| . | 08/21/2010
4 Play The Flying Karazov Brothers
By: Eugene Paul
| The Flying Karamazov Brothers |
| Photo by Mark Raker |
There’s deliberate overtones to the title the Flying Kramazov Brothers hung on their returning vaudeville show: something not for the kids, something grown ups cotton to as they accompany wildly enthusiastic youngsters to this latest Flying Karamazov Brothers spate of tomfoolery. The whole audience is willingly inveigled into being at one with the show. In fact, repeat enthusiasts are ready and armed when called upon to provide challenges. More of that anon.
They are not brothers. Neither do they fly nor are they Cossacks, Muzhiks, nor any brand of Russian. They’re all home grown USAers. Paul Magid, the doyen, having been with the troupe since its inception in 1973 – he’s even one of the inceptors – writes their sol-called book, a tatterdemalion affair at best full of giddy ad libs and saucy departures but then, don’t they all chip in, all the brothers especially in their amazing forte, juggling. Lordy, they are lovely jugglers. I can hear the kids screaming still. (Lots of deeper voices, too.) And that setting! Brown cardboard boxers piled to the rafters! Magid dreamed that up, that loonily delightful setting. No UPS warehouse ever had so many amusing boxes. (Magid is Dmitri. They all have Russian names. Goes with Karamazov, you know.) Mark Ettinger, he’s the main music director. Did I say they all play instruments besides juggling? Sometimes at the same time? He’s Alexei. He’s perhaps the nuttiest, maybe because he’s so sneakily erudite and it keeps popping out, that erudition, Did I say they all have degrees up the wazoo? And play the wazoo, too? Roderick Kimball – Charming Rod we call him when we’re not calling him Pavel -- is listed in the opening credits as the Juggling Czar which just gives you a teeny idea of his jugular gifts. He can even walk through twelve flying dumbbells! And back! Unscathed! Not even ducking! (Hmmm. Flying dumbbells, Flying Karamazovs, is there something there?) And last but not least, Stephen Bent, Zossima Karamazov, a whip with the snappy retort when young voices yip wisecracks at him from the ever restive, ever involved audience.
And the show’s great moment arrives. (It arrives in every Karamazov show since the very first one. 4Play is the latest, probably the best.) Grand Maestro Paul Magid, Dmitri, challenges the champing at the bit short ones in the crowd to bring to the front of the stage an object, any object –er, no sharp edges, not over ten pounds, that is – and he’ll juggle ‘em. Everything from raisins to a squidgy comfort dragon is brought up to the stage. (Even a two year old who volunteered and had to be disqualified). The audience votes on the three worstest and Magid has to juggle the final, dreadful selections. If he flubs, he gets a pie in the face. What? You’ve seen that before? So? Does that ever fail?
As you see, the show is not brain surgery. It’s incredibly silly. There’s nothing so low they won’t stoop to. Yes, tutus and a ballet. (Oy, what a ballet.) Yes, drag. (Oy, such drag.) Yes, Polish jokes built around a scene stolen from Room Service. I laughed my head off. Alone. (Don’t ever do that in a theater full of kids.) Are there longueurs, as they say in Russian? Not while they’re juggling. Have you ever seen a more gemutlich foursome? Nope. Is the show fun? Well, as I said before, it ain’t brain surgery. But it’s mood surgery of the finest cut. The homespun foolish frolicking, the constant commedia del arte improvising. Take all the grand children. But hang on to those two year olds.
Minetta Lane Theater, 18 Minetta Lane, near Sixth Avenue. Tickets: $20-$65 at http://www.ticketmaster.com or 800-982-2787. Wed-Sat 8 pm, Sun 5 pm. Mats, Wed, Sat, Sun 2 pm.
|
|