Don't Be Cruel: The Life and Times of the King

In its one act, Don't Be Cruel: The Life and Times of the King is approximately sixty minutes biography set to music, fifteen minutes tribute concert. This multimedia play at Andiamo Novi stars Max Pellicano as Elvis Presley, narrating his own life and singing songs to fit the story. Ironically, it's only after arriving at Elvis's death that Pellicano comes to life in a joyous coda that surges with energy and fun.

Appearing alone on a narrow strip of stage, the character barely ripples the surface of Elvis's well-known and sometimes troubled life, treating events like his mama's death (sad) and meeting his future wife (happy) as though they were revelatory. Other shocking developments include: Elvis bought Graceland, and Elvis had a drug habit. The production gets plenty of support from backstage in the form of a live band and two performers whose silhouettes and voices stand in for many of Elvis's family, friends, and collaborators. Falling short of rock 'n' roll's raw power, the onstage stillness in which the man of the hour must recollect things the audience already knows feels like Walk the Line by way of Disney's Hall of Presidents.

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Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

Making musicals based on the life's work of a musician or band is the new black, and here is the entry for the great Neil Sedaka. In his prolific (and ongoing) career, Sedaka has written approximately four hundred million songs, so the catalog from which Breaking Up Is Hard to Do is assembled makes for an impressive and instantly recognizable score. On the script side (concept by Marsh Hanson and Gordon Greenberg; book by Erik Jackson and Ben H. Winters), the play has in its favor a show-within-a-show framework that opens up song possibilities as well as a kicky premise that practically owes royalties to Dirty Dancing.

To be clear, this musical is more Mamma Mia! than Spring Awakening; there is not a single element as untoward as much of the plot of the above-mentioned Patrick Swayze film. Yet the parallels are myriad, most notably the Catskills resort setting, guests fraternizing with employees and becoming part of the floor show, and a hunky headliner whose attractiveness nearly demands its own byline. The story is peripheral: a jilted fiancée and her friend turn her honeymoon that wasn't into a girl's weekend at Esther's Paradise, and a bit of cunning lands them roles as backup singers for the house entertainment, upon which the resort's future hopes seem to rest. Given a cast of three men and three women, the viewer can gather sufficient evidence within ten minutes to solve that particular math problem. A limp, tacked-on conflict leads to a resolution that defies adjectives in its immense lack of importance. But no matter — happily, this Meadow Brook Theatre production, directed by Travis W. Walter, gamely shoves the story to the wayside in favor of stronger focal points like singing, dancing, comedy, and light 1960s camp.

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Little Shop of Horrors

It doesn't take much to get me excited for Little Shop of Horrors. Infectiously catchy book and score by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken, crazy sci-fi tale about ethical slippery slopes and the dangers of botany, Motown girl group–inspired trio as Greek chorus — is it all right if I bring my giant foam finger to wave? Yet for its clarity of vision as well as its pure excitement and fun, this production at the Performance Network stands out as a phenomenal theatrical experience.

The show is best known for the character of Audrey II, the strange and unusual plant that brings fame to a struggling Skid Row flower shop and to the young man who cultivates it, but at a steep price: the fresh human blood on which it feeds. Audiences are used to fantastic feats of puppetry making up Audrey II, often as big as a green Jabba the Hutt, backed by a very specific-sounding male voice over. To deviate from the long-accepted formula would require nothing short of awesomeness in execution to justify the choice, and this is just what director Carla Milarch has done. I won't spoil her extreme and provocative departure here other than to say it works without question, especially in the atmosphere of this production.

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Jesus Christ Superstar

WHEREAS, the Rogue Critic is a known detractor of the ubiquitous Andrew Lloyd Webber, and WHEREAS, the Rogue — having heard from trustworthy people that his early stuff is worth a listen — went into Jesus Christ Superstar with an open mind, and WHEREAS, the Rogue was indeed not moved by the score of the rock opera, THEREFORE IT IS HEREBY DECREED that the Rogue harbors a black, sucking void in her heart where her love for Webber should reside. Caveat emptor, if you will.

The production now at the Encore Musical Theatre Company has a number of clear strengths. With a cast of twenty-six, staging by directors Daniel C. Cooney and Barbara F. Cullen and choreography by Kristi Davis provide constant visual stimuli without once crossing over into clutter. Thanks in no small part to the set design by Toni Auletti (whose combination of arid boulder backdrop and modern scaffolding looks like a funky archaeological dig), stage pictures are consistently dynamic and thoughtful. A thrilling wordless prologue, inspired by the Stations of the Cross, is made even more memorable by use of an effectively jarring strobe light, which recurs as the same moments play out again later. The strong ensemble helps fill the stage with energy, and some of the voices — my favorite the inhuman tenor of the priest Annas (Andy Jobe) — are exceptional. At the center of the show, Aaron LaVigne is a magnetic presence, making it easy to understand what the fuss is about.

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Detroit Be Dammed: A Beaver's Tale

News flash: Some people actually love Detroit so much, they're willing to sing about it. That's the kind of misplaced astonishment we're used to reading in the national media, the disbelief that anybody would willingly live in Detroit, and it makes some locals' blood boil. In that same defiant spirit, the Planet Ant original musical Detroit Be Dammed: A Beaver's Tale addresses both the history and the heart of the city, embracing them in an infectious surge of passion.

Written by Mikey Brown and Shawn Handlon and directed by the latter, the show evades the traditional mold of setup, song, setup, song. Musical numbers are used sparingly, leaving plenty of room to unfold numerous stories and even more jokes. The first act is a sweeping retelling of defining moments in the history of Detroit, each told through the lens of the LeMerde family. (For readers not versed in French expletives, a nice way of translating the name would be the poop. LeMerdes through the years are accordingly bumbling and hapless, but all are likable and never moronic.) Most of the progression is chronological, leading from French rule to British to American, briefly back to British, and then to American again. The city's role in the Underground Railroad is addressed, and Augustus B. Woodward and Henry Ford make appearances. The three men in the cast each play different men of the LeMerde ancestry, which is helpfully made clear by the use of a projection screen. Projected images also remind viewers of the year, provide visual aids, and feature a line-drawn cartoon beaver that belts brief synopses and exposition to a bluesy refrain.

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