Blues in the night: It don't mean a thing, this thing they call Swing!

June 21, 5:25 PMPittsburgh Stage and Screen ExaminerAlan Petrucelli

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It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.

And it can be pretty messy when too much Swing! hits the fan.

Swing! swung by Pittsburgh Saturday night, making the Benedum Center its home for a few nights. It’s a curious little musical, earning six Tony nominations (and losing all) when it opened on Broadway in December 1999, closing the following month.

A decade later, the Pittsburgh CLO is smart enough to cash in on the success of all those small-screen dance dramas.

Swing! Happens.

But I won’t dance. Don’t ask me.

There’s an embarrassment of musical riches at the Benedum, dragged down by a musical review that swings too far out of control and that, within 45 minutes, missteps so often that it becomes repetitive and forgettable. The woman sitting to my left summed it up best when she said, “It‘s like my daughter’s dance recital;” the woman to my right was too busy text messaging to care.

Buried beneath all that rhythm and soul is a hint of Something that Might Have Been; Swing! is the kind of piece Fosse or Champion would have championed before they became famous, then dismissed from their resume.

There is no book, no plot, not one word of dialogue---just cloying “lyrics” written by Ann Hampton Callaway, most famous for penning the song Barbra Streisand sang to James Brolin at their wedding and the theme to the sitcom The Nanny.

The major problem with Swing! is its inability to connect with an audience on anything but a superficial level. There are vignettes that attempt to make us laugh and smile by knocking us over the head by weaving “characters” and emotions through dance and music. Some of numbers are vulgar: Man dates woman, he whispers in her ear, she mistakes "get in my pants" for "get in the dance"). Some mock the music: Is having a trio of businessmen sing “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” some subliminal reference to Prop 8? Others are embarrassing: Cast member Lori Barber makes “Harlem Nocturne” love to a bass---actually she humps Jeffrey Mangone's instrument while dressed in a orange crushed velvet pantsuit festooned with f-holes. (I cannot, and will not, believe theater genius William Ivey Long was responsible for such ugly costumes.) This moment was, undeniably, the most ludicrous moment I’ve seen on stage since last week, when Liza thanked Mommy and Daddy for “the greatest gift they ever gave me, Kay Thompson!”  

“Cry Me a River” was also unnecessarily strongly sexual, with cast member Karen Loprest’s cries competing with trombonist Kevin McManus’ sliding suggestive wails. And "I’ll Be Seeing You,” one of my all-time tearjerkers, forced my ducts to dry up and my mouth fall open when, instead of simply allowing cast member Deb Lyons to sing, director and choreographer Dana Solimando added one of those dreamy ballet numbers usually reserved for Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron musicals.

The program actually contains a "show synopsis," though it's nothing more than a cursory history of swing music that ends with the promise "it has always been a state of mind!"

No wonder I felt so sleepy. Blues in the night never felt so, well, blue.

Swing! continues through Friday, June 26 at the Benedum Center. For tickets, call (412) 456-666 or visit pittsburghclo.org.