Riverside Theatre wraps up its season with another jukebox musical in collaboration with Philadelphia’s Walnut Street Theatre, this time “Saturday Night Fever,” an energetic, dance-filled version of the 1977 movie for which the British pop group the Bee Gees wrote the score.
What remains of the dark tone of that often violent film is at Riverside largely conveyed through sets. They are masterfully designed to be moved by the cast itself, depicting gritty backdrops of 1970s Brooklyn. The disco era hit about a decade after the Verrazano-Narrows bridge was built, connecting Bay Ridge to Staten Island and – metaphorically, at least – a larger world. The bridge factors prominently in both the set and the story, which also takes place within the bleak mid-century brownstone of Tony Manero, a 19-year-old still living with his parents and working in a paint store.
And then there is the two-level disco called 2001 Odyssey. That glittery, pulsating space becomes a play within a play, its dance competitions a distraction to dreary lives. In the case of the lead character, Manero, disco is his only chance to excel.
Vocals aside, the men in this show hold all the power. Dance is the vehicle for their ferocity and it comes through most in the musical numbers outside the club. Choreographed by the show’s director Richard Stafford, the men dance in a macho mash-up of styles: Broadway, ballroom, disco and martial arts. This crew would whup the cast of last year’s “West Side Story,” with aggressive lunges, karate chops and enough pelvic motility to direct traffic at a six-exit round-about.
It doesn’t hurt that those moves are on bodies costumed in stop-light colors, those wildly-printed jersey shirts held taut inside the rib-nicking waistbands of their double-knit polyester bell-bottoms.
The women’s bodies, on the other hand, were largely veiled in what today looks more like their Sunday best – kitschy below-the-knee dresses that masked much of their movement.
They also manage some monster lifts when the girls join in, partnering them with the same smoldering libido that they use to demean them off the dance floor. And we’re not talking wolf whistles: The movie included two rape scenes, one involving Tony trying to force himself on his dance partner Stephanie; in the other, Tony’s two friends rape the drunk, drugged and hapless Annette, an unpopular girl Tony has heartlessly rejected. Tony does nothing to intervene.
That horror has been edited out of the musical version, and talk is more muted of choosing an abortion when one of the guys, Bobby, learns his girlfriend is pregnant. Still, the disparaging remarks by men about women, right down to Tony’s parents, is unsettling to the point of grating, particularly delivered at full-throated volume in forced Brooklyn accents. It does, however, play to the study in contrasts with the Bee Gees’ soothing ballads, a couple of which have been given a top-to-bottom tonal makeover to better fit with the plot. I’ll leave that to fans of the Bee Gees to determine if that’s grating, too.
Stafford directed the same show in September with the same actors in several lead roles giving the customary short rehearsal time a major leg-up, one would suppose. Those roles included Tony (Jacob Tischler), Gus (Raynor Rubel), Double J (Joe Moeller, who also played the role under Stafford at North Shore Music Theatre in Massachusetts), Joey (Christopher Hlinka, my favorite) and Stephanie (Alexandra Matteo).
The show features a dedicated soloist, Candy (Crystal Joy), a performer in the disco. Joy may be the most experienced cast member, appearing on Broadway as Martha Reeves in “Motown the Musical” and in London’s West End in “Hair” – she played Abie Baby.
Candy often sings duets with another soloist, Monty, the deejay at the disco.
Stafford did not stage the original 1998 musical but a later version that opened on Broadway in 2015, with three songs added. That adaptation, credited to the producer of the 1977 movie, Robert Stigwood, and collaborator Bill Oakes, involves a new book, too. It was commissioned by Theatre Rights International for use in regional theaters and a national tour.
While the storyline is pure Americana – loser street kid looks to disco ball to illuminate his future – it has been told through the eyes of Australians and Englishmen; the musical first premiered in London’s West End.
“Saturday Night Fever” plays at Riverside through April 30.
