Kim Maresca
Ruthless! The Musical, the satirical take on the classic killer-kid movie The Bad Seed, is currently enjoying a successful off-Broadway revival. One of its stars, Kim Maresca (who plays the harried and put-upon mother, Judy Denmark), went a few blocks uptown to Feinstein’s/54 Below in a show that focused more on Broadway than off, and let her do “…songs that make me giddy, songs that make me dream and songs that scare the sh*t out of me!” She did quite will with all of them.
Musical director Jon Balcourt (from The Book of Mormon), leading a band of seven Broadway musicians, gave the evening a unique sound. The terrific orchestrations and arrangements by Larry Moore and Josh Clayton make me want to use the word orchestra rather than band—the strings, in particular, by the sheer number of them, made the music quite special, indeed. And Maresca was born to sing with this rich, sophisticated accompaniment. I might have liked a bit of understatement here and there in delivery, but more about that later.
The show was filled with essential cabaret and Broadway “standards,” and I realized in listening to them that a couple of generations have passed since everyone was doing these songs. There’s a reason that great songs can survive being overdone: it’s because they are good! And time has been kind to them; as the years have gone by, they have lost their cliché status. There was genuine joy and excitement in hearing them again, and hearing them done so well.
Her opener, “Yes” (Kander & Ebb, from 70, Girls, 70) followed closely by “The Other Side of the Tracks” (Cy Coleman, Carolyn Leigh, from Little Me) proved to be the aural equivalent of the singer jumping feet first into the heady waters of cabaret. Her sense of adventure, and her joy, spread through the audience. A bit later she got to the “scary” song, which turned out to be “Meadowlark” (Stephen Schwartz from The Baker’s Wife), a warhorse if ever there was one. She maneuvered its intricate lyric, complex story, and melodic shifts with ease and managed to wring new life from the old story. Maresca had a ball with “Crossword Puzzle” (Maltby & Shire, from Starting Here, Starting Now). There was a lovely take on “Since You Stayed Here” (Peter Larson, Josh Rubins from Brownstone) that unfortunately wasn’t as successful as it might have been because she chose to sing it referencing her grandmother. The lyrics are so specifically romantic that it didn’t quite work.
It is de rigueur in cabaret lately to do a “big” medley, and Maresca didn’t fool around. Under the umbrella of “Dream Roles,” she blasted through familiar suspects from Evita, Wicked, Les Misèrables, and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, letting her big voice fill the room in one 11 o’clock number after another. This is not usually my cup of cabaret tea, but she made it work.
Spoiler alert: as you can no doubt tell, I really enjoyed Kim Maresca’s show, but I do have some reservations that I feel must be noted. A lot of these—in fact all of these—apply not only to her show, but to about half the shows I’ve seen over the past six months. In years gone by (to quote Bette Midler) “the great, the near-great, and the lame” all started out in small clubs scattered throughout the city. They learned their craft in front of small audiences and got to polish and improve as they went along and developed microphone technique, focus, phrasing, movement, positioning on stage, storytelling, eye contact—all the myriad requirements for a truly successful cabaret show. Today, too many singers are thrust into a “big” room like Feinstein’s/54 Below without any of that training and without a director who can guide them through it “on the fly.” The shows often turn into an hour of audition songs. Even in (or perhaps especially in) the age of “American Idol” and “The Voice,” I wish vocalists would realize that it is okay to be small; they do not have to hit every note in their arsenal in every number.
Too often in Maresca’s show, she placed the microphone at “nose level,” blocking off the lower half of her face. She held on to the mic stand to the point of distraction and deprived herself of even the most minimal movement that might have enhanced a lyric. When she took the mic off the stand, she left the stand center stage, awkwardly vying with her for audience focus, and held the mic so high that, again, we couldn’t see her mouth for much of the song. The show could also have used a bit more shaping and a bit more of an arc or throughline to the songs. Lastly, the patter proved to be too self-referential, with the assumption that the audience was so familiar with her that the mere mention of a name or an incident would suffice. There were moments when a name was spoken and half the audience began whooping and hollering and the other half (including yours truly) was just bewildered.
I bring all this up only because the show was a success in spite of these missteps. How much better it might have been had some thought and effort gone into these rudimentary performance elements. The singer and her director, Jeremy Clayton, would do well to spend some time on them in preparation for her next show, or this show’s return. I look forward to either of those eventualities.
Feinstein’s/54 Below – March 17
About the Author
Gerry Geddes has conceived and directed a number of musical revues—including the Bistro- and MAC Award-winning "Monday in the Dark with George" and "Put On Your Saturday Suit-Words & Music by Jimmy Webb"—and directed many cabaret artists, including André De Shields, Helen Baldassare, Darius de Haas, and drag artist Julia Van Cartier. He directs "The David Drumgold Variety Show," currently in residence at Manhattan Movement & Arts Center, and has produced a number of recordings, including two Bistro-winning CDs. He’s taught vocal performance at The New School, NYU, and London’s Goldsmith’s College and continues to conduct private workshops and master classes. As a writer and critic, he has covered New York’s performing arts scene for over 40 years in both local and national publications; his lyrics have been sung by several cabaret and recording artists. Gerry is an artist in residence at Pangea, and a regular contributor to the podcast “Troubadours & Raconteurs.” He just completed a memoir of his life in NYC called “Didn’t I Ever Tell You This?”