Taking A Chance On Love

So, who’s at the York Theater?

Touche.

Touche who?

The lyricist, John Latouche, whose name is little known but whose lyrics no doubt have touched your heart. Author of TAKING A CHANCE ON LOVE, and a multitude of musicals that ran on and off-Broadway, Touche, as he called himself was the barefoot boy from the back woods of Virginia who climbed his way into the laps of the surrealists and into the arms of rich dowagers.

TAKING A CHANCE ON LOVE, the title of the York Theatre’s cabaret, relates the life of John Latouche through his lyrics and songs, his personal journals, and his reportedly risqué adventures. The first act is especially gregarious as the cast of four parlay their way through the entire plot of the musical hit CABIN IN THE SKY. The quartet masters a multitude of Latouche lyrics including one of the most unlikely pop songs to hit the air waves BALLAD FOR UNCLE SAM which tells the story of American independence in cantata form. Ironically, Latouche was blacklisted while Paul Robeson was still singing it on the radio.

A progressive writer, considered the precursor to Sondheim, Latouche’s musicals are a series of firsts... He’s responsible for the first interracial kiss on Broadway in BEGGARS HOLIDAY, he wrote the narrative song sequence to Man Ray’s "THE GIRL WITH THE PRE-FABRICATED HEART", the first surrealist film ever made, and is acknowledged in this production as the man who made Beverly Sills famous.

TAKING A CHANCE ON LOVE is the story of a fascinating man whose brilliant, wayward and crowded life ended mysteriously and all too quickly at the age of 41. The talented cast manages his monolithic achievements blithely, even though the production is a bit excessive, lengthy and loquacious.

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