn Rozensky Photography (Seth Rudetsky, Judy Kuhn)

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