Theater Review

TOM TITUS

When Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” became the first animated movie

ever nominated for a Best Picture Oscar, the big cheeses in the Mouse

House must have snapped to attention and considered additional ways to

keep the cash registers jingling for this ancient French fable.

How about a live Broadway version?

This proved to be one of the studio’s more prescient moves, for

“Beauty” has been anything but beastly at the box office ever since. The

current touring incarnation--on view for a two-week engagement at the

Orange County Performing Arts Center--is a lyrical and visual treat for

children and adults alike.

This splashy, colorful musical--with its animated objects kicking up

their heels in an extended, all-stops-out rendition of the show’s

signature number, “Be Our Guest”--is absolutely delightful.

Costumer Ann Hould-Ward and scenic designer Stanley A. Meyer have

created a lavish, almost overwhelming fantasy world in which the

performers had better be at the top of their form or risk getting lost

among the dishes and silverware.

The version now in Costa Mesa, staged by Robert Jess Roth, has no

problems on this score. Susan Owen and Grant Norman excel in their

radically contrasting title characters, while the energetic featured

players and smoothly drilled chorus members chime in with wonderfully

delineated characterizations.

Owen, as the beautiful but bookish Belle, mixes a healthy dash of

spice into her sugary interpretation, splendidly rebuffing the

narcissistic, overbearing Gaston and gradually warming to the clumsy

overtures of Norman’s dominant, yet insecure, Beast. Her transition is

most winningly illustrated in her late second-act solo, “A Change in Me.”

Character depth is not the first trait one imagines in the Beast, yet

Norman explores every avenue of tentative emotion behind his fearsome

growls. His plaintive “If I Can’t Love Her” number, which closes the

first act, is tinged with the pain and heartache of a once-insensitive

prince doomed to a beastly existence unless he can elicit genuine

romantic feelings in his comely captive.

The cartoonish, heavily muscled Gaston is rendered with appropriately

limited dimension by Chris Hoch, who excels in his title number, backed

by his tavern comrades, in a stein-clinking masterpiece of showmanship

and timing.

Michael Raine is equally effective as his fall guy buddy Lefou, who

absorbs more physical punishment than all three Stooges combined in one

of their two-reelers.

Ron Lee Savin displays an addled warmth as Belle’s elderly, eccentric

father, whose capture by the Beast induces Belle to offer herself as a

substitute hostage. It’s at that point that the show virtually takes wing

and the atmosphere becomes truly Disney-esque.

The part-human, part-object servants--suffering under the same spell

as their master--put on a glorious show. Their centerpiece is

candlestick-handed Lumiere (Ron Wisniski), who slices the ham thicker

than most of the servants, even pausing for a “take” to the audience

after a particular groaner of a pun.

Beautifully characterized renditions are delivered by John Alban

Coughlan as Cogsworth, the clock; Janet MacEwen as the gentle old teapot,

Mrs. Potts; Monica M. Wernitt as the grande dame transformed into a

bureau; and Jennifer Shrader as the sultry Babette, whose furry hands are

her only nonhuman trait.

Young Joshua Hawkins and Jonathan Press alternate as Chip, the teacup

yearning to be a little boy again (a superb visual effect, incidentally).

Gerard McIsaac effectively swipes his scenes as a doormat with

Olympic-level tumbling skills, also doubling as the young prince in the

prologue and one of the snarling wolves.

The “Three Silly Girls” who swoon over Gaston are well-played by

Danyelle Bossardet, Christine DeVito and Linda Griffen.

The real stars of “Beauty and the Beast,” however, are Meyer and

Hould-Ward, the scenic artist and costume designer, who have created

these marvelous effects, along with choreographer Matt West, whose work

with the ensemble renders the show eminently watchable--particularly

during the extended “Be Our Guest” production number, which earns

thunderous applause.

“Beauty and the Beast” is ticketed for an extra week more than the

customary one, a foresighted decision indeed. It’s a Disney show that you

don’t have to be a kid to appreciate.

FYI

* WHAT: “Beauty and the Beast”

* WHEN: 8 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays, and 2

and 7:30 p.m. Sundays through July 23

* WHERE: Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive,

Costa Mesa

* HOW MUCH: $21-$61

* PHONE: (714) 740-7878

*

* TOM TITUS reviews local theater for the Daily Pilot. His reviews

appear Thursdays and Saturdays.