Musical Theater Review—“Cabaret” at Barrington Stage

Cabaret

Book by Joe Masteroff, from the play by John Van Druten and stories by Christopher Isherwood

Music by John Kander; lyrics by Fred Ebb

Directed by Alan Paul; choreographed by Katie Spelman

Performances through July 8, 2023

Boyd-Quinson Stage, 30 Union Street, Pittsfield, Massachusetts

barringtonstageco.org

Krysta Rodriguez, center, in Cabaret (photo: Daniel Rader)

The Barrington Stage production of Kander and Ebb’s Cabaret is, despite some provocative window dressing, a staging of this still disturbing, groundbreaking musical that’s close in spirit to the 1998 Sam Mendes restaging that took Broadway by storm. After I read the typically imperceptive and shrilly clever New York Times review, I was expecting an out-there interpretation (“OMG, a genderqueer Cabaret—run for your lives!”), but director Alan Paul has stayed pretty faithful to the book and songs, with the notable exception of “Tomorrow Belongs to Me,” which is sung by a trio of non-binary and trans performers as part of the renamed Kit Kat Ensemble.

Paul’s decision to do away with the Kit Kat Girls further underlines the notion that the immorality and decadence of Weimer-era Berlin will soon be comprehensively stifled quite brutally by the thuggish Nazis. But aside from that—and the amusing squirming of some audience members pre-show and post-intermission as the ensemble wanders among the seats to flirt or dance with the paying customers—there’s nothing here that screams, “Look! We’re making Cabaret relevant to our time!” Paul doesn’t have to make obvious the parallels to today’s wannabe fascists as they viciously fight a more progressive society—it’s already there in the show.

Paul and his able choreographer, Katie Spelman, use the small stage—which features a terrific small orchestra, led by music director Angela Steiner—to their advantage, as the song and dance interludes and dramatic scenes rub against each other effectively and, often, almost inevitably.

As the proudly amoral heroine, club chanteuse Sally Bowles, the always wonderful Krysta Rodriguez turns on her natural charm—along with a beguiling, if erratic, British accent—to complement her lithe movements and powerhouse voice. Her stirringly emotional rendition of the title tune is the very definition of a showstopper; maybe Rodriguez will finally get the Broadway starring role she deserves if this production makes it to New York.

Other cast members are accomplished, at times even inspired, although Dan Amboyer’s portrayal of Cliff Bradshaw—the naïve American writer who falls in love with Sally after coming to Berlin to start a novel—is more lackadaisical than it should be, even for such a passive character. As Cliff’s spinster landlady Fräulein Schneider, Candy Buckley has a lovely but sad presence; as her paramour, the elderly Herr Schulz, Richard Kline gives a noble performance as a German Jew who can’t comprehend what the Nazis have in store for him.

The Emcee has become a touchstone role, not only because of Joel Grey’s sinister Tony- and Oscar-winning portrayal but also because of Alan Cumming’s flamboyant, Tony-winning reinterpretation in Mendes’ revival. Nik Alexander mischievously combines both of them in a slyly uninhibited, subtly menacing performance. That Alexander occasionally swallows his lines doesn’t mitigate his idiosyncratic stage presence, which is the ominous center of this Cabaret.