The obvious question is "why was this show revived?" But, once past this, and this production's slow start (a black-and-white montage of TV clips sporting the trends of the time, hula hoops et al), Bells Are Ringing makes an endearing, cheerful, optimistic, feel-good evening of old fashioned musical theater, with a sparkling Broadway score (orchestrated by Don Sebesky) which includes "Just In Time," "The Party's Over," the touching "Long Before I Met You" and the rousing "Its A Simple Little System." The Comden and Green/Jule Styne 1956 opus, made into a movie in l960, both starring Judy Holliday for whom it was written, is an sweet bauble from times past of character-driven, intimate musicals, when you actually cared about the people in them.
How refreshing to see dance numbers which propelled the plot (original choreography by both Fosse and Robbins, re-staged here by Jeff Calhoun) instead of today's frantic, torso torturing, tribal sized show stoppers, wherein one could actually learn the "Mu Cha Cha" as promised in the script, preparing a frantic lady on her societal maiden voyage to a party of hoi polloi where she is certain to be a misfit. The show is about a telephone operator (Faith Prince) at the Susanswerphone service who gets involved with all of her clients, especially a songwriter (Marc Kudish), whose career she saves and with whom she ultimately falls in love. The sub characters, whose careers she also saves, are a songwriting dentist (Martin Moran), marble-chewing actor (Darren Ritchie), and a criminal client (David Garrison), who is deceiving the service's owner (Beth Fowler) using the service as a front for a bookie joint, whose career she destroys.
As directed by Tina Landau, Faith Prince both evokes Judy Holliday and melds into her image, testimony to a part that is so clearly written it transforms the person playing it. While some may argue that Prince is a bit mature to play the role, I think the problem here is rather that Marc Kudisch is too young and bland (though of remarkable voice) to play a ragged edged, alcohol-ridden, formerly successful paramour (think Sydney Chaplin and Dean Martin who played the part). Another problem might be the references, as in the famous name-dropping song, whose pop culture personalities might be as enigmatic to younger patrons as some of the pre-curtain references that get the show off to its sluggish start. How many Mary and Ethel's can you remember???
David Woolard certainly did his research on the waist-nipping, crinolined and/or bright-colored, tight-sweater, pedal-pusher creations of the age. Though comparatively simple, Riccardo Hernandez' sets did manage to malfunction, destroying the story's "dramatic" denouement, which, for this viewer, just happily reminded one of the vicissitudes of live theater. The score seems, at times, terminally cute in this sophisticated Sondheim era, but the show is so full of good cheer, it makes one nostalgic for a simpler, happier time when people could actually sing on subways or dance in the Park without being mugged!
