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Stearns Matthews & Megan Candio
August 4, 2009
“50 Years Experience…25 Years in the Making” Don’t Tell Mama
July 31, Aug. 2 & 5
Stearns Matthews and Megan Candio have been friends since childhood—which isn’t all that long ago since they are now only in their mid-twenties. Besides having growing-up-in-New Jersey in common, they are both disarming, charming, and funny, and both have excellent voices: Matthews a legit lyric baritone, Candio a legit/operatic soprano. Under Lennie Watts’s direction, their show gives clear evidence of their affection for each other without ever being cloying or explicitly articulating their feelings. Much obliged.
With duets comprising more than half of the numbers, this is truly a duo show (as opposed to two people sharing a bill with perhaps a couple of songs done jointly). The opening number—Craig Carnelia’s sweetly affecting song of friendship, “Fran and Janie”—nicely establishes the theme of the evening. Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “Stepsisters’ Lament” is spirited and fun, as is Bernstein, Comden & Green’s “Carried Away,” which has nifty bits of staging. Simply adorable is a segment in which they recreate the Irving Berlin medley they performed in competition at the Sussex County Farm and Horse Show when they were 17 years old; I won’t spoil the surprise by telling you the outcome of that contest. A friendship medley pokes fun at the type of duo show they’ve opted not to do; it’s really quite cute. Indeed, much of the evening is quite cute-but never cutesy.
From the piano, musical director James K. Mitchell lends his voice to Maltby & Shire’s lovely “She Loves Me Not”; this trio is extremely pretty. From time to time Mitchell does more than simply provide good accompaniment—as in his running commentary during Matthews and Candio’s rendition of John Du Prez and Eric Idle’s parodic “The Song That Goes Like This.” Though looking angelic and scarcely post-pubescent, Mitchell displays an against-type sly twinkle. I wouldn’t be surprised to see future shows giving him even greater opportunity to participate.
In one of her solo turns, Candio doesn’t do full justice to “It Never Was You”; her rendition comes across as more a singing and acting exercise than the exquisite romantic expression that Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson wrote. On the other hand, she does very well in a number that explains why she was not right for the title role in Annie. Matthews fails to convey the ahh! quality that Larry Grossman and Hal Hackady’s “Poor Sweet Baby” should have, but with its palpable feeling of loss, anguish and hopelessness, his interpretation of Irving Berlin’s “What’ll I Do?” is heartbreaking. And each of them gets to do a French song: Fauré for monsieur, Satie for mademoiselle. (Candio performs the Satie initially reclining atop the piano, then sitting on the piano, and finally standing. All that shifting has no real payoff and seems unnecessary—but I quibble.)
Roy Sander has been covering cabaret and theatre for over thirty years. He’s written cabaret and theatre reviews, features, and commentary for seven print publications, most notably Back Stage, and for CitySearch on the Internet. He covered cabaret monthly on “New York Theatre Review” on PBS TV, and cabaret and theatre weekly on WLIM-FM radio. He was twice a guest instructor at the London School of Musical Theatre. A critic for BistroAwards.com, he is also the site’s Reviews Editor; in addition, he is Chairman of the Advisory Board of MAC.
