Chicago Tribune | By trimming the fat, 'Spamalot' adds flavor

Five of my favorite words in show business are "out-of-town musical try-out," and one of the reasons is this: With an out-of-town musical tryout, audiences seeing the show mid-run often get a better version than the first-nighters. Having seen the substantially revised and improved "Spamalot" the other day, 10 days after the musical opened its pre-Broadway tryout at Chicago's Shubert Theatre, I'm here to tell you: Nobody misses the witch-burning number. Nobody misses the singing cow. Nobody misses the missing 15 minutes.

Director Mike Nichols, composer John Du Prez and librettist, lyricist and co-composer Eric Idle haven't been twiddling their respective thumbs, or anyone else's. It was a good time opening night, but as of the Jan. 19 matinee the stage version of "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" is no longer a good time. It is closer to a very good time -- close enough, I think, to transcend its larger, nagging questions of satiric intent and focus.

Helming his first stage musical since LBJ was in office, Nichols realizes he has a popular hit on his highly compensated hands. The national press, at least as represented by the New York Post and Newsweek, has already determined the probable smashdom of "Spamalot." Broadway is hungry. "Spamalot," which owes so much of its spirit (and too many of its jokes) to "The Producers," is likely to become the biggest just-for-laughs Broadway musical since Mel Brooks made crossover hay.

Not only that: The Python musical is a less star-dependent lark than "The Producers," a show that owed more of its initial buzz to Nathan Lane than Brooks would care to admit. "Spamalot," which may (and should) turn out to be a full 40 minutes shorter than "The Producers," is more of an ensemble piece. It requires a few good comics who can sing, and who can "do" Python without being slavish geeks about it.

Paradoxically, however, the cuts in Act 1 have done a helpful thing: They have given King Arthur (Tim Curry) a natural authority over the proceedings. The writers and Nichols haven't beefed up the Arthur role; they've merely cut away the dead wood not involving Arthur. Now, when Curry and the extremely valuable Michael McGrath (Patsy) sing "I'm All Alone," the number registers more strongly. It's the one song that gets at what Nichols, somewhat optimistically, discussed in pre-opening interviews as the class conflict theme -- and it's the right kind of funny, tinged with rue.

Sara Ramirez, who kills, kills, kills as the Lady of the Lake, no longer appears as the witch or the cow. It's better this way. It's too bad the funniest song in the polyglot "Spamalot" score comes so early: The song called "The Song That Goes Like This," at once a parody of Andrew Lloyd Webber's brand of bathetic balladry and, as delivered by Ramirez and Christopher Sieber, wonderful on its own terms. Ramirez's other big number, "The Diva's Lament," is more conventional, though Ramirez could sell the "Spamalot" audience just about anything. And that includes the special limited-edition "Golden Honey Grail" flavor of Spam, made possible by the good people of Hormel.

Opening night, Act 1 was the act with the biggest dead spots. No more. On the recent Wednesday matinee Act 1 clocked in at a supermodel-skinny 49 minutes, Act 2, about an hour. Idle and Du Prez may yet replace "Burn Her!," the late, unlamented witch number, with something else (and this time, something funny?) to introduce Sir Bedevere. As is, though, the revised Act 1 -- even with a blurry, halfhearted "run away!" scene at the French castle -- played like an act with a mission, holy or otherwise.

Broadway bits

Then comes Act 2, which hasn't changed much, and which asks the question: Does "Spamalot" give too many regards to Broadway?

At one point in what we'll call the "plot," King Arthur meets up with the Knights Who Say Ni, who have more on their minds than merely securing a shrubbery. The king and his men, says the head Ni Knight, must stage a musical on Broadway. (In print two weeks ago I misstated that the put-on-a-musical idea came from Almighty God, not the Knight of Ni. Here is a correction. "In the Jan. 11 review of `Spamalot,' Almighty God was credited with the notion of King Arthur's knights doing a musical on Broadway. In fact, the idea came from the Knight Who Says Ni. The Tribune regrets the error.")

The best bits of "Spamalot" don't come entirely from the movie, and they don't come entirely from Brooks or "Forbidden Broadway." Like comic dybbuks, they come from somewhere in between two worlds. In Act 1, when the song "Knights of the Round Table" turns into a jazz-inflected Vegas spectacular, it's hilarious. It's worth it just to watch Ramirez do Liza Minnelli with a side order of Lorna Luft. And if "Spamalot" doesn't end up playing the Excalibur Hotel someday -- the Vegas resort gets enormous product placement here -- I'm the Chicken of Bristol.

But when Sir Robin (David Hyde Pierce) sings "You Won't Succeed on Broadway (If You Haven't Any Jews)," the joke is tired at best, wince-worthy at worst. I'm sure Idle means to be the right kind of offensive with this one. But the Anglo-Saxon comic perspective leaves the sight gags (a huge Star of David in lights, a "Fiddler" chorus line of grail dancers instead of bottle dancers) wanting, patronizing, pandering or all three. Similarly, when Sir Lancelot (Hank Azaria) offers a stirring defense of the castle-bound homosexual Prince Herbert (Christian Borle), it's pretty soggy writing. Lancelot's subsequent big coming-out number, "His Name Is Lancelot," is treated as a Peter Allen/Village People tropical bash. That's a start, but Azaria doesn't do much of anything in it. Les boys do all the work.

Now: How much of these issues are, in fact, issues? Idle and company settle for increasingly familiar showbiz targets, especially in Act 2, in terms of its spoofing. Yet "Spamalot" has too much else in its corner to thwart its lust for Broadway glory. Nichols, Idle, Du Prez and the rest of the company aren't resting on their laurels. The cuts and changes have already made it all more fun.

Meantime, in London, Idle's fellow Python founder Michael Palin recently told a journalist that "Life of Brian" might make a good comic opera. At this rate, the song "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" -- written for "Life of Brian," but very comfortably interpolated into the "Spamalot" score -- may become the cheer-up number for the early 21st Century.

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"Spamalot" concludes its Chicago Shubert Theatre tryout with the 2 p.m. matinee Jan. 23. The show moves to Broadway Feb. 14, with an official opening March 17 at the Shubert Theatre, 225 W. 44th St., New York City. Broadway "Spamalot" tickets ($36.25-$101.25, with $201.25 premium seats) at 800-432-7250 or telecharge.com.