Chicago Theater Review: BYE BYE BIRDIE (Drury Lane)

EVERYTHING’S FINE IN ‘59

It’s as welcome as flowers that bloom in the spring: A cascading, minute-by-minute hit,  Bye Bye Birdie  is a showcase for happiness even as it merrily mocks the pseudo-innocent “togetherness” of the Eisenhower Era and the scary advent of rock ‘n’ roll. For coy or legal reasons, Elvis Presley never gets mentioned in Drury Lane Theatre’s press release or director’s note, let alone the musical. But, no question, the superstar’s two-year draft into the Army in 1958 is a headline the show trades on and sends up. Teen dream Conrad Birdie is clearly “The King,” pulsating pelvis and all. Equally plausible is his shameless PR  journey to Sweet Apple, Ohio to give a pre-enlistment “one last kiss” to lucky Kim MacAfee, a Sandra Dee-wanna-be. And it’s all gonna be live, on Sunday night’s vastly popular Ed Sullivan Show no less!

The rock star’s arrival in this Norman Rockwell burg shakes up Sweet Water, just as, 47 years before, music man “Professor” Harold Hill did River City, Iowa. Plot-wise, this is no  Hairspray: The storyline is pell-mell and hit-and-miss, with the T.V. denouement occurring too early and the final duet a bit anticlimactic. But Charles Strouse’s songs are absolute delights, Michael Stewart’s dialogue is sitcom sharp, and Lee Adams’ lyrics both exploit and spoof the feel-good wholesomeness of this whitebread fantasy.

Tammy Mader’s pop-art revival, cleverly using video panels to expose its televised artificiality, is an irresistible doo-wop romp. It’s gloriously embellished with terrific sock-hop/American Bandstand-style dance sequences (“A Lot of Livin’ to Do”) and cunning caricatures, like Conrad’s ever-screaming fan club, that are all the more compelling for being contemporary. (Unlike  Grease, no nostalgia happens here:  Bye Bye Birdie  is of and from its real time.)

Anyway, there’s a whole lot of shaking going on with these “fish out of water” New Yorkers or “caught in the crossfire” locals. As if horny Birdie isn’t handful enough, Conrad’s overdriven 33-year-old manager and record producer Albert Peterson (Matt Crowle, doing Dick Van Dyke proud) must placate his fiery girlfriend Rose Alvarez (Michelle Aravena, doing Chita Rivera proud). Like frustrated Adelaide in  Guys and Dolls, she wants this mama’s boy to marry her and become the English teacher he was meant to be. Easily cowed, milquetoast Albert must contend with his sourpuss mother Mae (Catherine Smitko, perfectly channeling Eve Arden, Elizabeth Wilson and Bea Arthur). Meanwhile, Jason Michael Evans’ swivel-hipped Conrad is just cool enough to belt out his signature ballad “Honestly Sincere” and to teach the eager Buckeye kids—a golden ensemble—just how much “livin’” they’ve got left.

Naturally, Conrad’s synthetic dalliance with teenybopper Kim (Leryn Turlington, a tad more mature than her character) riles up her jealous boyfriend Hugo Peabody (sadsack Ryan Stajmiger). The scorned lover joins forces with Rose, as Kim does with Conrad, to straighten out their rocky romances. The love-crossed shenanigans get sorted out in a second-act showdown at the town’s notorious “Ice House.” Then it really is “Bye Bye Birdie.” (“Nothing to see, folks. Conrad has left the town.”) By then we’ve been regaled, as Mader promised, with a Top-40 Hit Parade, effortlessly ranging from the foxtrot to the Herky Jerky to the Hully Gully to the Stroll to your heart.

There’s not a wrong note, weak spot, bad move or lost opportunity in Drury Lane’s deliriously delightful, well-worth-the-wait revival. Too smart to be sentimental, it brims with showbiz wonders: There’s the gossip girls’ contagious “Telephone Hour,” Crowle’s moxie-packed tap dance with sad-girl Isabelle Roberts in “Put On A Happy Face,” and Aravena’s go-for-broke, tour-de-force blowout with astonished conventioneers in the “Shriners’ Ballet” at the dive known as Maude’s Roadside Retreat. How not to love George Andrew Wolff and Brianna Borger as Kim’s frazzled parents lamenting “Kids,” Roger Mueller’s doofus mayor (or his excellent Ed Sullivan imitation) or the teenage twosome’s sweet-scented duo “One Boy”? Using two turntables and wizard projections, designer Christopher Ash makes the scenery sing. Sharon Sachs’ period-perfect poodle skirts and dorky jeans are time capsules in themselves. If you packed an ounce more fun into this winter sizzler, it would explode.

photos by Brett Beiner

Bye Bye Birdie
Drury Lane Theatre
100 Drury Lane in Oakbrook Terrace
Wed at 1:30; Thurs at 1:30 & 8;
Fri at 8; Sat at 5 & 8; Sun at 2 & 6
ends on  March 13, 2016
for tickets, call 630.530.0111  or visit Drury Lane

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