Home >  A & E

Wednesday, February 19, 2003

By Christopher Rawson, Post-Gazette Drama Critic

"Without a hurt, the heart is hollow," sings the saturnine narrator in "The Fantasticks," the musical by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt that owns the record for the longest continual run -- 41 years off-Broadway -- in American history, and maybe even world history.

	The sadder but wiser finale to "The Fantasticks": (from left) Scott Sambuco, Lindsey Carothers, Daniel MacLaughlin and Anthony Marino; above, Tim Hartman. (Patti Brahim, PMT photo) "The Fantasticks" Where: Pittsburgh Musical Theater at Byham Theater, Downtown. When: 7:30 p.m. through Friday; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday. Tickets: $10-$34, students half-price; 412-456-6666.

It's been seen often in Pittsburgh, but it's a timeless fable and there's always a new audience that needs to experience the famous shows for themselves, so this revival is a welcome enough part of Pittsburgh Musical Theater's make-or-break 13th season. Though just a wisp of a thing, a studied "Our Town"-like exercise in bare-stage make-believe, "Fantasticks" conveys a sobering message, one PMT itself may take to heart: That the adversities of life are what make it special.

That's also the message of its best-known song, "Try to Remember." Many of its lyrics don't stand up to close analysis, but its general tenor is a captivating poignancy, a lament for lost youth and ideals.

The stagey two-hour fable is also bolstered with friendlier comic turns, chief among them the lively "Plant a Radish" of Act 2, in which two feuding fathers reconcile by admitting the relative superiority of gardening over parenthood. Any parent can sympathize.

Singing and dancing that number in a sweetly slapdash display of showmanship (credit choreographer Lisa Moran Phinney) are Anthony Marino and Scott Sambuco, part of a capable cast which is itself one of the chief attractions of PMT musicals. Who in Pittsburgh could better Tim Hartman as the avuncular narrator with his swashbuckling El Gallo alter ego? And come to think of it -- though this is his PMT debut -- who better than Martin Giles for the delightfully hammy old actor, a role he's been prepping for probably longer than he is old?

As the girl next door, Lindsey Carothers' dream-pretty looks and ingenuous air are perfect casting, though her speaking voice can run thin and her strong singing seems to change registers in an unusual way. As the boy, Daniel MacLaughlin's voice is not as impressive, but his acting is more consistent; he's at his best when he returns from absorbing the brutal lessons of the uncaring world.

Hartman is the show's presiding force, and a force he is, easily authoritative in voice and commanding of presence. I'd call his characterization a little soft -- too ready to commiserate, too willing to tell us how to feel. But this is a matter of taste, like arguments over whether to play the Stage Manager in "Our Town" as a twinkly grandpa or flinty taskmaster. (I lean toward flinty.)

Just as Act 1 seems to drag, the stage is galvanized by the creaking entrance of Giles' antique actor. He dodders, he orates, he mugs, he fumbles. He could be a genial Scrooge, or, in the doublet he dons, a scruffy Growltiger in "Cats." It's shameless, as it should be, and it gains from the contrast to Shaun Rolly's cheery, physical Mortimer, The Man Who Dies.

Ken Gargaro directs, as he did when his company staged "Fantasticks" the first time, more than a decade ago. He knows how to find the balance between romance and cynicism. But some of his staging isn't adapted to the Byham stage -- the long "Round and Round" sequence, for example, is crammed awkwardly together.

A simple scrim places the accompanying piano, bass, percussion and harp in silhouette. Schmidt's score is designed for just such a small combo, including several jazz-like treatments, but the boy and girl's rueful "They Were You" could almost be Kurt Weill.

Indeed, "Fantasticks" is like the flip side to Weill's collaborator Brecht -- the sweetsour to balance his soursweet.