Mr. Miss.“Oriental Tories rarely reach the Western stage with any sense of reality,” Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote shortly before The King and I premiered in 1951. Or, as one of the musical’s Siamese characters sings about Westerners, “that’s how they feel” about the sentimental/Oriental. ”
Like many mid-century classics, The King and I has its problems. If you were to cover this story today, you wouldn’t center around a white British woman who talks loud and bossy until foreigners appreciate her. Rogers and Hammerstein follow Anna Leonowens, who arrives in Siam to tutor the royal children, and follows his family through repeated clashes with the autocratic King Mongkut while fending off predatory Western powers. It depicts how it became essential to the modernization project.
Bartlett Sher’s reverent but handsome Broadway production, designed and lit in sparkling jewel tones, has already been performed in the West End and on tour. There’s no bolder reimagining than Daniel Fish’s transformation of Oklahoma. Her operetta-like songs are undoubtedly popular, and Shah’s most penetrating insight is how unsettling her brilliant music is. Songs in the shadow of power cannot escape further heightening of fear.
Anna, played by Helen George, is first seen biting her lip nervously. In her “I Whistle a Happy Tune,” she had her eyes completely round and she was trying to look confident, but she soon realized that she was becoming more and more crisp towards authority. She often spoke her truth. She arrives at court in a wave of aquamarine (gorgeous costumes by Catherine Zuber) and meets a select group of the king’s 67 children. They respond enthusiastically to her unique teachings – breezy explanations of snow and rousing show tunes (we’re awaiting the Ofsted report).
This show is feminist through and through. The women are the show’s smartest cookies and moral compasses, and they get the best songs. Cesara Bonner, who plays the king’s first wife, shrewdly navigates the politics of the palace, a look of bewilderment that ripples beneath her calmness. Marinella Phillips, who plays Tuptim, his new wife, shares her fleeting love songs with her soft-voiced lover (Dean John Wilson). The Choir of Royal Wives is also a group of mothers, and its activities center on men with sensitive skin.
Just like Pique, leonin Darren Lee finds traces of mischief in Mongkut. This musical has a gentle melody, but at its heart there is an incomplete romance. Anna and the king often can barely even coexist, let alone fantasize about each other. When Anna performs polkas in “Shall We Dance?,” they suggest a deeper attraction. His hands slide around her waist and the atmosphere changes, if only while they spin on the floor. They can never be together – “I don’t like polygamy,” Anna declares, “or even moderate bigamy” – but for a moment you think they are. Imagine a world where things could be.
It’s a lively moment in Cher’s solid direction, which delivers heavy dialogue at a ponderous pace. The most dynamic is Uncle Tom’s dramatic ballet her version of Tom’s Cabin, based on original choreography by Jerome Robbins and built from graphic, flexible figures. The dancers’ menacing fingers tremble in the air, reminding us that this story is a reflection on the use of power, then and now.
