Chenoweth makes a huge impression in the uproarious (and sad) true story of Jackie Siegel, now on stage at Boston's Emerson Colonial Theatre.
By Peter Chianca and Jackie Chianca
First things first: Kristin Chenoweth is a national treasure, and if you don’t agree, you will have to fight us.
Or at the very least, you will have to consider whether you want to see director Michael Arden’s “The Queen of Versailles,”making its world premiere at the Emerson Colonial Theatre en route to Broadway. The “Wicked” actress simply dominates the proceedings from beginning to end, almost never leaving the stage and emanating a level of energy from her 4-foot-11 frame that you simply cannot comprehend without experiencing it in person. She’s like a neutron bomb of charisma.
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Based on the 2012 documentary of the same name, the show features music and lyrics by “Wicked” mastermind Stephen Schwartz and a rollicking book by Lindsey Ferrentino. It’s ostensibly about the efforts of Jackie and David Siegel — a one-time “Mrs. Florida” and her husband, a timeshare billionaire — to build the largest private home in America, inspired by the Palace of Versailles, “because we can” (to quote the dynamic opening number). It’s really about the uniquely American desire for wealth, fame, and simply having “more” —first as farce, and then as tragedy.
It’s a tricky balancing act, and one that would be impossible without Schwartz and Ferrentino’s adept plumbing of Jackie Siegel’s real life for both high comedy and poignant irony, as well as Chenoweth’s full-throated embodiment of what could be, let’s face it, a pretty unlikeable character. Chenoweth manages to satisfyingly lampoon the real-life Jackie’s gaudy, unfettered consumerism while somehow making you sympathize with her cringey cluelessness.
The type of woman who’d quote Genghis Khan during her beauty pageant interview, Chenoweth’s Jackie Siegel deserves to immediately enter the pantheon of unstoppable Broadway musical matrons alongside Streisand’s Fanny Brice, Merman’s Mama Rose, and Lansbury’s Auntie Mame. And the show itself, with its plucky, uproarious side characters and show-stopping moments — including “This Is Not The Way,” the Act One closer that serves as Jackie’s very own “Don’t Rain on My Parade” —actually owes a lot to those stage stalwarts.
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Not so much, though, to Schwartz’s best-known work, “Wicked,” which generated the kind of musical magic that comes along once in a generation, if you’re lucky. “The Queen of Versailles” is too grounded in the real world to soar in the exquisitely clever way that “Wicked” did, but it brings its own unique pleasures; these include an engaging (albeit not notably catchy) modern score by Schwartz to accompany a book that is as funny as anything Broadway has seen in decades. That’s until things take a darker turn.
Not that there are no callbacks at all to “Wicked”: The play’s recurring theme of “American Royalty” owes more than a little to “Defying Gravity,” and “Higher Than Ever,” a second act ensemble number that has Jackie trying to pull the family up by its bootstraps after falling on hard times, can’t help but remind you of Glinda’s similar efforts to manufacture happiness out of emptiness in “Thank Goodness.” But overall, “Versailles” is very much a different animal, and in the end, the audience is better off for having a completely different set of charms to experience.
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Chenoweth is abetted by a fabulous supporting cast, notably “Amadeus” Oscar winner F. Murray Abraham as her husband, David, who takes full advantage of his ability to churn through a gamut of emotions behind his deep, dark eyes. And while not a belter, his vocals carry a welcome warmth —particularly in the sweet Act One number “Trust Me” — and he gets what may be the show’s most unexpected highlight in “The Ballad of the Timeshare King,” an uproarious old-time country-western number that nails every two-step, right down to the unlikely sight of F. Murray on a big plastic horse.
The expressive Nina White is sympathetically authentic, and eventually heartbreaking, as Jackie’s oldest daughter, Victoria. Theirs is the most pivotal relationship in the play, so it’s kind of a shame that the character feels so similar to every other disaffected teen you’ve ever seen portrayed on stage or screen. Her Act One breakout number, “Pretty Wins,” about society’s shallow preference for a particular type of good looks, is one of the few times that Schwartz’s lyrics settle for the obvious. But White rises above the cliche, especially in her Act Two duet “Pavane for a Dead Lizard,” in which she and her cousin Jonquil (excellent 19-year-old actress Tatum Grace Hopkins) smoke pot and bury a pet reptile. It’s a sheer pleasure and anything but expected.
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Jonquil, introduced late in Act One, is probably meant to be our stand-in among this family of over-the-top conspicuous consumers —one of her first lines upon entering Jackie’s gaudy Versailles-in-progress is “What the f***?” —but by that time we’ve already seen so many tacky accouterments swirl by on a wondrous array of spinning scaffolding that we’ve gotten used to it. (At one point Jackie promises to have her face painted over the subject of a classic work of art, and if you think we’re not going to see that later in the play, you haven’t been paying attention.)
Meanwhile, a phalanx of stellar supporting performers not only manages to stand up to Chenoweth’s potentially overpowering aura, but to complement it — most notably Melody Butiu’s pitch-perfect Sofia, the family’s long-suffering nanny, and Greg Hildreth as David’s hapless second-in-command. But every player is given a chance to shine, thanks to generous musical numbers and a versatile script. This is the type of show when even the wordless reactions draw big laughs, particularly by Andrew Kober in several hilarious turns.
Dane Laffrey’s glorious, multi-tiered sets — including the aforementioned scaffolding at the Siegels’ forever-in-progress palace; the art-laden walls we see during an ingenious, if overused, framing device set in actual 18th century Versailles (“the one in France,” to quote Jackie); and the marble pillars and staircases of the (almost) finished product at the play’s end — are characters in and of themselves. As the show revolves around efforts to film the documentary that made Jackie famous, an intricate array of cameras and screens circle the stage to stunning effect.
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Christian Cowan’s glorious costumes run a brilliant gamut from Ancien Régime to Juicy Couture, and the characters in them — while the show doesn’t necessarily revolve around Lauren Yalango-Grant and Christoper Cree Grant’s seamless choreography —are given a nonstop array of fun movements to propel the musical numbers and maximize the show’s ingratiating physical humor.
In the end, though, it all comes back to Chenoweth. The way she manages to pull poignant moments from out of the farce is testament to her versatility. It’s also what elevates the show from simple money-pit slapstick. In fact, her comic energy is so fierce, and the book so exquisitely funny, that it’s sometimes hard to determine when the play is truly trying to be sincere, especially in the uproarious first act. This changes a bit in Act Two, when things turn decidedly darker, but it’s there that Chenoweth pulls off an equally tricky reversal, mining laughs from the sadness.
You’re left not really knowing whether you’re really supposed to like Jackie, which may be something they need to figure out before heading to Broadway. Regardless, the ending is haunting; the audience leaves having experienced all too clearly the lessons that the play’s main character resolutely refuses to learn, making her all the more tragic. It’s a performance you absolutely need to see, just because you can.
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