Medieval Hippie

By T.E. Kalem

PIPPIN Music and Lyrics by STEPHEN SCHWARTZ Book by ROGER O. HIRSON

A phalanx of Marine Corps MPs would not be able to keep audiences away from Pippin. Does this mean that it is one of the pinnacles of the art of musical comedy? Hardly. What Pippin possesses is splendiferous theatricality, the kick of a lightning bolt and a passionate professional knack for being entertaining. The show satisfies the popular non-platonic ideal of a US musical. It has the musk of sexuality, firecracker dance numbers, sunshiny songs and smashing girls that the gods of Olympus might ogle.

The time is A.D. 780, when Charlemagne was building an empire, but the behavior and attitudes are very much 1972. Pippin (actually Pepin) Charlemagne's son, is a bewildered young medieval hippie with what we used to call big ideas. He wants to find some all-embracing purpose that will give his life a deep sense of fulfillment.

As innocent as Candide, he embarks on this quest. He plunges into war sates himself with sex, goads his father's discontented subjects to revolt and embarks on domesticity with a wealthy widow. But the elixir of life eludes him. After each venture he finds himself asking, in the words of Peggy Lee's song "Is that all there is?" Indeed, this Pippin might seem like something of a fool if John Rubinstein, son of the pianist Artur, had not imbued him with such a sweet and winning nature. His life, as related in this story, is more the stuff of show biz than history.

Sixth Sense of Dance. However, history need not concern us, and Charlemagne, played with bluff joviality by Eric Berry, is only nominally Pippin's father. The prince's and the show's true parents are three other musicals: Stop the World, I Want to Get Off!, Oh, What a Lovely War! and Cabaret. From Stop the World come the circusy atmosphere and the little-everyman-lost sentiments. From Lovely War comes the mood of ironic incongruity in which some people are dying while others are dancing, each group visible and oblivious to the other. It is a form of double vision. The sight of the people dancing makes play-goers see the people who are dying with a disconcerting clarity. And from Cabaret comes the master of ceremonies who dominates and observes the show like a seeing-eye god. Ben Vereen moves through the role of M.C. like a meteor. His near equal is Leland Palmer, a dervish of a dancer, who plays a kind of inflectively Jewish stepmother to Pippin.

The spectacular staging of Pippin makes the production-credits list a roll call of honor. Tony Walton's scenery functions with elegant heraldic humor. Patricia Zipprodt's costumes are eye-blinking dazzlers, as are Jules Fisher's lighting effects. But the star of stars is Choreographer-Director Bob Fosse. This man has the sixth sense of dance, and he uses it with undeviating intelligence. Call him the Balanchine of the musical comedy stage and you will not be far off the mark. Fosse knows that at its core, the American musical celebrates collective energy. The force that Fosse unleashes in Pippin is the spirit that flung railroads across a continent and raised skyscrapers to rake the heavens. At least that is the way you feel as you watch his dancers arc across the stage like tracer bullets. qedT.E.Kalem

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