The Cocoanuts
Book by George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind
Music by Irving Berlin
Directed by Kate Culbertson
Opens: Friday, January 25, 2008
Runs: 8 pm, Friday & Saturday, January 25 to March 2
Matinees: Sunday at 2 pm, February 10, 17, 24, March 2
Tickets: $24, $15 age 16 & under
Reservations: 510-524-9132
Read the Contra Costa Times Review
Read the East Bay Express Review
The Marx Brothers are back, wreaking havoc in this Broadway musical comedy hit. Groucho runs a failing resort hotel during the Florida land boom of the 1920s, and is up to his usual tricks: dodgy land deals, wooing a wealthy dowager, and refusing to pay his staff. Throw in a romantic subplot, a jewel theft, and the antics of Harpo & Chico — and the hotel is turned upside down! From start to finish the brothers run rampant in their trademark style.
"The result, as intended, is comic pandemonium."- N.Y. Times
Contra Costa Times Review
'Cocoanuts' a faithful Marx Bros. revival
By Pat Craig
http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_8099427
January 28, 2008
The Roaring Twenties were watershed times for Broadway musicals, with the likes of Irving Berlin and the Gershwins turning out tunes and Oscar Hammerstein II and George S. Kaufman writing the scripts.
It would seem theaters would still be awash with these lively shows, but the truth is there are few that survive to be produced regularly. Typically the ones that are still around are groundbreaking in some way ("Showboat") or have the cachet of memorable performers attached to them (The Marx Brothers) "The Cocoanuts," the wild Marx Bros. musical romp is the prime example right now, since El Cerrito's Contra Costa Civic Theater just opened its production of the 1925 Broadway hit and 1929 movie debut for Groucho and his sibling gang.
The show is just about exactly what you would hope for from the Marxes, as well as George S. Kaufman, who wrote the book and Irving Berlin, who wrote the music. It's a solid two hours of silliness set in a Florida resort just as the land boom down there was going bust.
By the time we arrive in sunny Florida, many of the big wheeler-dealers are rolling on flat tires, and the remaining con artists, from hotel manager Henry W. Schlemmer (the Groucho character played delightfully by Timothy Beagley) to the inept grifters, Willie the Shill (the Chico character created by Tom Reardon) and Silent Sam (Harpo, personified by Amy Nielson), are all angling for a buck or two.
The prime targets are Mrs. Potter (Nan Ayers) and her daughter, Polly
(Jillian Seagrave), wealthy and ripe for swindle. They come to the attention, not surprisingly, of the Marx boys, but also Harvey Yates (Greg Milholland) and Penelope Martyn (Jessica Kiely), who want to steal the Potter jewels. Yates also convinces Mother Potter that he would be an ideal husband for Polly, who already has eyes for poor, but ambitious Bob Adams (Benjamin Scott).
You don't need a doctorate in musical comedy to figure out what's going to happen, but the wild ride is far more important than the destination, particularly when it involves classic Marx Bros.-style comedy. And the actors cast in the parts, the above mentioned plus R. Martin Newton in the Zeppo role, pull of the Marx hilarity beautifully.
Director Kate Culbertson has given the show a speedy pace that intensifies the humor and doesn't open much time to reflect on shortcomings in the plot. She has cast the show well, from the tap-dancing bellhops to the principals on both sides of the law.
Not surprisingly, Kaufman's dialog sparkles, and the songs by Berlin are excellent ("Always" is the only tune to emerge from the play to become a standard).
Mat Flynn's art deco set creates a perfect mood for the show, and has enough flexibility to keep Culbertson's quick pace scurrying along through scene changes.
East Bay Express Review
Hitting the Marx - Contra Costa Civic brings the brothers back.
By Sam Hurwitt
http://www.eastbayexpress.com/artsculture/hitting_the_marx/Content?oid=632629
January 30, 2008
When you think of hit Broadway musicals, it's easy to forget something like The Cocoanuts, which played the Lyric Theatre for eight months in 1925 and '26. That's because, more than an Irving Berlin musical with a book by George S. Kaufman (not too shabby, as pedigrees go), it was first and foremost a Marx Brothers vehicle, the one that became their first feature film. So for a community theater to stage it as they might any other musical takes some chutzpah, but the folks at El Cerrito's Contra Costa Civic Theatre had so much fun doing Animal Crackers in 2006 that they decided to reunite their own Marx Brothers .
As was the case with Mae West's Sex at the Aurora last year, doing a play like this is often complicated because you're really playing two roles at once — both the character and the famous personality who played it originally. In this case that complexity is alleviated by the fact that the characters in The Cocoanuts are inconsequential. They're just Groucho, Chico, and Harpo by any other name — and you really have to be paying attention to catch the names the latter two are using at all.
The Cocoanuts isn't as strong a script as Animal Crackers (also cowritten by Kaufman), although it has a few memorable moments such as the viaduct ("why a duck?") routine. Groucho is a hotel owner trying to take advantage of a real estate boom, his brothers are a couple of pickpockets, and there's a scheme to defraud a rich society matron who wants to marry her daughter off to a supposed wealthy heir who's actually a con man despite the fact that the girl loves a poor aspiring architect. It's not worth worrying about.
More surprisingly, Berlin's songs for it haven't stood the test of time nearly as well as those Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby wrote for the latter show. The closest there is to a memorable song is the schmaltzy love duet "Always," which eventually did become a hit but was left out of the original staging and the film. The songs aren't even ephemeral because they're somehow plot-anchored "book numbers" — in fact, aside from the love duets they don't have much to do with the action at all.
Timothy Beagley does a credible Groucho impersonation, and his comic timing is sharp but not so much so that you can quite believe that people can't keep up with him, an aspect that a lot of his humor relies on. Instead of the canny shiftiness of someone who's not nearly as smart as he thinks he is, Tom Reardon goes for blank-eyed, gape-jawed idiocy in the Chico role, but the most puzzling bit is how his feet are constantly shuffling in a near-trot like a punch-drunk boxer. Amy Nielson's Harpo was a hilarious highlight of the previous show, and her slight-of-hand slapstick is still quite funny despite the fact that she has less to do in this production.
The young lovers are more interesting than usual in a comedy like this, mainly because Jillian Seagrave has such a sunny voice and demeanor and such grace while dancing as the ingenue Polly. Benjamin Scott has some upright charm as true love Bob, and Nan Ayers does the flustered Margaret Dumont shtick proud as stuffy Mrs. Potter. Although strong in the dance numbers, Jessica Kiely lacks poise as husky-voiced con artist Penelope, but in that sense she's true to Kay Francis' wispy film performance.
Perhaps because there are so many people on stage, much of Nielson's choreography involves some limp shuffling back and forth in place, but there are some standout dance numbers such as a tap dance of the bellhops and Penelope's lively homage to the Charleston. The ballroom-style dances between Bob and Polly are also delightful, as is Groucho's exaggerated tango with Mrs. Potter.
The production looks great, with a gaudy quasi-deco hotel lobby set by Matt Flynn and sharp formal attire by Helen Slomowitz. The small band ably led by Joe Simiele is visible on the set's second story throughout the show. Particularly missed amid the hubbub is the usual cameo appearance in nearly every CCCT production by theater founder and longtime artistic director Louis Flynn, who passed away earlier this month at the age of 86.
Director Kate Culbertson (who's also artistic director while Mark Manske is on hiatus) keeps the pace snappy, especially in a beautifully executed door-slamming scene with half the characters darting in and out of two adjoining suites. Other comedic highlights include a real estate auction where planted shill Chico keeps outbidding himself, and an operatic bit with a detective (Alex Shafer) lamenting the loss of his stolen shirt to the tune of the "Habanera" from Carmen. The Marx Brothers were always the glue that held this bit of fluff together, but this affectionate homage is an entertaining enough way to pass the time while the real ones are unavailable.