The Apple Tree

At Studio 54 there’s a revival. A great pick. Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick’s charming musical THE APPLE TREE, loosely weaves together three winsome tales of love and yearning. The first about Adam and Eve, the second based on the “THE LADY OR THE TIGER?” and the third from Jules Feiffer’s PASSIONELLA.

In this Roundabout Theatre production, beautifully orchestrated by Jonathan Tunick, Kristin Chenoweth portrays the temptress Eve in the first story, the jealous Princess Barbara in the second and PASSIONELLA a Marilyn Monroe- like movie star in the third. In this is her most convincing incarnation, she morphs from a gaunt, bedraggled chimney sweep to the buxom Hollywood star, evoking Monroe’s erotic posturing quite effortlessly.

In fact, watching Ms. Chenoweth one senses that imitation is her MO. Even as a singer she seems to model herself and her voice on the operatic divas of an earlier generation, as if awed by their grandeur. While this brings a convincing sense of her own iconic qualities, it also exposes a vocal capacity in which squealing and nasality are too often the means of comic expression. That’s especially grating in the second scene “The Lady or The Tiger?”, a satirical tale told burlesque style, about a jealous princess and her despotic father, King Arik played by Walter Charles.

None of this bodes well for a suitor. And as staged by director Gary Griffin with a cacophonous mix of ancient times and high camp, the story’s open ended conclusion is more baffling than controversial. So is Brian d’Arcy James, the suitor whose downfall includes too many pratfalls. Later though d’Arcy James takes on a distinguished air as the British rock ‘n roll star, Flip Charming in PASSIONELLA. But he’s at his best in ADAM AND EVE, playing a regular guy whose arm is forcefully twisted by a bossy but adoring wife.

It’s this first scene which is most enchanting. Adapted from Mark Twain’s “The Diary of Adam and Eve”, Part I is filled with fractured aphorisms, colloquialisms and a delicious sense of humor, marvelously topped by Marc Kudisch’s rendering of the Snake. So evil and so transfixing, the role seems to have been made for Kudisch, your typical bad guy.

Still it’s the music of APPLE TREE so very beautiful that you’ll feel like you’re in the Garden of Eden.

That’s This Week on Broadway. I’m Isa Goldberg.