The Motown sound is ready once again to take New York by storm when Ain’t Too Proud—The Life and Times of The Temptations, now earning some of the loudest Ahmanson Theatre audience cheers I’ve heard in years, transfers to Broadway’s Imperial this spring.

 There may have been three Supremes and four Tops, but five was the lucky number for the Deep South-to-Detroit transplants who hit Number One on Billboard’s Hot 100 four times between 1965 and 1972 with “My Girl,” “Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me), “I Can’t Get Next To You,” and “Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone.”

 Like Jersey Boys before it, Ain’t Too Proud takes a first-person approach to its rags-to-riches tale, perhaps not surprisingly since Dominique Morisseau has based her book on Temptations founder Otis Williams’ 1988 autobiography, and if it take a while to move from exposition to the drama that ensues when five very different men attempt to make music together year after year after year, it’s more than worth the wait.

 In the role that has already won him the San Francisco Theatre Critics Circle Award for Ain’t Too Proud’s 2017 Berkeley Rep World Premiere, a sensational Derrick Baskin scarcely leaves the stage as he recounts the tale of Texas-born Otis, a Detroit teenager with dreams of stardom in his eyes.

Success didn’t come overnight for the group that was to become among Motown’s biggest superstars, nor was their initial lineup the “Classic Five” who first hit Number One in 1964 with “My Girl,” but before long Otis, Melvin Franklin (Jawan M. Jackson), Eddie Kendricks (Jeremy Pope), Paul Williams (James Harkness), and lead singer David Ruffin (Ephraim Sykes), who replaced the volatile, heavy-drinking Al Bryant (Jarvis B. Manning, Jr.), were living the high life, and not just in terms of success.

 The power-piped Ruffin came with an ego as big as his talent and a drug addiction to match, and both he and Kendricks soon found themselves at loggerheads with Otis, whose insistence that they were five equal partners did not always ring true.

Not surprisingly, these conflicts give Ain’t Too Proud much of its dramatic punch, as does Otis’s marriage to Josephine (Rachidra Scott), already pregnant on their wedding day and none too pleased about raising their child with little help from a husband on the road fifty-two weeks a year.

 Adding to the drama is Motown head honcho Berry Gordy’s (Jahi Kearse) insistence that he knew better than Otis what was best for the Temptations, including refusing to even consider allowing them to write their own songs, leaving that up to the likes of Smokey Robinson (Christian Thompson) and Norman Whitfield (Manning), the latter of whom gave the Temps the “psychedelic soul” sound that became their late-1960s trademark when Ruffin replacement Dennis Edwards (Saint Aubin) informed the world that “Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone.”

 The Temptations aren’t the only Motown royalty to take centerstage at the Ahmanson. Diana Ross (Candice Marie Woods), Florence Ballard (Nasia Thomas), and Mary Wilson (Taylor Symone Jackson) give us The Best Of The Supremes, and Tammi Terrell (Thomas) duets “If I Could Build My Whole World Around You” with David Ruffin as romantic sparks ignite between the Temptations lead singer and his doomed young love.

As out-of-town tryout number three of Ain’t Too Proud’s journey to Broadway (D.C.’s Kennedy Center was number two and it’s got one more stop in Toronto this fall), book writer Morisseau, Des McAnuff (perhaps not coincidentally Jersey Boys’ director as well), and Sergio Trujillo (also choreographer for the now-touring On Your Feet!) have had ample time to iron out the kind of kinks often present in pre-Broadway runs, and it shows in dramaturgy, direction, and pitch-perfect renditions of those signature Motown moves.

 A finely-tuned, dramatically compelling musical extravaganza, Ain’t Too Proud features thirty-one Motown hits performed by a spectacular cast with acting chops to match their vocal prowess,

Aubyn, Jackson, Pope, Sykes, Thompson, and Woods merit special snaps for convincing us we’re hearing Edwards, Franklin, Kendricks, Ruffin, Robinson, and Ross’s distinctive pipes (or the next best thing), and company members playing characters whose voices are less well known do just as bang-up a job.

 Though it’s Baskin’s powerhouse, deeply felt Otis that anchors the production and Pope’s Eddie and Sykes’s Ruffin who provide the most explosive dramatic fireworks, there’s not a weak link in a cast that also includes E. Clayton Cornelious as Paul Williams replacement Richard Street, Shawn Bowers as Otis’s son Lamont, and Joshua Morgan as Shelly Berger, the Temptations’ game-changing Jewish-American manager.

 Ain’t Too Proud’s Broadway-pro design team have given the production a slick, distinctive black-and-white look with just enough splashes of color to make visually varied, and it sounds great too thanks to musical director-arranger Kenny Seymour.

Molly Meg Legal is production stage manager. Esther Antoine, Rodney Earl Jackson Jr., and Curtis Wiley are swings.

With Motown: The Musical focusing on The Supremes, Smokey Robinson, and the Jackson Five, The Temptations have had to wait till now for their Broadway star turn. Ain’t Too Proud more than does them justice in the most spellbinding and entertaining of ways.

Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N Grand Ave, Los Angeles.
www.CenterTheatreGroup.org

–Steven Stanley
August 24, 2018
Photos: Matthew Murphy, Doug Hamilton, Kevin Berne, Joel Dockendorf

Tags: Ahmanson Theatre, Dominique Morisseau, Los Angeles Theater Review, The Temptations