Sky high

Guys and Dolls is a soulful stereotype

by Bill Rodriguez

GUYS AND DOLLS. Book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows, music and lyrics by Frank Loesser. Directed by Jerome Vivona. With Patricia Ben Peterson, Steven Bogard, Amanda Butterbaugh, and Nathan Klau. At Theatre-by-the-Sea through June 25.

How is it that the colorful denizens of Guys and Dolls keep on charming, as they do in the current Theatre-by-the-Sea incarnation? Back in 1950, when the musical began what was then the longest run in Broadway history (3 years and 3 days), it was already a period tale, the characters as quaint as Mark Twain's. So how come it's still a kick in the next century, when equivalent Times Square types are wearing tongue studs and hip-hop cargoes instead of pomade and zoot suits?

Because a stereotype with soul is an archetype; and if he's also a comfort, so much the better. Harry the Horse, Benny Southstreet, Nicely-Nicely Johnson -- these gamblers and hustlers celebrate a mythic, Golden Age time when criminals were harmless, their crimes entertaining. They are based on the short stories of Damon Runyon, who wrote about the Prohibition-era underworld of midtown Manhattan. As the program informs us, he thought the exotic scene would make a great musical. He was right, although he didn't live long enough to see the creators of Broadway classics Where's Charley? and Silk Stockings pull it off.

The main story revolves around the '30s musical stock character of a rescue mission do-gooder, Sgt. Sarah Brown (Patricia Ben Peterson), and a smooth-talking gambler, Sky Masterson (Steven Bogard). Holy roller, meet high roller. He makes a bet that he can convince any "doll" to fly off to Havana with him, not knowing that the challenge will be the haughty Save-a-Soul Mission sergeant. Sky bribes her into complying, promising that he will get a dozen "souls" to a midnight meeting when Sgt. Brown needs them to keep the mission from being closed.

The trip to Havana provides a rhumba-beat production number for the ensemble, but choreographer Rick Kerby couldn't get it to rollick like the dances in Act II. The counter-rhythms do get Sarah to loosen up. Add a few coconuts full of "native ingredients," and she has cast off enough Judeo-Christian inhibitions to supply a new repressive religion. Peterson gets to rip-roar with "If I Were a Bell," as in let freedom ring. She and Bogard deliver a wistful "I've Never Been in Love Before" with enough chemistry to convince us, to close the first act and provide sweet anticipation for the second. Personable throughout her Matunuck romp, Peterson played Sarah on Broadway in the revival; Bogard -- playing Sky with off-putting phoniness until that closing song -- was Sky in the original national tour.

Actually, the most delightful romance in this production is provided by Nathan Detroit (Nathan Klau) and Miss Adelaide (Amanda Butterbaugh). With her Betty Boop voice, Butterbaugh delivers a captivating Adelaide. The headline singer at the Hot Box nightclub, she has been engaged to Nathan for 14 years, to the point of having a chronic psychosomatic sneeze over the frustration, as she explains in the hilarious "Adelaide's Lament." ("From a lack of community property/And a feeling she's getting too old/A person can develop a bad, bad cold!") Their duet, "Sue Me," could be the co-dependents' anthem. Klau gives us all the fidgets and anxieties we'd expect from Nathan, who has been keeping secret from Adelaide that he is still organizing the longest-running floating crap game in New York history.

This silly story alone, amiable denizens notwithstanding, would not have made this show a hit without the wonderful songs. The opening "Fugue for Tinhorns" perfectly establishes the setting, with the overlapping voices of three gamblers as they pick their sure things from a racing tip sheet. (It inspired a similar song device that opened The Music Man seven years later -- salesmen conversing on a jostling train.) "Luck Be a Lady" forever captures the high hopes and suave self-image of the gambler not yet in a 12-step program. Sung at a revival meeting, "Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat" is a rouser that fuels the next energetic production number.

Applause to costume designer Jane Alois Stein for the bold duds -- especially the yellow Dick Tracy outfit of Lt. Brannigan (Steve Fabrizio) and the lipstick red suit of Big Jule (Britt Gunter). As usual, Jeff Modereger's sets are colorful, action-packed eyefuls. Guys and Dolls may not last into the next century, but it's still providing opportunities for fun in this one.