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Orpheus Society's production of the baseball-themed musical Damn Yankees, now playing at Centrepointe Theatre, begins with a mood-setting slide show designed to immerse audience members in the America of the 1950s, and, in particular, baseball in 1950s America. Photos of Roger Bannister, Cary Grant, the Washington Monument, Yankee Stadium, Elvis' induction, a submarine, the Cat in the Hat, Scrabble, Marlon Brando, Marilyn Monroe, pitchers Walter Johnson and Jack Kralich (more realistically products of the 1910s and '60s respectively, but let's not split hairs) and Chevrolets admittedly do the trick, but the introduction is a bit of overkill: We don't need to be hit over the head repeatedly with a bat to get the gist. Unfortunately, Orpheus' production, directed by Bob Lackey, fails to hit the long ball, settling instead for a decent - and decently acted - story stretched out by a dozen or more largely forgettable tunes. The company is known for its lavish sets and costumes and big, showy numbers, factors that often make it easier to sit still for three hours. With Damn Yankees, there's no such saving grace. George Abbott and Douglass Wallop's book is fun enough: A middle-aged, die-hard Washington Senators fan, Joe Boyd (Jim Robertson), strikes a Faustian pact with the devil, giving up his wife Meg (Joyce Landry) and real-estate career to become a 22-year-old batting phenom - Shoeless Joe Hardy, played by Ben Nowell - who can overcome those damn New York Yankees and take his team to the World Series. The devil, aka Mr. Applegate (Dennis Van Staalduinen), in an uncharacteristic display of charity, allows Boyd an escape clause, to come in effect at midnight on the second-last day of the season. There'll be some tough decisions on that day, won't there? In a word: No. While Damn Yankees nominally examines the issues of love and loyalty, its outcome is only briefly in doubt, and never seriously at that; any possible question of the story's ending will be quickly answered for those who read their programs beforehand. Richard Adler and Jerry Ross's songs, meanwhile, with the possible exceptions of Heart (You know the one: "miles and miles and miles of heart") and Van Staalduinene's devilish rendition of Those Were The Good Old Days, are vapid and punchless. And while Orpheus' cast fortunately included no one in the atonal range during Friday night's premiere, so, too, was it missing a single voice to make it soar. Nowell provided the best pipes, but occasionally faltered on the scales. Orpheus' strongest point Friday was the acting: Van Staalduinen had by far the best role, and played it to the hilt, while Nowell, Landry, Robertson and Charles Russell as Senators manager Benny Van Buren were all sharp. This might simply be a case of music and baseball not being natural bedfellows. If Take Me Out to the ball Game is the best a national pastime can come up with... |