The season started on a high with the magic realism of the touring production from Broadway at the Hobby of Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, starring that wiz of a tiger puppet Richard Parker. What charisma, what stage presence, what animal magnetism! That was followed by the intimate quintet of Circle Mirror Transformation from Mighty Acornin the most intimate of spaces at Spring Street Studios, only to be transported to a small studio at the JCC for Mildred Umbrella’s sparkle and tang of The Last Yiddish Speaker. Then we were blasted awake by the singing sickos from Houston Broadway Theatre’s American Psycho with its Broadway caliber production accompanied by its glossy high-end Playbill. In quick succession, the good shows kept coming: the heart-felt two-hander Dancing Lessons from Lionwomen; the tap dancin’ Purlie Victorious at Ensemble; and a stunning and comic Eureka Day from 4th Wall. Then The DaVinci Code mystified at the Alley, while the family epic of the American dream gone sour, The Lehman Trilogy,stunned at Stages. And that was only September.
BEST SET DESIGN
Winner: Tim Mackabee for Disney’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Houston Broadway Theatre)
The parapets of the medieval Notre Dame cathedral. Let’s conjure them. No need, Tim Mackabee has placed them squarely in our imagination, and we’ll never see them the same way again.
We’re off to Paris, old Paris, for the musical The Hunchback of Notre Dame, where deaf and deformed Quasimodo lives in the bell tower. He may be deformed, but his heart is pure. Now, we’re in state-of-the-art land where design is minimal but the projections mighty. Up a level, stage right, sits the orchestra, as if in their own cathedral apse, while down below in an angled foyer is the main playing area, with balcony and staircase where gargoyles can congregate. A gigantic rose window flies in, the balustrades are overlaid, as are the interior stone walls. All done without fuss or stagehands scurrying around.
When evil Frollo is defenestrated, his fall is vertiginous as the walls seem to fall with him as the actor rushes into the background. Very neat and clean, abetted by crisp lighting, but never far from minimal design becoming maximum. The look of both productions was very different – one, cluttered yet clean, like Annie; the other, bare and utilitarian until it was swarmed by choristers, dancing gypsies, gargoyles. Gorgeous work from Mackabee and his team, and most worthy of Best Set Design.
BEST COSTUMES
Winner: Colleen Grady for American Psycho (Houston Broadway Theatre)
A musical set amongst the superficial, status-obsessed 1980s era Wall Street power players better come dressed correctLY. After all, it’s not every musical that has a song rhyming Mahi Mahi with Isaac Mizrahi or red wine with Calvin Klein.
“Chanel, Gautier, or Giorgio Armani. Moschino, Alai or Normal Kamali” croons the chorus of the show’s joyous fashion number, ‘You are What You Wear.’ Funny as the song is, it’s nothing without Colleen Grady’s designer-inspired on-stage explosion of dresses. Metallic, short and/or tight, one shoulder or shoulder pads, jeweled embellishments, sequins – it was all there and it looked expensive, like the real deal.
And it wasn’t just the gals that got the upscale duds treatment. The financial fellas also dressed the part perfectly. Dark suits in lush fabrics showed off the men’s buff, workout-obsessed bodies. Designer ties, shoes and flashy watches showed off their bank accounts. You could smell the money coming from the stage.
Grady understood the assignment, as the kids say.
It takes a lot in a musical about a serial killer for the costumes to be the starring player, but in Grady’s hands, they often stole the show. At times sinister, at times riotous, these costumes did some heavy lifting and we, along with the audience, gasped loudly several times at the glorious excess of it all.
BEST LIGHTING
Finalist: Tyler Micoleau for The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Houston Broadway Theatre)
BEST SOUND
Finalist: Andrew Harper for The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Houston Broadway Theatre)
BEST CHOREOGRAPHY
Finalist: Hope Easterbrook for The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Houston Broadway Theatre)
BEST MUSICAL
Finalist: American Psycho (Houston Broadway Theatre), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Houston Broadway Theatre)