Review: Jean Louisa Kelly Masters The Art Of Cabaret With ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN at The Laurie Beechman Theatre

Film and television actress Jean Louisa Kelly has finally made her way to the cabaret and concert stage of New York City. Yes, that is a statement that seems hardly possible. Surely the woman who made her Broadway debut in the original company of the original Into the Woods, the actress that was so memorable singing in the film Mr. Holland's Opus, the girl who played The Girl in the feature film adaptation of The Fantasticks has done a cabaret show, in all this time. No. It would appear not. Jean Louisa Kelly made her Manhattan solo show debut on Saturday night, January 21st, at the Laurie Beechman Theatre. And it's about time, too.

ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN is Ms. Kelly's memoir musical cabaret, charting not only her life as an actress but her life as a woman, a wife, a mother, a warrior, a champion. In her immaculately crafted script, Kelly managed to tell her truth without ever becoming cringey (so important), self-indulgent (more important), or inauthentic (most important). She and her wonderfully gifted and experienced team (Musical Director Paul Bogaev and Director Richard Sabellico) have created a true one-woman nightclub act that reads like a play - an intricate, charted, meticulous play that weaves her own writing in, out, and around compositions and pieces of compositions that aid in the storytelling. This isn't a set. And even though press materials for Anything Can Happen have used the word concert, this isn't a concert. This is a play. Jean Louisa Kelly clearly sat at a desk, made an outline, created an arc, and carefully chose the words, the sentences, the syntax, and the structure that would tell her story concisely and economically, so that there was still time and space to add the musical selections of her favor. The rise and fall of activity is built into the script, one where a mere verse from a song might be used ("I Want It All") before the composition is abandoned for another verse from another song ("I Don't Need Anything But You") because those two snippets from two different songs will best tell her story. It is elegant craftsmanship, intelligent storytelling, the sort that her audience was happy to lean into.

Often, in a cabaret show, the production is built with the more regular structure of sing, stop, applause, speak, sing, stop, applause, speak. Audiences have come to rely on that structure and follow it. Occasionally, artists will go against the grain, choosing to segue from song into speech into new song, making no allowances for the audience to applaud their efforts before transitioning to a new one. They do this because they started out with a story to tell, and this is the format that they feel, most effectively, tells that story. There will be no pandering. There will be no necessity to follow the norm. There will be only art and the telling of tales. That is how Kelly and co. have structured Anything Can Happen, interesting because it is the same format that Schmidt and Jones followed in the original stage version of The Fantasticks. Remember, at the end of the play, how The Boy and The Girl sing "Metaphor" and, as they complete the tender ballad, the authors imposed no button on the song. The words end but the music continues as an audience too swept up in emotion to clap is carried forward by the dialogue of the fathers: "Look." "They've come back." "Let's take down the wall." And the story continues, sans applause. This is the sophisticated, unapologetic writing style of Jean Louisa Kelly in Anything Can Happen, and the audience must keep up and keep going, which Saturday night's audience was just fine doing because they were mesmerized, enchanted by glory and the glamor of Jean Louisa Kelly.

Musically, Jean Louisa Kelly is not a revelation. We all saw Mr. Holland's Opus. Some of us have heard her solo album. It is a non-starter: this is a Lady who can sing. BUT. Listening to Jean Louisa Kelly sing, live, IS a revelation. This is a voice that can go legit on two ballads from The Fantasticks and two from Beauty and The Beast, or it can go Broadway belt on famous power numbers from Gypsy and Smash, and, like the seamlessness of her script, the vocal production is absolutely effortless. It's not a distinctive voice like, say, Ms. LuPone or Ms. Peters, but it is a beautiful, rock-solid instrument that should be heard raised in song, especially when the songs being performed feature genuine, real-time, invested acting moments such as those applied to comedy numbers like "When I'm Drunk I'm Beautiful" and "Getting Married Today" or employed to spark hopefulness, like that seen in Kelly's "Children and Art" or sorrow, so well communicated with "Out Here On My Own." Like the singing, there is no surprise when it comes to Jean Louisa Kelly's acting. The work that Ms. Kelly has given the world in her film and television appearances speaks for itself - Jean Louisa Kelly is a great actress. But there have been those occasions when great actors get up on the cabaret and concert stage and just park and bark. This is not one of those times. The Lady came to work. The Actress came prepared. The Singer came to show up. And it shows.

Anything Can Happen is not a big story. It is an individual story. It belongs, solely, to Jean Louisa Kelly. Interesting things happen in it, like a fourteen-year-old winning a contest and ending up on Broadway. That's interesting. But much of the story Ms. Kelly tells is about things that many of us live through: the meeting of a man, the creation of a family, the vanquishing of a personal demon, the battle of balance that every working mother fights. These are relatable issues and they make Jean Louisa Kelly accessible, something that doesn't always happen when listening to the life story of a movie star. Yes, there is talk of Hollywood and Kelly's experience there, as a woman, but the fact that she has honestly and vulnerably discussed the more personal and relatable moments of her life places even the Hollywood aspects of Anything Can Happen within audience grasp. That is good writing. That is good acting. And that is what Jean Louisa Kelly is offering her audience.

Anything Can Happen is good theater, it is good cabaret, it is good entertainment. It is being presented by a team of exceptional talents, from Kelly herself to her expertly gifted guides, Bogaev and Sabellico, who have done the Lady right. Indeed, there is practically nothing this writer could find with the presentation to critique. Well... there might be two little grievances regarding Jean Louisa Kelly's solo show debut: One - why did it take so long? And Two - why was there only one performance? Of course, one of these could be corrected, and quite easily, by another date. That's all it would take. And then another, and then another, and then another.

Jean Louisa Kelly, welcome. You are now a member of the cabaret and concert family. Please stick around a while - we have been waiting for you.

Find shows to see at The Laurie Beechman Theatre HERE.

Visit the Jean Louisa Kelly Instagram page HERE.

Photos by Stephen Mosher; Visit the Stephen Mosher website HERE.

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