Skylight’s ‘Oliver!’ Is Fast Moving Songfest

Skylight Music Theatre’s Oliver! Photo courtesy of the Skylight Music Theatre.

The lighter side of great novelist Charles Dickens (1812-1870) was captured in 1960 by the prolific melodic talents of Lionel Bart, now deceased.

The result is Oliver! the often revived musical with tunes famous to young and old (“Where Is Love?”, “Consider Yourself at Home,” “I’ll Do Anything,” “Be Back Soon,” “Who Will Buy” to name a few), with a storyline equally famous about an orphan rescued from crime and poverty, with memorable character types and a music-hall pace. Partly fitting the original musical, the acting style is so broadly performed that audiences have to hang onto the musical pleasures without letting the brain get in the way.

It is amazing that in 65 seasons, dating back to when the musical was created, this is the first time the Skylight Music Theatre has done this work, so demanding is the staging, scope and casting. It is also one of the few times the Skylight has bypassed a live orchestra to work with an orchestral track.

Perhaps double casting 24 area children along with 12 of the 14 professional adults explains the track. Artistic director Michael Unger has worked hard on the technical details of keeping story afloat and bouncing from one big musical number to another, hitting the familiar line readings along the way. With hand and foot punctuation, choreographer Stephanie Staszak adds an almost militaristic exactitude to the proceedings, but that was the style in the early productions in the 1960s.

I said this was Dickens’ lighter gifts. While his literary flair for characters is present, the musical has lost core concerns about social injustice. He freely mixed novelistic sensation (penny dreadfuls) with sentiment and caricature but the complaints about society’s treatment of rich and poor was a constant intent in these serialized early writings. Even A Christmas Carol – which the Rep has staged successfully since the 1970s – is not as much about Christmas as it is about teaching a social lesson. Similarly Oliver Twist – another stage and film triumph– is more about how society creates despair and poverty creates crime than about melodrama.

Oliver! the musical understandably cuts back on Dickens’ social conscience, but the Skylight production is ignoring places where more than the music should be strengthening the scenes and characters. There are some exceptions, but the sudden bursts of interesting acting are almost an afterthought.

The musical also turns pickpocket tutor Fagin from a key cog in an evil business to a comic figure. Actor Randall Dodge slyly winks his way into our good graces, even when forced to eat up stage time to cover set changes.

Bart, working as both lyricist and composer, had an uncommon gift for the oompah sound (one of his most famous group songs in the musical is not so coincidentally called “Oom Pah-Pah”) as well as for British romantic ballads and the interplay of singing street vendors – pleasant acoustic moments in this production.

In terms of lyrics, he went around the barn to find a rhyme no matter how anachronistic. Consider this in the title song of “Oliver”:

There’s a dark, thin, winding stairway without any banister
Which we’ll throw him down, and feed him on cockroaches served in a canister

Or this one in “It’s a Fine Life”

If you don’t mind having to deal with Fagin (it’s a fine life)
Although diseased rats threaten to bring the plague in (it’s a fine life)

Bart fans might argue that, like Dickens, he had a sense of humor, but the Skylight production demonstrates that his charms lie more on the melodic side and that the best dialogue in his script comes directly from Dickens (“Please sir, I want some more”). Unger’s production thrives on how well the kids are handled but disintegrates in a Keystone Kops scramble in which melodramatics excesses take over and both Dickens and Bart disappear.

If you’re selective, Dodge as Fagin displays some acting nimbleness. And playing Nancy, Rachel Schoenecker has a powerful voice displayed in many famous songs, particularly in “As Long as He Needs Me.” As a concert moment this is moving, but she is so busy selling the music that the tragedy of Nancy evaporates.

The city of London is actually a co-star in the tale of Oliver!, though not quite so much in this production. The original Broadway production relied on turntables and huge scenery. Here set designer Jonathan Berg-Einhorn and his aides inventively make do with cutout walls, scenic drop downs, separate spaces for the dancers to prance around in, a portable stairway and a stage-length skyway to display everything from a workhouse to London Bridge. It doesn’t make a cohesive artistic whole, but it’s a fun way to move young and old bodies around.

Lighting designer Smooch Medina floods in brightening effects to help us follow the story while costume designer Michelle Grimm has cleaned out the Skylight dressing rooms to cleverly use multiple outer garbs and padding. These disguise an ensemble of 12 adults fast-changing their hearts out. They sing powerfully together while individually taking on many roles.

Among the men stepping out of the ensemble, Jared Brandt Hoover adopts a menacing snarl to sing and threaten as Bill Sikes, and Miss Kyle Blair (yes, that’s the performer’s name) hits the “Boy for Sale” difficult tenor notes winningly as beadle Bumble. Among the women I was impressed by Candace Decker (even though she seemed determine to steal scenes with her vocal antics) and by the tighter singing of Paula Garcia.

While there had to be nervousness among the children in the cast, they were disciplined and capable. Opening night had the Piccadilly cast (the other is the Trafalgar cast) with 7^th grader Gus Kolbe playing Oliver (the other cast feature Mac Heinrich, 6^th grader) while the Artful Dodger (here a female) relies on the big voice and multi-theater experience of Jenna Krysiak (the other Dodger is Harper Fornstedt, 8^th grader). The Skylight doesn’t refer to either cast as first or second and neither will I.

The violence is subdued and the feeling of a songfest with costumes is elevated, making this an attractive holiday production for children 8 and over as well as an occasional acting pleasure for adults. Oliver! runs through Dec. 29 on the Cabot Stage at the Broadway Theater Center. For full schedule and prices, visit https://cart.broadwaytheatrecenter.com/overview/oliver. Or call 414-291-7800 or email tickets@skylightmusictheatre.org.

Dominique Paul Noth served for decades as film and drama critic, later senior editor for features at the Milwaukee Journal. You’ll find his blog here and here.