Spiritual heir to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler’s Best Musical Tony Award-winning A Little Night Music beguiles, enchants and amuses with a top-notch cast at Marriott Theatre.
Set in 1900 Sweden and based on Ingmar Bergman’s film Smiles of a Summer Night, which was itself inspired by Shakespeare’s play, this show is a Sondheim highlight well-stocked with fine songs and erudite, bittersweet humor. Powered by actors with Broadway-level chops and directed with a sure hand by Nick Bowling, the Marriott production is comfort food for theater fans, a musical meal served just right.
In addition to warm, winning performances from leads Alexandra Silber (free-spirited actress Desirée Armfeldt) and Andrew Samonsky (lawyer Fredrik Egerman, Desirée’s long-ago fling looking to reconnect when her touring show stops in his town), the show features very funny turns by Veronica Garza as a countess married to Alan H Green’s dunderheaded dragoon who is also Desirée’s insanely jealous affair partner. Garza, who gets many of the show’s best lines, delivers her zingers with devilish glee and scores some of the evening’s biggest laughs. (But not all of them. Silber’s throwaway “And this is my daughter” absolutely slays.)
Sondheim’s songs, at turns wry, witty and quite poignant, are very well-handled by this cast, especially “Send in the Clowns,” the number everyone is waiting for.
Is this production one for the ages? No. What it is, though, is supremely satisfying. A rewarding night out at the theater for adults who enjoy sophisticated entertainment.
A Little Night Music runs through Aug. 9 at Marriott Theatre.
For a full roundup of reviews of this show, visit Theatre in Chicago.
Photo by Justin Barbin
