Ingenious staging and a talented young cast make Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Merrily We Roll Along, a guest production at the Colony Theater, the summer’s brightest musical comedy surprise.

It’s party time circa 1976, and famed Broadway/Hollywood composer Franklin Shepard (Trevor James Berger) finds himself surrounded by “the movers” and “the shapers” who have helped him reach the top, if only Frank hadn’t forgotten what it was that once inspired him.

Then, in a move that might at first stump audiences unfamiliar with the musical’s reverse chronology, Furth’s book jumps back in time to 1973 and the New York TV studio where Frank and his longtime best friend/lyric-writing partner Charley (Jeremy Ethan Harris) are being interviewed about their collaboration, Charley’s rant about “Franklin Shepard Inc.” making it abundantly clear that these “Old Friends” can never again make it “Like It Was,” to quote three of Sondheim’s best Merrily songs.

As Merrily We Roll Along progresses backwards, we meet the women in Franklin’s life including first wife Beth Spencer (Sarah Ryan), the third member of his nightclub act with Charley back in Greenwich Village circa 1960, and Gussie Carnegie (Renee Cohen), the Broadway star who becomes Frank’s second wife.

 Most important of all is the song writer’s onetime closest female friend Mary Flynn (Tori Gresham), revolted after twenty years by Frank’s career trajectory and his choice of chums and ready to forge on ahead in life without him.

Other supporting characters include bigwig producer Joe Josephson (Brian Felker), ambitious TV journalist KT (Donna Kim), lawyer/deal maker Jerome (Riley Boronkay), aspiring screenwriter Ru (Christopher J. Thume), bubble-headed would-be actress Meg Kincaid (Taylor Bass), and Frank’s 8-to-12-year-old son Frank Jr. (Vince Venia).

Merrily We Roll Along’s reverse chronology proves an inspired choice, tempering the joy and optimism of three 20something best friends with the knowledge of how sadly it all turned out.

Director-choreographer Sonny James Lira merits high marks, not just for eliciting top-notch performances but for his imaginative use of the Colony Theatre stage. Full cast dance sequences are as lively as they are striking (Boronkay is associate choreographer) and the production’s modular set is cleverly designed and ingeniously maneuvered into ever new configurations throughout the show.

Drab projections, on the other hand, do not make the most of what could be a more visually appealing, effectively scene-setting upstage scrim, and without showing us what year we’re in (only costumes provide any indication that the first scene is even set in the past), I can imagine many in the audience remaining clueless into well into the show about its backwards time structure.

These are relatively minor quibbles, however, compared to the Colony guest production’s many plusses, since not only is this Merrily We Roll Along a charmer, it proves an ideal showcase for actors just about the same age as Frank and Charley and Mary when they began/ended their journey back in 1957.

Berger (who played his character’s 10-year-old son in a Musical Theatre Guild concert staged reading back in 2006) has grown up into a fine, vibrantly voiced leading man, giving us an adult Franklin as bedeviled as he is gifted.

NYC’s Harris makes a particularly strong impression as Charley, hiding bitterness with wise cracks and stealing the show with the manic vocal tour-de-force that is “Franklin Shepard, Inc.”

Expect big things ahead for the Seattle-based Gresham, who takes Mary from disillusioned drunk to starry-eyed innocent and sings “Like It Was” with the kind of signature pipes that can turn starlet into star.

Big-voiced L.A. favorite Cohen does Broadway diva Gussie proud, and in a clever comedic turn, reveals it’s not just Miss Carnegie’s name that has changed since her secretarial days, and the lovely Ryan shines brightly too, whether in a heartrending “Not A Day Goes By” or as the distaff Kennedy in “Bobby and Jackie and Jack.”

 Ensemble kudos are shared equally by the all-around terrific (and indefatigably multitasking) Logan Allison (TV Newsman, Mr. Spencer), Bass, Boronkay (also Dory), Aaron Camitses (Makeup Artist, Photographer), Felker, Kim, Ashley Knaack (TV Newswoman, Mrs. Spencer), Josiah Lucas (Tyler, Judge), Shaunte Nickels (Scotty, Evelyn), Thume (also Minister), and Venia (who miraculously does not shrink an inch, no matter how much younger young Frank gets).

Merrily We Roll Along sounds sensational thanks to musical director Jan Roper, her Grade-A orchestra, and sound designer Jeff Resnick, and the entire cast looks fabulous in Michael Mullen’s bevy of period-perfect, color-coordinated costumes, with Zachary Titterington scoring lighting design points as well.

Merrily We Roll Along is presented by 4Leaf Music Productions in association with Golden Performing Arts Center. Manichanh Kham is stage manager.

Guest productions can be an iffy thing, but there’s scarcely an if, and, or but about Merrily We Roll Along at the Colony. The Sondheim-Furth gem is in good hands indeed.

Colony Theatre, 555 North Third Street, Burbank.
https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/3511635

–Steven Stanley
August 16, 2018

Tags: 4Leaf Music Productions, Colony Theatre, George Furth, Los Angeles Theater Review, Stephen Sondheim