BWW Reviews: Street Theatre Company's I LOVE YOU, YOU'RE PERFECT, NOW CHANGE

If anyone could possibly find four performers more charming, more engaging, more winning and - damn it! - just more entertaining than the cast of Street Theatre Company's I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change onstage at the Nashville venue through February 13 - I'll eat a bug! Bring the performers forth immediately! I feel pretty confident in issuing the challenge, because I don't think anyone can find a better cast (and since I'd be doing the judging, I can rest easy) than the quartet onstage serving up the amusing musical revue.

Just in time for Valentine's Day, director Larry Tobias and music director Rollie Mains have ushered the clever little musical (with book and lyrics by Joe DiPietro and music by Jimmy Roberts) to the stage, featuring the delightful - and supremely on-target - talents of Bakari King, Tyson Laemmel, Megan Murphy Chambers and Cathy Sanborn Street. The talented quartet take audiences on a roller-coaster ride of sorts as they give us a look at the contemporary dating scene, which is apparently "all heterosexual, all the time" - and which could be the revue's one element that dates the material to the 1990s.

It's a quick-paced paean to modern romance, with all its foibles and mysteries, presented in a loving, yet sometimes biting, way that is certain to entertain and to impress. The talented actors each perform a bevy of characters, allowing them to show their range, to tap into their little-seen, heretofore perhaps unknown bag of tricks to present a show that's thoroughly delightful.

Granted, the four are known throughout the Nashville theater community for their immense talents and fearless approach to every project they tackle, and with I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change, they do so with a zealous relish that is infectiously joyful and downright fun.

King is in fine voice, displaying a warmth and charm that fairly bubbles across the stage (even when he's playing a prison inmate serving seven consecutive life sentences for a series of murders of his married friends), bringing his steady grace to the variety of characers he creates onstage.

Laemmel, who opens as the lead in Circle Players' The Wedding Singer in a couple of weeks, has never been funnier and his melodious voice, which he manipulates so effortlessly, makes his songs all the more appealing. His performance of act two's "The Baby Song" is terrific.

Street has a beautiful voice, which is amply displayed, but perhaps most astonishing in this rather sardonic piece her best moments come in a sweetly conveyed and very moving sequence called "The Very First Dating Video of Rosie Ritz," in which a fortysomething divorcee takes her first tentative steps into the dating world six months after her husband left her. It's a very affecting moment made all the more impressive by Street's performance.

Clearly, Chambers can do no wrong and is completely unafraid of showing us everything that's in her; her performances are consistently engaging because of her total lack of guile and her innate grace, her tremendous acting and singing talents notwithstanding. She is at her best in this revue when she is paired with Laemmel on "A Stud and A Babe," which comes early in act one, and in the second stanza's "I Can Live With That."

The review's two acts are performed on a set - credit goes to director Tobias for that, as well - that hearkens back to TV's The Dating Game, a sherbet-colored backdrop that lends a certain candy-coated flavor to the onstage proceedings. Tobias' exceptional set design is given its due by Steven Steele's beautifully conceived and executed lighting design which sets the perfect tone for the musical throughout its onstage action.

Tobias' confident direction is apparent throughout the evening, ensuring that each scene is filled with wit and style, while Mains' superb musical direction makes certain that the songs are presented with a certain ease of style that's totally apropos for the subject matter. The musical accompaniment by Mains and violinist Michael O'Gieblyn is nothing short of terrific.

- I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change. Book and lyrics by Joe DiPietro. Music by Jimmy Roberts. Directed by Larry Tobias. Music direction by Rollie Mains. Presented by Street Theatre Company, 1933 Elm Hill Pike, Nashville, through February 13. Call (615) 554-7414 for tickets or visit www.streettheatrecompany.org.

Pictured (clockwise from top left): Cathy Sanborn Street, Bakari King, Megan Murphy Chambers and Tyson Laemmel

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