‘Agile’ and ‘ambitious’ are words you might use to describe a pair of young Broadway-bound performers, but instead these are in reference to Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin. They’ve been to Broadway and back, LuPone, 65, and Patinkin, 61.
Other words overheard at the sold out Bing Concert showing of An Evening with Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin include, “Amazing”, “Rolling Chairs?” “They’re so cute”. Granted, I was sitting in the student section, which was populated by a multitude of musical theatre buffs, student talents who had been in a Ram’s Head Musical or two.
Musicals and melodramas are not everybody’s cup of tea, but being in an environment with people who truly appreciate the art can make one come to enjoy the Broadway scene too. You can get swept up in it; the corniness that can sometimes arise out of songs called something like “The Hills of Tomorrow” ends up not seeming so corny.
Mandy Patinkin and Patti LuPone’s performance was both melodramatic and moving. That’s how things tend to come off when nostalgia is put on display. There is this precarious balance between banality and sharpness, the banal coming out of re-hashing popular Broadway songs in an hour and a half performance. The brilliance, on the other hand, was in the chemistry.
LuPone and Patinkin have a history, and as history-makers in the Broadway world their partnership was enchanting to watch on the Bing stage. Putting on a two-person show for a full house is no easy feat, and the mastery of these two legends was evident throughout the whole performance. The Tony award-winners paired up again for this show, their most evocative collaboration since their days starring in the original Evita on Broadway, as a kind of commemoration to those days of old.
Patinkin has since become better known for his roles as hard-edged crime and terrorism fighters. The reputation of FBI profiler Jason Gideon on Criminal Minds and CIA agent Saul Berenson onHomeland pale in comparison to his role as Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride, though. My childhood familiarity with Inigo Montoya, as well as Patinkin’s successive roles, seemed to set me up to be in a place of automatic reminiscence. For the audience members who were either more familiar with Patti or Patinkin, or familiar with both actor/singers equally, I believe a similar sentimentality was already embedded in the padded seats of the Bing that night.
LuPone is still a mighty force in the world of musical theatre. Her spunk and passion made her performance all the more worthy of her established reputation. Her tinny, yet emphatic voice was an interesting contrast to Patinkin’s low and resounding one. The juxtaposition of their two distinct voices was at times disconcerting, but also engaging. Harmony seemed like it wouldn’t come easily to them, but it did.
The intimacy between LuPone and Patinkin was mesmerizing to watch. Both married to other people, their affectionate friendship played out in famous Broadway love songs seemed exceptionally platonic. It was strangely encouraging to see two old friends sing a range of love-filled songs from Into the Woods’ “It Takes Two” to “If I Loved You” from Carousel.
When intimacy is paired with playfulness, though, the easygoing relationship between two people establishes an honest kind of chemistry. Songs that paid heed to this gleeful partnership included Patinkin and LuPone’s rendition of “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” and “Old Friends”. Ending the first part of the program, LuPone and Patinkin rolled out on the two roller chairs used as the primary stage set up throughout the whole performance, stomachs on the seats and arms outstretched like two little kids having the time of their lives, all the while singing the Broadway classic “April in Fairbanks”.
An Evening with Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin was a journey through Broadway classics, a love story between two old friends; an evening to remember both the past and the present. The performance was simple, just two people singing, walking around a sparsely set stage and making use of a full house by using the stage as a round one. There was a moment in the performance that I don’t think I’ll forget very soon. Mandy took a moment to give a bit of background on Patti. After a brief, platonic peck on the mouth, he began to explain the history they have together. It started with the opening night of Evita, and Mandy told Patti, who broke her tough girl exterior and was a bundle of nerves, breaking down in tears, that she needn’t worry, she had a friend for life.
She sure did.
(‘17, Anthropology/Creative Writing, Multimedia Editor) is a hopeless wanderer hailing from Moscow, Windhoek, Maryland, Mexico City, Asunción, Tokyo, Cairo, and now Palo Alto, California. She loves good movies and music. Writing and film is her thing, but dammit she can’t sing.