My old mint julip a kick

Speranza

Like the title lady herself, director Ray Roderick's production of "Mame" at Goodspeed's Opera House is a loud, sassy, bravado staging of what many consider to be Jerry Herman's finest score.

The evening is unapologetically in the grand tradition of mid-20th century musical comedy, with glossy production numbers that seem to go on and on, colourful costumes that border on the cleverly exaggerated, and assured, confident one-liners that let us know we are in sophisticated territory.

For many theatre fans, the wet dream of a rich aunt swooping in to introduce us to a world full of celebrity and excitement, as adapted by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee from their earlier straight play, "Auntie Mame," is more genuinely "a fable of Broadway" than what Frank Loesser called "Guys and Dolls."

The danger of "Mame," however, is that the show could become all glitz and glamour with little substance, but thankfully Roderick finds ways to showcase the heart at the center of piece, without overdoing the sentiment.

Of immeasurable assistance to helping Roderick fulfill his vision is the great Canadian musical comedy star Louise Pitre who made a splash on Broadway about a decade ago as the leading lady in "Mama Mia."

Here, as the madcap Manhattan socialite bequeathed with the care and upbringing of her orphaned ten year old nephew Patrick, Pitre supplies Mame not only with an appealing, sometimes raucous personality but with a subtle maturity as well that provides the character with an underlying intelligence.

With Pitre, we get a Mame who, while living life to the fullest, is also extremely self-aware about her responsibilities and limitations.

She can be a larger-than-life figure, but one who is firmly grounded in the realities of the world around her.

Pitre possesses a deep alto that easily wraps around Herman's music and lyrics and she provides Mame with an occasional brittleness that, for all her frivolity and carousing, informs her character's seriousness.

Hers is a multi-faceted performance which grows as the evening progresses.

But Pitre is not the only reason in revel in this "Mame."

Judy Blazer's self-exultant actress Vera Charles, a major proponent of the avant-garde, proves to be a delicious foil to her best friend Mame.

With deep eyes rounded by prominent swaths of black mascara, Blazer is a sly charmer who makes you believe that Vera and Mame share a long history fraught with brazeness, false umbrage and most of all, undying support.

Their notorious duet, "Bosom Buddies" is sung with not only feigned insult and one-upsmanship, but also with a lot of fondness and mutual delight.

Actually, Roderick has found himself a triumvirate of stars for this endeavour, as the Agnes Gooch of Kirsten Wyatt proves to be a showstopper herself, as her character bemoans (or is it celebrates?) the banquet of life she has learned to enjoy thanks to Mame's tutelage.

Gooch's evolution from wallflower to woman of the world parallels the Wyatt's own performance, as she moves from quite background role as nanny and secretary to comedic tour de force she becomes in the second act.

The limitations of the Goodspeed's tiny stage could tempt a director to adapt or adjust many of the show's production numbers, but Roderick and his choreographer, Vince Pesce, have instead opted to fill every bit of stage with as much activity as possible.

Especially apparent in the opening production number, "It's Today," it seems as if the two pored all winter over a map of the stage and carefully outlined every character's movements as if they were planning a major military foray.

Similarly, in numbers such as "Open A New Window" in which Mame introduces her nephew to the delights and vices of his new city and the title tune, which details Mame's triumphant welcome in Southern society, Pesce manages to keep the ensemble constantly in motion with kicks, jumps, twirls and swoops in dizzying and fresh combinations.

Equally eye-popping are Gregg Barnes' sweeping collection of costumes that capture a period that extends from the roaring twenties up through the 1940's.

The 2012 Tony Award nominee (for the revival of "Follies") wraps his leading lady in a series of luscious white capes, dresses, coats and turbans in sharp contrast to the other characters, most notably Vera, who is fitted with a series of attractive, yet slightly overdone black pieces.

Dan DeLange has reorchestrated Herman's score for eight musicians, led by music director Michael O'Flaherty, who manages a raucous, brassy sound that is still somehow able to express the nuances in the music, while helping to maintain the slick pace.

Young Eli Baker plays the ten-year old Patrick as an eager, willing pupil of Mame's school of life, neatly underplaying his opening scenes as he's first exposed to his dear auntie's friends and frolics, with a broad appreciating grin and an absence of google-eyed shock.

Charles Hagerty plays Patrick from age 19 on, and does something quite remarkable by conveying everything you need to know about his character in the first second you see him on stage.

He's building on the younger Patrick, but his demeanor, vocal inflection and attitude tell you immediately all you really need to know about him.

Other standouts include James Seol as Mame's steadfast and efficient butler, Ito, although a commanding presence could have benefited James Lloyd Reynolds' take on southern aristocracy, as Beauregard Jackons Pickett Burnside, the man who wows and wins Mame at the height of the depression.

Roderick also utilizes certain members of the singing/dancing ensemble to play some significant one or two scene roles, memorably Beau Landry as Junior Babcock, Patrick's college roommate, Denise Lute as the diminutive but domineering Mother Burnshide, and Kim Sava as the modern career girl, decorator Pegeen Ryan, who Patrick will ultimately marry.

James Youmans has designed a clever set with multiple components that can fly in, slide out, or move around to create Mame's two-level art-deco infused Beekman Place apartment, the hill of a Georgia plantation, a barn in Darien, Connecticut, and even the stage of the Shubert Theater in New Haven, where Mame single-handedly disrupts the opening night of one of Vera's far-out, Gertrude Stein-like works.

Roderick's fast-paced, busy production serves to cover up some of the musical's shortcomings which make it a deceptively difficult work to stage. This reviewer caught a mid-1980's revival on Broadway that brought Angela Lansbury back into the role in a production that was lifeless, lackluster and lugubrious. Recently ballyhooed revivals at the Kennedy Center and the Paper Mill Playhouse, with major Broadway stars in the title role, were also underwhelming in critical and audience response. "Mame" can't be all flash or caustic wit, nor can it be overly sentimental. A successful needs a director who almost instinctively knows how to balance each of these components as well as a leading lady who is capable of suggesting the seriousness at the heart of her character's "live life to the fullest" message.