–MYRNA Loy in “The Thin Man” (1934)
Asta as a main event? That was just one clue that the show was, if not a dog, certainly in trouble. Close to four years in the making, “Nick & Nora” finally opened last week on Broadway. Despite a seasoned creative team, two fine stars (Barry Bostwick and Joanna Gleason) and a swell terrier, the kick in the “Thin Man” cocktail is gone. The story of how “Nick & Nora” arrived is much livelier than the musical. Internecine battles have been eagerly covered by The New York Times. As Laurents says, “Nobody would need a perm if I started to talk about what’s gone on with this show.”
In 1988, James Pentecost and Charles Suisman took the “Thin Man” idea to Laurents. Despite his antipathy to the movies, the veteran director (“La Cage Aux Folles”) liked the concept and signed on. That was enough to lure composer Charles Strouse (“Bye Bye Birdie,” “Annie”) and lyricist Richard Maltby Jr. (“Miss Saigon”). Playwright A. R. Gurney agreed to write but then backed out, so Laurents, who had done the books for “West Side Story” and “Gypsy,” took over.
The producers set out to raise the millions it takes to mount a Broadway musical. Some big money-and big egos-expressed interest, but the potential investors and the first-time producers disagreed about billing and profit sharing. Deals hovered and disappeared. In the summer of 1990, with Bostwick and Gleason signed but a multimillion-dollar budget not secure, the producers scheduled a workshop. When Bostwick had a malaria attack, Maltby gamely, if lamely, subbed. “The noise of money rolling away was deafening,” says Suisman.
Meanwhile, there were serious artistic problems. Audiences expect show stoppers, and razzle-dazzle is Strouse’s strong suit. But Laurents had a different, more elliptical vision. “I was trained to write numbers that go for the jugular,” says Strouse. “Here I am working with a playwright who, he admits, likes his scenes to go for the jugular. And he’s the boss. I’m a very proud composer. I think that probably brought a lot of contention into the thing.” Says Suisman, “The fundamental problem was the director and the writer. They were the same person. The director was a huge fan of the writer, and vice versa. All writers love their own work, but somebody’s got to be tough.”
But “Nick & Nora” refused to die. Early this year, after new arguments between the producers and would-be investors, Suisman and Pentecost agreed to leave. To cut costs, the new producers, including the powerful James Nederlander, canceled a Baltimore tryout. “Nick & Nora,” still in creative flux, would flux in front of preview audiences in New York City. A Broadway preview, Maltby says, is like “having a prostate examination in the middle of Times Square. If something doesn’t work, 1,600 people are there saying, ‘Blechhhh’.” Previews began Oct. 8 but dragged on after the Nov. 10 opening was postponed.
The play changed almost nightly. Only 14 of an estimated 50-plus songs made the final cut. Gleason spent most of Thanksgiving Day learning the new closing number (the fourth since early October); one of her songs was written eight ways, then dropped. Five days before opening night, Bostwick rehearsed new changes. “Just enough,” he says, “to make the hair stand up on the back of your neck.”
After all that, “Nick & Nora” falls flat. With the exception of the stilted choreography, no element is terrible, but the show sits in the stomach like a bland score is quite pleasant, though “Boom Chicka Boom,” with its gross parodies of Latinos and crass references to breasts, is intolerable. There are only two stand-out numbers, one of which goes to the murder victim, a coke-sniffing floozy (played with relish by Faith Prince). The book is only mildly funny. Laurents has superimposed a superficial clash of class-Nora is still Nob Hill, but the elegant Mr. Charles is now Nick the Greek, who Anglicized his Mediterranean surname-but worse, he has made the pair boring. The crackle is missing, which is not the fault of the stars, particularly Bostwick, who makes his cardboard character charming. Oh, nuts.
