Oh! What a past.
A Guest Review of
“ONE NIGHT WITH FANNY BRICE”
at the 13th Street Repertory Company
November 10, 2014
How does one bring Fanny Brice back to the stage? The inspired insanity of her comedy departed with her. The ornate and riotous reviews in which she performed are a long gone memory. All that is left are very few films, some recordings and broadcast transcriptions of her “Baby Snooks” radio show. In ONE NIGHT WITH FANNY BRICE, Author Chip Deffaa realizes that attempting to minutely recapture that unique side of Fanny Brice would do no favors to either the subject or the actress who would have to make the attempt. To be sure ONE NIGHT WITH FANNY BRICE provides a good framework with an impressive song list that illustrates and comments on Fanny Brice’s life and career. The show even manages to invoke brief flashes of her stage presence and humor. But it is her life story backstage and out of the theater that drives this play. And what a story Fanny shares with the audience! She guides us along her girlhood start in the vaudeville amateur nights, works her way through the burlesque circuit and then makes her name as a star on Broadway and finally in radio. At the same time Fanny must copes with her dysfunctional but fascinating personal life. A lot is revealed – much of it surprising – that show what a complex woman Fanny Brice was, but Mr. Deffaa focuses largely on her relationship with Nicky Arnstein. This makes sense as Arnstein – gambler, swindler and lothario – was the love of Fanny’s life and so much has been romanticized about their love affair and marriage that part of the fun of the evening is having Fanny set the story straight. Still the glimpses of her dealings with her stage associates – producers such as Florenz Ziegfeld and friends like W.C. Fields, Eddie Cantor and Gypsy Rose Lee – or the rather offhand description of her final marriage with Billy Rose, offer up the promise of so much more that Fanny ought to be able to tell. But as the Show Business saying goes; always leave them wanting more.
Ms. Chloe Brooks gives an outstanding and memorable performance. Her Fanny Brice really comes to life in Mr. Chip Deffaa’s play; chatting with her audience and taking them through her life as if she is sharing their amazement and amusement on how it all happened. We see Fanny re-enact a crucial episode of the past, first as herself and then another person and then, in the middle of it all, toss an observation to the audience that really defines the situation. This Fanny Brice truly relishes a good story – including her own. Ms. Brooks also understands that an impression is better than a slavish imitation and if she only occasionally slips into the phrases and accents that Fanny was known for, it is because Fanny is telling her story – not giving a performance in a Ziegfeld production. It is the same for the singing as well: in ONE NIGHT WITH FANNY BRICE Fanny is using the songs to tell her story – not telling her story to sing the songs, and in Ms. Brooks’ hands the songs are nicely delivered whether with an amused detachment as in her burlesque number “Be My Little Baby Bumble Bee” or using “My Man” both seriously and ironically to punctuate how her biggest hit song capitalized on her troubled relationship with Nicky Arnstein. Ms. Brooks’ singing is adeptly aided by Music Director Richard Danley who deserves high praise for his skilled and delightful piano playing.
A good deal of credit for this exceptional presentation must also be shared with Director Rachel Hundert. She paces the proceedings extremely well, making it hard to believe that this is a nearly two hour performance of a one actor show. Every scene and number flows onwards believably even when Fanny is being Fanny imitating the other people who are talking to Fanny.
As Producing Artistic Director, Ms. Sandra Nordgren created a very simple but highly effective stage setting that always kept the focus on Fanny and perhaps it is she who provided Ms. Chloe Brooks with the costuming that allowed her to span Fanny’s life so effectively.
If anything significant was missing from ONE NIGHT WITH FANNY BRICE it was the way Fanny often used an exaggerated Yiddish accent in her sketches and songs. Perhaps there was fear that the ethnic side of her comedy might not play so well and needed to be diminished but it was an essential part of Fanny’s career. Now Ms. Chloe Brooks does give some idea of Fanny’s inflections in performance, but I think that had she been given the opportunity, Ms. Brooks would have marvelously captured Fanny Brice’s wonderfully incongruous onstage mixing of the Yiddish and the Uptown.
But even with that deficiency, this is still very much a fascinating telling of Fanny Brice’s story, but even more, it is truly Ms. Chloe Brooks’ show and should not be missed.
13th Street Repertory Company
About the reviewer:
I am a computer programmer, wannabe writer who loves theater and just got into the habit of inflicting my theatrical opinions.
I live in New York. Moshe can be reached at MB1224@aol.com