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Jon Peterson
May 7, 2013
“Song Man Dance Man”
Stage 72 at the Triad Theatre – May 7
Jon Peterson’s talent as both singer and tap dancer is impressive. He provides an amiable, riveting stage presence; on top of that, his complete absorption of the work of his deceased double- triple- and even quadruple-threat, iconic showbiz predecessors and his enthusiasm for channeling their careers to his audience are palpable. He’s given himself an enormous mission here: to cover George M. Cohan, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Donald O’Connor, Sammy Davis Jr., Bobby Darin, and Anthony Newley in one 100-minute show on a small stage, with only his piano accompanist, Julian Reeve, for support. But Peterson delivers each of his vaudeville-inspired septet’s highlights so wonderfully that occasional misfires in his spoken and musical narrative are easily forgiven.
Beginning with George M. Cohan, the godfather of the performance genre Peterson is celebrating, this tribute show spans the early 20th century through the 1960s and Newley’s best work. At first, Peterson’s progression is chronological, and the connections between succeeding artists nearly seamless. Astaire and Kelly played together in the 1945 movieZiegfeld Follies, for example, followed by Kelly and O’Connor in Singin’ in the Rain in 1952. Peterson’s vocal range and choreographic zeal easily cover all seven bases. His standout numbers include “Give My Regards to Broadway” (Cohan); a Kelly-esque “Singin’ in the Rain” (Arthur Freed, Nacio Herb Brown); the Davis signature songs “If I Ruled the World” (Leslie Bricusse, Cyril Ornadel, from Pickwick) and “I’ve Gotta Be Me” (Walter Marks, from Golden Rainbow); and Darin’s best-remembered hit,”Mack the Knife” (Kurt Weill, Bertolt Brecht, Marc Blitzstein, from Threepenny Opera).
The British-born Peterson employs an American accent when he’s talking or singing for all but Newley, credibly flattening his pronunciation of “ask,” “answer,” “can’t,” and the all-important word “dance.” To his credit, he doesn’t really imitate any of his U.S.-born subjects, and distinguishes among them in only subtle ways. But when it comes to Anthony Newley, Peterson is really in his element. It can’t be just that their accents are similar. He truly embodies the late composer/lyricist/librettist/actor/director in such songs as “A Wonderful Day Like Today” and “Nothing Can Stop Me Now!” (both written by Newley and Bricusse forThe Roar of the Greasepaint, the Smell of the Crowd) and of course “What Kind of Fool Am I?” (Newley and Bricusse, from Stop the Word – I Want to Get Off), this show’s spine-tingling closer.
Quibble time. While biographical context is essential for a younger audience that would not have seen any of these men perform live, Peterson trots out a couple of anecdotes that must have whiskers even for the YouTube generation: the assessment of Astaire’s first screen test (“can’t sing, can’t act, is going bald…can dance a little”); and Darin’s true maternity (his “mother” was really his grandmother, his “sister” was his mother). Two songs could easily be cut: Davis’s biggest hit, “Candy Man” (Newley and Bricusse, yet again, from Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory), and Darin’s breakthrough recording, “Splish Splash” (Darin, Murray Kaufman). Both singers hated these atypical songs, even though they provided the chance for each to pursue his true calling as a nightclub singer. Peterson doesn’t need a director so much as he needs an editor. This one-act show is at least ten minutes too long, and loses steam when it doubles back on itself, to revisit, in order, some of the characters who have gone before. Peterson has done a version of this show with only five subjects (O’Connor and Davis are out), and another with all seven that was two hours long, with an intermission. Clearly he’s flexible. What I want to see now is his Anthony Newley-only show. On a bigger stage, please.
Robert Windeler is the author of 18 books, including biographies of Mary Pickford, Julie Andrews, Shirley Temple, and Burt Lancaster. As a West Coast correspondent for The New York Times and Time magazine, he covered movies, television and music, and he was an arts and entertainment critic for National Public Radio. He has contributed to a variety of other publications, including TV Guide, Architectural Digest, The Sondheim Review, and People, for which he wrote 35 cover stories. He is a graduate of Duke University in English literature and holds a masters in journalism from Columbia, where he studied critical writing with Judith Crist. He has been a theatre critic for Back Stage since 1999, writes reviews for BistroAwards.com, and is a member of The Players and the American Theatre Critics Association.
Jon Peterson’s talent as both singer and tap dancer is impressive. He provides an amiable, riveting stage presence; on top of that, his complete absorption of the work of his deceased double- triple- and even quadruple-threat, iconic showbiz predecessors and his enthusiasm for channeling their careers to his audience are palpable. He’s given himself an enormous mission here: to cover George M. Cohan, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Donald O’Connor, Sammy Davis Jr., Bobby Darin, and Anthony Newley in one 100-minute show on a small stage, with only his piano accompanist, Julian Reeve, for support. But Peterson delivers each of his vaudeville-inspired septet’s highlights so wonderfully that occasional misfires in his spoken and musical narrative are easily forgiven.