BWW Commentary: With Return of His RUSSIANS Show As a Greatest Hit and Going CRAZY On New PBS Series, MARK NADLER is Making Cabaret History His Way

What Was I Thinking?
Commentary About Cabaret by Peter Napolitano

Editor's Note: This is the first in a series of bimonthly columns (more or less) by award-winning writer/director/producer Peter Napolitano. He will not be reviewing the shows he sees, but, rather, discussing them and the artists involved with a wider lens and a personal perspective.

This week, Mark Nadler made his solo television debut on WNET (New York/13) and WLIW (Long Island/21) in the latest installment of the new Public Television series 66th & Broadway (photo below). My friends, in the contemporary cabaret world, this is a BIG DEAL. Let's face it: When 100 people show up to a show on the same night it is an event, so the possibility of thousands (or--dare we dream--millions) of people watching Mr. Nadler perform in the comfort of their homes is beyond exciting. It is Cabaret Nirvana, Shangri-La, and Xanadu combined, the kind of exposure a cabaret artist dreams about but rarely receives. Two other performers had that dream realized earlier this year when both KT Sullivan and Jennifer Sheehan launched the Series and enjoyed the pleasure of their shows being rebroadcast this week, too. If 66th & Broadway succeeds and PBS continues to produce full hour-long shows the benefits for cabaret as an entertainment art form in general-and the featured performers in particular--seem obvious.

Far more fortunate will be a potential new cabaret audience, people who will watch these shows and hear this kind of music for the first time. Young people who watch and enjoy Nadler's show will be changed by the experience. Yes, I truly believe that. Why? Because when I was a child in the 1960s, I remember having only seven TV channels to choose from. One day, I happened upon Channel 13 and watched an hour of Kurt Weill songs sung by Georgia Brown. It was the first time I saw what a solo performer could achieve singing a dozen or so classic songs and with an uninterrupted hour during which to sing them. I won't forget that moment. And I am willing to bet there will be many young people who will feel the same way after seeing Mark Nadler perform.

It was just a month or so ago that I saw Nadler in a solo show for the first time, even though he's been on the New York cabaret scene since the 1980s. I had seen him perform in variety/group shows at events such as the New York Cabaret Convention and the now Feinstein's/54 Below. Nadler is very effective in those situations, but to truly receive and appreciate what this gifted artist has to offer, one must see him in a complete solo show. Nadler doesn't just sing songs with panache or crack outrageous jokes that land or play the piano with dynamo energy, although he does all those things and his talents are fully on display in a two-song set.

What you get from Nadler in a solo show, though, is history; his history and ours and of the songs he sings and the people he mentions along the way. His performing style is intimate yet still theatrical, intricate yet simple, over-the-top yet subtle and, frankly, I can't quite figure out how he does it. But he does. And he's been doing it for years.

The Nadler show I saw in late August at the Metropolitan Room, Tchaikovsky (and Other Russians) was produced by Stephen Hanks' Cabaret Life Productions as the first in a series called New York Cabaret's Greatest Hits. The premise of Nadler's show (that he first introduced to rave reviews in 2003) is to take the long, tongue-twisting list of Russian composers in the Ira Gershwin lyric of the same name that Kurt Weill (remember him?) set to music for the landmark 1941 musical Lady in the Dark. Nadler proceeds to tell us everything about every single one of them. Each time he's done with a mini-biography of a composer, he literally throws the sheet music he's discussing over his shoulder behind the piano.

Before long, Nadler is surrounded by the work he has just been celebrating and/or denigrating. A less imaginative artist might have taken this premise too literally and simply rearranged the music of these men or featured pop versions of their tunes. Not Mark Nadler. He uses songs as varied as Frank Loesser's "The Ugly Duckling" from the film Hans Christian Anderson, Adam Guettel's "Icarus" and Cole Porter's "I Concentrate On You" to illustrate the side stories he encounters and the personal connections that arise from them. By show's end, Nadler hits the points he has been making all along; that fame is fleeting, that these funny-sounding names may be forgotten now but they are a part of the cultural continuum, part of our history, and that history must be preserved and shared and celebrated. How fitting that this was the show Hanks chose to open his series, which intends to bring back outstanding work from cabaret's own history for new audiences to enjoy.

The show Nadler is presenting in the PBS Series, Crazy 1961, features the hit songs of the year the performer was born, with his same imaginative Tchaikovsky approach to cabaret. If you can't catch his act on TV, Nadler will be performing live in New York at Cafe Noctambulo at Pangea on Saturday nights in October. Who knows what surprises are in store for his audiences. I'm certainly looking forward to finding out and to seeing the future shows in the New York Cabaret's Greatest Hits series (see info below). Here's to the history they will share and the contributions they will make for the future of cabaret.

And that's what I was thinking.

For future broadcast dates and streaming information on Mark Nadler in Crazy 1961 and the other episodes of 66th & Broadway, visit www.thirteen.org or www.wliw.org. For information on seeing Mark Nadler Live! at Cafe Noctambulo at Pangea (at 178 2nd Ave.) on Saturday nights in October, visit www.cafenoctabulo.com or call 212-995-0900. The next show in New York Cabaret's Greatest Hits, Maxine Linehan's What Would Petula Do? A Tribute to Petula Clark will be at the Metropolitan Room on November 2 at 7 pm. Visit www.metropolitanroom.com or call 212-206-0440 for reservations.

Napolitano illustration by Hector Coris
Top Nadler photo courtesy of PBS
Bottom Nadler photo by Lou Montesano/Still Rock Photography

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