Well, sweetheart, it ain't pretty, what they're doing to author Stine's first big novel out there in Hollywood.
Yeah, Hollywood, baby.The "H" word.
All Stine wants to do is turn his book into a screenplay.
Trouble is . . . he keeps running into trouble.
But the only trouble "City of Angels" itself might have is finding an audience in just four more days here in Salt Lake City.
I hope word-of-mouth spreads fast, because this is a big, brassy and brilliantly conceived musical comedy that deserves to be playing to packed houses. The Tony Award-winning show cleverly juggles two parallel plots, both jammed with wry Hollywood humor, sensational music, spectacular sets and a terrific cast. Larry Gelbart's razor-sharp dialogue sizzles.
The show's two main stars (and the only ones who aren't cast in dual or even triple roles) are Barry Williams as fictional Detective Stone and Jordan Leeds as Stine, novelist-turned-screenwriter and Stone's creator.
It's bad enough that Stine is always painting his alter-ego, gumshoe Stone, into corners that have to be rewritten.
Even more trouble is studio bigwig Buddy Fidler, the producer/director. He's got an ego as big as his . . . well . . . as big as his casting couch of starlets. Fidler keeps trying to change Stine's script.
Meanwhile, both Stine and Stone have their share of "woman trouble."
Stine's integrity - or what's left of it - is confronted by Gabby, his cross-country wife, who wishes he'd stop selling himself short ("I'd rather see you shoot yourself, than prostitute yourself," she sings during one poignant scene.
Gelbart's innovative plotting in "City of Angels" - shifting back and forth from Technicolor reality to film noirish black-and-white - is what makes this show completely different from any musical you've ever seen. That's also what makes the show move lickety-split, like the balls in Alaura Kingsley's tennis games, quickly bouncing from reality to fiction and back to reality, sometimes blurring the lines between.
Barry Williams (yes, that Barry Williams - all grown up from his old "Brady Bunch" days) is thoroughly believable as tough, cynical Detective Stone. And he's no slouch as a singer, either.
He gets to deliver some great Cy Coleman/David Zippel songs, including the showstopping duet, "You're Nothing Without Me."
Jordan Leeds is top-notch, too, as Stine. Leeds (who has performed in "Les Miserables" on Broadway) is perfectly cast as the East Coast writer trying to fit himself into the Hollywood scene.
The rest of the cast is also great, especially Anastasia Barzee as missing daughter Mallory Kingsley (whom Stone is hired to locate) and starlet Avril Raines; Charles Levin (from both the Broadway and Los Angeles casts) as both the "real" and "reel" movie producers; Ronnie Farer as the seductive Alaura Kingsley and Buddy Fidler's wife; Betsy Joslyn, who has some of the best songs and funniest lines in the show as Fidler's secretary, Donna, and Stone's lovelorn Girl Friday, Oolie, and Jessica Molaskey (who's played Mme. Thenardier in "Les Miz" on Broadway) in the dual roles of Gabby, Stine's wife, and Bobbi, another of Stone's done-me-wrong women.
Also impressive is the pit orchestra: conductor Vincent Fanuele, keyboardist Fred Barton and drummer Michael Brothers, who tour with the show, augmented by 13 local musicians drawn from Eugene Jelesnik's Salt Lake Philharmonic. They had only one day's rehearsal but sounded like they'd been on tour for months.