MUSICAL THEATRE REVIEW:
SISTER ACT

JOHN COULBOURN,
Special to TorSun
5 OCT 2012
R: 3/5


Pictured: Hollis Resnik, Ta'Rea Campbell

Consider it a bit of divine intervention that, when Deloris Van Cartier, the brassy, ambitious heroine of SISTER ACT: A DIVINE MUSICAL COMEDY, witnesses a gangland execution, she finds herself hiding out in a Philadelphia convent. Because if there is one thing Deloris — and indeed the entire musical in which she is featured — is in need of, it’s a good book. And a convent is bound to have at least one of those.

But sadly, it’s not the kind of book on which winning musicals are based - the kind that use such things as plot and character development to take us where they want us to go instead of simply telling us where we should be. And that leaves Ta’Rea Campbell — cast as the hapless Deloris in the touring production of SISTER ACT launched Thursday at Ed Mirvish Theatre — and her castmates with only a score and a lot of God-given talent with which to redeem themselves.

Happily, that score is composed by Alan Menken, who, in complicity with lyricist Glenn Slater, manages to provide a songbook full of ’70s inspired disco soul that does much to mitigate the many shortcomings in a book inelegantly hewn from Joseph Howard’s hit movie by Cheri and Bill Steinkellner and Douglas Carter Beane. Deprived of the familiar hit tunes that propelled the movie, Menken and Slater have at least come up with an original score that has the virtue of sounding oddly familiar. On the talent front, however, veteran director Jerry Zaks hasn’t fared nearly so well, recruiting a cast that individually seems up to its tasks, but collectively, earns a failing grade on the interacting front.

Cast as the stiff-necked Mother Superior, Hollis Resnik brings a lot of heart to her character, which only serves to underline the fact that while Campbell may have the vocal range necessary for her role, she is a brassy one-note wonder on the acting front. As bad guy Curtis, Kingsley Leggs can’t scare up enough villainy, even backed by a gangland version of the Three Stooges, to make happy salvation anything less than utterly inevitable. And as for love interest sweaty Eddie, E. Clayton Cornelious has some nice moments in I Could Be That Guy, but is left hanging in his ‘romantic’ interludes with a self-involved Campbell.

On a choreographic front, Anthony Van Laast at least keeps things hopping, whether it serves the story or not, and while Klara Zieglerova’s sets are often eye-catching in their use of theatrical trompe l’oeil, the costumes, designed by Lez Brotherston, prove conclusively that, at least on Broadway, sequins are a tough habit to shake.

Where truly memorable musical theatre succeeds by gently wooing its audience into a willing surrender of disbelief, SISTER ACT: A DIVINE MUSICAL COMEDY shows up with little more than brash enthusiasm and demands we simply take it all on faith.