Review: THE LAST OF THE RED HOT MAMAS at Bucks County Playhouse

This review requires a disclaimer up front: the reviewer, a "woman of a certain age," was raised with Sophie Tucker on THE Ed Sullivan SHOW and with Sophie Tucker albums in her family's records, and when home alone as a young girl she would put on Sophie Tucker and mime her routines. This probably accounts for her regular counseling sessions now. But yes, this is written by someone raised on the last of the red hot mamas. 

Susan Ecker and Lloyd Ecker also adore The Divine Sophie, and since doing their documentary on her, they, with Harrison David Rivers, have created a bio musical in her honor, THE LAST OF THE RED HOT MAMAS. Directed and choreographed by Shea Sullivan, it's premiering at Bucks County Playhouse in a lavish and - well it IS Sophie - loud production that skimps on no element. Sets are not at all minimal. Costuming is particularly lavish and absolutely delightful. Jeannette Christensen's costume design resulted in a hushed argument between my plus-one and myself as to who was stealing which wardrobe pieces. This may be a brand new musical, but the over-the-top froth and fun are reminiscent of stagings of THE MUSIC MAN and HELLO DOLLY.  If you love full sets, flouncing costumes, and plenty of them, this is your show. May no one ever try a minimalist version. 

Portraying the Last of the Red Hot Mamas herself is Broadway veteran Ryann Redmond, belting her way through period vaudeville numbers like "Hello My Baby," with, thankfully, no assistance from Michigan J. Frog, and some of Sophie Tucker's own songs, like the classic "Some of These Days."  As you watch, you'll be unable to miss just how much Mae West, Bette Midler, and even Cindi Lauder and Madonna have borrowed, consciously or not, from Tucker's repertoire, song styling, performance, and humor. Redmond has an acting range as Tucker from meek to formidable, and yet maintains an even keel the x rot when portraying Sophie Tucker singing on stage, when no scenery was exempt from her eating it. This, in depicting Tucker, is as it should be. Kudos to Redmond for a fine performance. 

But no less fine a performer is DeWitt Fleming, Jr., who plays Bill "Bojangles"'Robinson, who worked closely with Tucker. Tucker, herself Jewish, and who started in blackface vaudeville, was long known for her happiness to work with minority performers. Fleming is a fine actor and singer and certainly a ridiculously gifted tap dancer. If you're familiar with film footage of Bojangles himself, though, set that aside. Fleming's dance is a tribute to the man, not an exact depiction of the hoofer himself. It's nearly impossible to do an exact portrayal of a man who once drew eight encores in the middle of a show. But if you can't watch Bojangles, watch Fleming play him, and you'll get a good sense of it. 

Stephanie Gibson is delightfully comic as Nora Bayes, writer of "Shine On, Harvest Moon," the vaudeville singer whose popularity had her at the top of marquees for two decades  The depiction of her struggles with Tucker are close to the actual story of her issues regarding performing on the same stage as Tucker (and the resulting lawsuits and theatre blacklistings). Over the top in real life and in her personal life, she's another over the top cherry on the sundae that is this show.  Rheaume Crenshaw, as Mollie Elkins, Tucker's best friend, former Ziegfeld co-toiler, and in this story, harried assistant to Nora Bayes, brings the acting chops to keep Redmond's Tucker back to earth when needed  

There are some points not to be overlooked in this show.  It's more memoir than biography; like most musical "lives of" stories, it's not precisely factual.  As a brand new show, yes, there are moments that could be tighter in the pacing.  It's also a bit of a disguised jukebox musical, as virtually all singing is presented as part of performances or rehearsals - there's no moment when any character is pushed to a height of emotion requiring them to sing about themselves or anything else.  My personal issue with the music is that even though one risqué number is performed during a vaudeville show that provokes police attention, there is no effort to include any of Tucker's own charmingly double entendre numbers, of which she had quite a few, or anything of the like.  While this show already is not so sanitized as to be child safe, it feels close but for the inclusion of the "Meatballs" number and the ensuing plot devices.  It would feel more alive without that storyline (and without the cringeworthy Nora Bayes moment in her agent's office from it) and with a forward-looking dose of "vitamins, hormones, and pills" to jazz it up  The medical supplement song may not have been around in Tucker's early days, but what a prediction she gave us for Viagra.  One hates to say it but the song used, "Meatballs," feels mostly like an expanded version of one English verse in "Che la Luna" that could have been sung a few years later if Rosie Clooney went vulgar.  No, let Tucker be Tucker. (While Tucker was once arrested for indecency in 1910 in Connecticut, the case had nothing to do with the musical's story line of it. Tucker's recollection of the incident was itself wildly funny.)

THE LAST OF THE RED HOT MAMAS, though not a comedy, is certainly the sort of evening's entertainment designed to put hard work, bad weather, and tax problems right out of mind for a few hours of frothy, foamy fun and some great song and dance.  And, like the old days of the New Haven tryout, Bucks County Playhouse is the perfect place to run a new show.  The Eckers have brought just the right sort of summer premiere, over the top with a big red cherry to crown it.  Despite its second-act oversights, it's a fun show and well worth catching. 

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