HIGH NOTES AND HARD KNOCKS: SHOWSTOPPER
CHARTS THE SONGBOOK OF SURVIVAL
Singer songwriter Gary Stockdale has a loyal but eclectic fan base. His long-term devotees date back to legendary TV producer Steven Bochco’s cutting-edge and sadly short-lived musical police drama Cop Rock, in which he played a drug dealer who stood before the bench and heard his verdict delivered by the jury in a gospel rendering. He provided the melody for the harsh social criticism of magicians Penn and Teller’s series Bullshit!, and his efforts to make the scatological rankings of the cult favorite The Aristocrats a toe-tapping experience won him even more admirers. Still more enthusiasts were lured in by his theatrical efforts (with partner Spencer Green) such as Bukowsical, the musical based on America’s celebrated beau laid poet Charles Bukowski, and Bumperstickers, a musical based on… well, bumper stickers.
Showstopper is a different twist for Stockdale in that it is a one-man show—and that one man is Stockdale himself.
Meet Jerry Rockwell (Stockdale), a Broadway tune-master whose career consisted of being both the “toast of the town” and the bread slice landing butter-side down on the pavement. He relates the ups and downs—and way downs, and even farther downs—of his career in an evening of fifteen songs and ditties, plucked from his fifty-year pursuit of an eleven o’clock number to bring the roof down.
The songs, with music by Stockdale and lyrics by Green (with the exception of “With You,” a romantic air with lyrics by Stockdale and his wife Danelle Stockdale), run the gamut from ballads to jingles—but all resonate with emotional sincerity and intellectual sharpness.
Kicking off the evening is “Don’t You Just Love a Musical,” an homage to the genre which references about twenty of Broadway’s most beloved “showstoppers,” with Rockwell adding his advice to them (“Argentina, quit your crying”). This is followed by tunes drawn from his catalog of “hits” and those productions that didn’t see a second weekend following their opening. These tend to reflect the era in which they were penned. There was Key Party in the Sixties, about a couple going to their first swinger party; Tricky Dick in the Seventies, featuring a duet between Nixon and Kissinger as Nixon tries to get his Secretary of State to join him in prayer—offering the mocking refrain, “You’re going to miss me someday.” This was followed by Rockwell’s tribute to the American space race, Beyond, which was scheduled to open in 1986—until the year started with the Challenger exploding in January.
As directed by Matthew Leavitt, who also contributed to the book along with Stockdale and Green, the show is well balanced between reminiscences and tunes, and presented to the audience with a skill and subtlety that never overloads either.
The offerings of Stockdale and Green never disappoint—and at times even hint at a concurrence of Sondheim and Lehrer.
But layered within the stories of Rockwell trying to compose the perfect “showstopper” are the tales of him trying to compose himself: as an artist, a husband, a father, and ultimately a human being. Here, Stockdale manages to capture and convey the simple truth—that artist or not, this is a blank canvas we all must face.
Showstopper
produced by John Mitchell
Whitefire Theatre, 13500 Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks
Fridays at 8
ends on April 25, 2025
for tickets ($25), call 818.687.8559 or visit Whitefire or Showstopper
for more shows, visit Theatre in LA
