‘DESPERATE MEASURES’ TRANSFORMS SHAKESPEARE’S ‘MEASURE FOR MEASURE’ INTO A WILD WEST MUSICAL

Lauren Molina, Peter Saide, Conor Ryan, Nick Wyman, Emma Degerstedt and Gary Marachek. Photo: Carol Rosegg

HENRY EDWARDS - New York - June 1, 2018

Nothing is desperate about “Desperate Measures” except its desire to please. And please it does from start to finish.

After an extended run at the York Theatre Company’s Theater at Saint Peter’s (where it received mainly terrific reviews and generated enthusiastic word of mouth), the rollicking six-character musical by David Friedman (music) and Peter Kellogg (book and lyrics) has relocated to New World Stages. 

That is where I finally caught up with the shamelessly entertaining show.

“Desperate Measures” takes as its inspiration Shakespeare’s “problem play,” “Measure for Measure.”

The problem play (and it is very problematical) dramatizes the events that occur when the Duke of Vienna leaves town, and the young nun Isabella appoaches the Duke's deputy Angelo in search of mercy for her brother who faces a death sentence. Overcome with lust, the temporary leader declares that he will let the brother live if Isabella has sex with him.

It's an awful story and doesn't sound like it would make a great musical -at least to me. Or does it to you?

Frankly, in general, I tend to be wary of musicals drawn from Shakespeare.

Of course, there’s “West Side Story,”  “Kiss Me, Kate,” “Two Gentleman of Verona,” The Boys from Syracuse,” and what Forbidden Broadway calls “Hamlet on safari,” “The Lion King.”

But there have also been a bumper crop of stinkers, “Rockabye Hamlet” (seven performances), “Oh, Brother,” based on “The Comedy of Errors” (three performances), and “Play On!,” based on “Twelfth Night” (61 performances), among them.

“Desperate Measures” takes place “somewhere out west” (the pre-state territory of Arizona) in the early 1890s. something else that raised concern.

Other than three early-1950's Howard Keel movies, with Betty Hutton (“Annie Get Your Gun”), Doris Day (“Calamity Jane”) and Jane Powell (“Seven Brides for Seven Brothers”), musicals and westerns are an uneasy mix.

Not even Rodgers and Hammerstein and Lerner and Lowe could make the shotgun marriage work.  For proof, take a look at R&H’s film version of “Oklahoma!” or Lerner and Lowe’s “Paint Your Wagon.”

Conventional wisdom be damned. I was wrong, incredibly wrong. “Desperate Measures” blows my reservations to smithereens.

Peter Kellogg’s farcical book (in rhymed couplets, no less!) wisely discards almost all of “Measure for Measure” except for the key ethical dilemma, Angelo’s scheme to trade sex with a nun in exchange for her brother’s freedom.

Pulling out all the stops, the attempted sexual harassment - and just about everything else - is played for laughs, lots of them, and miraculously it works.

Wielding a very broad brush, Kellogg renders his characters as brazen stereotypes.  We may have met encountered them before, but not as amusingly.

 “Desperate” aptly characterizes hot blooded, appropriately named Johnny Blood (Conor Ryan, tall, skinny and incredibly loose limbed), who is in prison awaiting execution for committing murder. 

The spirited opening number, “The Ballad of Johnny Blood” (think of every classic Western movie theme you’ve ever heard –they’re all here), informs us the murder was an act of self-defense. Johnny was involved in a fight over the attentions being paid to the love of his life, stripper and occasional prostitute Bella Rose (broadly comic Lauren Molina).

Cynical, taciturn but gallant Sheriff Martin Green (perfect hero Peter Saide) was responsible for arresting Johnny,  Now he's guilt ridden about the death sentence and determined to do something about it.

Blood’s sister, Susanna (incredibly appealing Emma Degerstedt), is a postulant on the verge of becoming Sister Mary Jo. As she attempts to make her devotions, the good-hearted sheriff approaches her and convinces her to appeal to the governor for her brother’s life.

Villainous and lecherous Governor von Richterhenkenpflichtgetruber (Nick Wyman, outrageous) has a horrible last name, an awful Teutonic accent, a twitchy eye, and the ability to suggest another even creepier politician. (“Make Arizona great again,” he roars.)

One look at how adorable Susanna looks in a wimple is all it takes to encourage him to try to grab her by the rosary.

The governor, by nature a dealmaker and an odious one at that, agrees to free her brother only if the singing nun spends the night in bed with him. Otherwise, bro will hang. (A waiting noose hangs over the audience.)

An appalled Susanna refuses to agree to her own rape, but Sheriff Martin cooks up a bed trick, Susanna will agree to the governor's depraved plan, but, at the last minute, will be swapped out with Bella Rose. The sexy saloon girl has already slept with all the men in town anyway.

The bed trick is a plot device in traditional literature and folklore that involves going to bed with someone whom you mistake for someone else, something that seems never to happen in real life (I think).

“Desperate Measures” also calls upon another classic comic device, the  vaudeville mirror routine, in which two characters stand on opposite sides of an empty mirror frame and one pretends to be the other’s reflection.

Almost every great comedian, from Charlie Chaplin to the Marx Brothers to Adam Sandler to Bugs Bunny, has at some point in his performed his own variation of the bit.

Despite the ensuing cascade of complications, the show comes to a rip-roaring happy conclusion with two marriages, that of Johnny and Bella Rose and Sheriff Martin and Susanna.  The ceremony is performed by perpetually drunk and confused Irish priest, Father Morse (model of confusion Gary Marachek), who pens letters to fabled atheist Friedrich Nietzsche.

Of course, the marriages take place at a refugee camp.

As you can see the jokes never let up.

“Desperate Measures” comes equipped with an engaging 16-number score.  I especially liked the Act One closer, “The Way You Feel Inside,” which brims with emotion, and two powerhouse songs about the complexity of love, "What is This Feeling" and "Stop There.”

James Morgan’s unit barn set features some shameless signage (“Bridle Chapel” for a weddings hall; "Justice sleeps here" for the governor's bedroom).

Director and choreographer Bill Castellino knows how far to go and his wonderful cast and he go all the way and then some to create an evening bursting with high spirits.

“Desperate Measures” is fast, funny and tuneful. It also happens to be a rarity, one of the few entertainments these days that lives up to the positive word-of-mouth.

Conor Ryan and Gary Marachek. Photo: Carol Rosegg

For tickets:  Visit : DESPERATE MEASURES THE MUSICAL