Not All ‘Days of Wine and Roses’ Are Created Equal

Many consider the 1962 film “Days of Wine and Roses” an enduring classic even though its only Academy Award was for Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer’s title song, which was subsequently covered by Frank Sinatra, Nancy Wilson, and Marvin Gaye, among other greats. Yet the tune, which is not included in Craig Lucas and composer/lyricist Adam Guettel’s new musical adaptation of the movie, was a bigger hit for Andy Williams, whose sentimental version hasn’t exactly aged like fine wine.Neither, for me, has the movie itself. While stars Jack Lemmon and Lee Remick, who both earned Oscar nominations, were first-rate charting a couple’s descent into alcoholism, JP Miller’s screenplay, adapted from a teleplay he had written for the renowned anthology series “Playhouse 90” in the late 1950s, reads today like an overheated sermon on the dangers of the bottle. There are a couple of scenes in which Lemmon’s character, a public relations exec named Joe Clay, is shown hospitalized; at one point we see him writhing in a straight jacket, sweating buckets as orderlies try to sedate him.Happily, Messrs. Lucas and Guettel did not try to recreate this moment; better still, they and director Michael Greif snagged a pair of musical theater’s most reliably brilliant stars to play Joe and his wife, Kirsten Arnesen. One could quibble that Kelli O’Hara and Brian d’Arcy James are each a couple of decades older than Remick and Lemmon were when they tackled these characters, but the stage actors — Ms. O’Hara in particular, who retains the kind of wholesome glamor and sharp wit that made Remick irresistible even in unwholesome roles — prove credible as a young-ish couple trying to establish a life and family together.If anything, the leading actors’ additional years lend poignance to their early scenes, casting shadows of approaching horrors as Joe introduces Kirsten, a teetotaler when they meet, to the joys of one Brandy Alexander. It’s not long before she’s sampling other cocktails, then graduating to harder stuff as she and Joe struggle to settle into marriage and parenthood. In the jazzy number “Evanesce,” Ms. O’Hara and Mr. D’Arcy James bounce around, physically and vocally, extolling the “magic” of booze; moments later in the show, Ms. O’Hara is scatting a very different tune, “Are You Blue,” as Kirsten, pie-eyed and manic but clearly distressed, tries in vain to clean their apartment.For those unfamiliar with Mr. Guettel’s previous work, which includes the acclaimed scores of “The Light in the Piazza” and “Floyd Collins,” his dissonant, often meandering melodies would hardly lead you to guess he’s the grandson of Richard Rodgers — or the son of Mary Rodgers, whose own credits include the brightly tuneful “Once Upon A Mattress.” But the third-generation composer provides a few haunting showcases for his troubled characters, and for Ms. O’Hara’s gleaming soprano, featured here in no fewer than 10 songs and four reprises. Mr. Guettel’s lyrics here can be similarly evocative. When Joe suggests to Kirsten that they join an organization of recovering drinkers (Alcoholics Anonymous is not mentioned specifically, as it is in the film), she sings of feeling abandoned: “What about the church we built? Do I have to go there alone? What about our secret language? Who will I talk to?” Mr. Lucas’s libretto provides both leads with dialogue that can be fresh, funny, and wrenching, even if the book never fully shakes off the dated preachiness of the movie.While the musical is more of a showcase for Ms. O’Hara, who in addition to singing gloriously is by turns dryly hilarious and deeply moving, Mr. D’Arcy James is scarcely overshadowed as a singer or actor. He’s chilling in the frantic “435,” falling off the wagon and suffering a post-traumatic flashback to his service in the Korean War, then makes the more uplifting “Forgiveness” soar.Under Mr. Greif’s supple, compassionate direction, the supporting players also thrive, among them the redoubtable Byron Jennings, cast as Kirsten’s disappointed father, and a young actress named Ella Dane Morgan, adorable and poignant as Joe and Kirsten’s daughter, who suffers even more but is presented as almost preternaturally sturdy. A fine David Jennings appears as Joe’s sponsor, played on screen by Jack Klugman, and gamely fields lines such as, “Being born drunks doesn’t mean we get to do whatever the hell we want.” Certainly, in keeping the musical at a brisk 100 minutes, the creators of this “Days of Wine and Roses” show admirable restraint. And thanks to their redeeming wit and, especially, the power and nuance of the performances, the show packs a solid punch — and not, be assured, the spiked kind.

Not All ‘Days of Wine and Roses’ Are Created Equal

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