READY FOR HER CLOSE-UP
IN PALM SPRINGS

Palm Canyon Theatre’s Sunset Blvd.
finds a commanding Norma Desmond
and a powerful ensemble

Se Layne

Although Andrew Lloyd Webber turned Billy Wilder’s classic 1950 film noir Sunset Blvd. into a musical almost three decades ago, it is not tackled by schools or community theatres very often for two reasons: the original production is so lavish that it consistently loses money, and the success of any production of the musical rests on the shoulders of the enigmatic and delusional Norma Desmond, a silent movie diva whose career ends when she turns old—in this case, 50. Palm Canyon Theatre tackles the show and succeeds on all counts, delivering one of its best productions in recent memory.

We first meet a young screenwriter, Joe Gillis (Christian Quevedo), as he arrives at Paramount Studios to pitch his latest script. The stage quickly fills with movie actors, stagehands, agents, and other writers on the Paramount lot who join for the song “Let’s Have Lunch.” The number pokes fun at the shallowness of hurried backlot conversations. From that beginning, we see the work of director/choreographer Derik Shopinski as he moves 20 frenetic ensemble members around a stage that is barely 40 feet wide. Not only do they deliver the hectic movement of controlled chaos, the power of so many singers creates a wall of sound that presses viewers back into their seats.

Joe meets with producer Sheldrake (Nick Edwards), who tells him that Paramount does not want his script. While in Sheldrake’s office, he meets secretary Betty Schaffer (Tara Howard), who becomes one of the four principals in the show.

Joe escapes the studio and starts driving through a dark and rainy Hollywood. The driving is delivered via Nick Edwards’ projections. A white curtain runs full stage just behind the proscenium, and projections on the blank sheet provide many of the settings. For the driving sequence, Edwards borrows clips from numerous films of the 1950s to show a car speeding down a rainy street, including close-ups of a foot stomping on the gas pedal.

Eventually Joe pulls his car into the driveway of a mansion on Hollywood’s Sunset Boulevard. The mansion’s butler, Max (Mark Almy), leads him into the living room, a grandiose chamber dominated by a huge upstage staircase. There are also numerous gold-framed portraits, velvet drapes, and a pipe organ.

Soon a frail woman, Norma Desmond (Se Layne), descends the staircase, and we see from her flighty movements that she views life on a different plane than the rest of us. She believes Joe is a mortician who has been called to perform a funeral for her closest friend, a chimpanzee. When he explains that he is a screenwriter, she presents him with her magnum opus, a 600-page script of Salome. She insists that he move into the house and work with her, preparing the script to present to Paramount. The problem is that she insists on playing Salome, a 17-year-old, and still believes she can deliver a film without dialogue because she can say anything she wants with her eyes.

When she delivers “With One Look,” the audience recognizes that there is indeed a star playing a star. Layne’s powerful soprano voice is clearly operatically trained, but her acting uses that voice to reveal dimension and insight into a deeply disturbed character. When she leaves, Max and Joe discuss Norma Desmond, and Max explains that she once was “The Greatest Star of All.” Almy, the actor playing Max, has decades of credits with numerous opera companies across the country. His song, primarily in a bass register, ends up in a delicate falsetto. Almy’s range and powerful voice assure us that the butler is not simply a throwaway character used to advance the plot.

Joe’s friend Artie (Stephen Giboney) is engaged to Betty Schaffer, the secretary from the opening scene. Gillis offers Betty one of his early scripts to rewrite on her own, but she urges him to co-write it with her. When Artie goes out of town for location filming later in the show, she and Gillis fall in love. Eventually Norma, now attracted to Gillis, discovers Betty and confronts her by telephone. Gillis invites Betty to the Sunset Boulevard mansion, and events begin to spiral toward the tragic ending.

The character who holds the show together—and holds the audience in the palm of her hand—is Norma Desmond. Se Layne’s performance is nothing short of remarkable. She controls every scene she enters while still revealing the vulnerability of a woman confronting the passage of time. The final moments of the show, when she transitions into a fully delusional state, are both terrifying and mesmerizing. A true tour de force.

The four principals—Layne, Quevedo, Almy, and Howard—have uniformly strong voices that deliver Lloyd Webber’s score effectively. When combined with the impact of a 20-person ensemble, the music lands with considerable force. Music direction is by Broadway veteran Steven Smith, who also plays piano during the performance. He is joined by Jim Watson on drums and Larry Holloway on bass.

This raises an interesting point about musical accompaniment. With a live combo such as this production employs, actors can take liberties with dramatic phrasing, and a couple of times the musical director makes quick adjustments when a singer comes in a beat too early or strays slightly from the melody. On the other hand, Lloyd Webber’s orchestrations for this show feature lush strings and even a harp. Are those orchestrations not as essential to the score as a full orchestra is to a Tchaikovsky symphony?

As noted, Shopinski’s direction and choreography are uniformly strong. He also designs and makes the costumes. Norma dons a new outfit virtually every time she leaves the stage, and every cast member has between two and six different looks. If that is not enough work for one person, he also delivers tickets at the box office, gives the opening welcome speech, and—since no one else is listed as stage manager—likely handles those duties as well.

Set and lighting design are carried out, as always, by J.W. Layne, with sound design by Nick Campbell.

One small observation: a key element of the plot is that Norma, an older woman, is keeping Joe Gillis, a younger man. Se Layne rarely looks more youthful or beautiful than she does in this production, and when she and Joe dance, they appear almost the same age. I might have preferred a Norma trying to reclaim fading beauty with thicker layers of makeup. Aside from that small quibble, this is one of the finest local productions I have seen in a very long time.

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