Review: "The Who's Tommy" -- Berkshire Theatre Festival

["James Yattaw" <jim@xxxxxxxxxx>]

A new take on the venerable rock opera...

http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=153082&category=POPRE
VIEWS&BCCode=&newsdate=7/21/2003

'Tommy' Truly Embarrassing

By MICHAEL ECK, Special to the (Albany, NY) Times Union
First published: Sunday, July 20, 2003

 STOCKBRIDGE, Mass. -- Jared Coseglia's production of "The Who's Tommy" is
magnificently stupid.
It's a shame that the Berkshire Theatre Festival has wasted a slot in its
experimental Unicorn Season staging such an utter piece of tripe.

As a rock opera on record, "Tommy" was exciting as much for its oddball
freshness and the thunder of The Who's feral performances as for anything
inherent in the songs themselves.

As a stage piece, "Tommy" has always been lame, asking the audience to buy
writer Pete Townshend's psycho-babble wholesale and fill in many of the
story's blanks for themselves.

Coseglia manages to make the whole affair even dumber.

Coseglia has refashioned the tale of the pinball messiah for our times,
which really isn't necessary considering the original is less than 35 years
old. What's more, he's done a remarkably bad job of it.

His updates are obvious, unfunny and unnecessary. In Coseglia's vision,
World War II becomes Vietnam, Mother Walker's lover is a lesbian, the Acid
Queen is a man in drag and Tommy, dear god, is re-imagined as Michael
Jackson, right down to the black fedora, red brocade jacket and veil.

What's more, the Walkers are a white-trash couple, with dad dressed as an
urban cowboy and mom traipsing around like a stripper.

To what end, any of this, is anyone's guess.

And that's almost not to mention Uncle Ernie's gloves, with penises as
fingers, the neon-haired judges that echo "Macbeth's" witches or Sally
Simpson's silvery pink bra.

Or the pseudo industrial set, the pastiche fashions that include Wal-Mart
western wear, new wave school clothes and safety-pin punk.

Or even the mock barroom ad for "White Woman's Redneck Single Malt, Stove
Top Distilled Whiskey."

OK, Jared, the liquor in the play is noted as Scotch. American whiskey -- as
opposed to Scotch whisky; note the missing e -- is made from corn and rye,
not malt. Besides, who ever heard of a stereo-typical redneck caring whether
they got single malt or chocolate malt as long as it got them drunk? Jeez.

To make matters even worse, as if they could be, teen Tommy, that "deaf,
dumb and blind kid," dances in rhythm to the music, murmurs constantly and
ducks before he gets hit -- all long before his transformation into the
daffy pinball wizard.

To their credit, the cast -- save Cory Grant as the very uncomfortable
looking adult Tommy -- sings well and the Ken Clark-led band plays great,
but their efforts cannot hope to pull Coseglia out of his own pretentious
mire.

This "Tommy" is lascivious when it doesn't need to be, wrong-headed at every
turn and about as entertaining as reality TV.

This "Tommy" is an embarrassment.

"THE WHO'S TOMMY"

Performance reviewed: 2 p.m. Saturday

Where: Unicorn Theatre, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Stockbridge, Mass.

Running time: 2 hours, 10 minutes. One intermission

Continues: 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Through Aug. 2

Tickets: $35

Info: (413) 298-5576

Web site: http://www.berkshiretheatre.org