Friday, February 21, 2003 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

SHOW REVIEW: Musical 'Mamma Mia!' rates high in camp value

Show inspired by ABBA music finds its own niche on the Strip

"Mamma Mia," which is performed at Mandalay Bay, offers something for everyone.

In the '70s we had disco and a few guys who wanted to be John Travolta, but more who went along with the whole thing because the girls loved it and they wanted to be where the girls were.

Now, a good 25 years later, we have an ABBA musical, "Mamma Mia!" The grown-up disco gals will love it, and the guys will go along if they want to keep their gals happy.

In other words, "Mamma Mia!" is the stage equivalent of a chick flick.

The good news is that like many a so-called chick flick, there's something for everyone enticed into the theater. It's frothy, escapist fun, betrayed only by a story that coasts a little too much on its own good will and by a TV sitcom level of humor.

ABBA loyalists are bound to enjoy it more (and thus can feel free to advance the above rating one letter grade). But even those only passingly familiar with the Swedish quartet can appreciate the skill with which the tunes have been drafted for a stand-alone story, and the exuberant performance level by a cast that doesn't want for recognizable stars.

And people who cringe at seeing the Strip polarized between Cirque du Soleil and stubborn remnants of the variety era can welcome traditional theater well-crafted, even for a vehicle so light.

The subtleties of Anthony Van Laast's choreography, Mark Thompson's production design and Howard Harrison's lighting -- dreamy, impressionist hues of aqua blue painted onto the canvas of a simple set -- help anchor the production when it otherwise stumbles.

The chief conceit is drafting the ABBA hits by Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus to serve as show tunes. When the lights come up to reveal young bride-to-be Sophie (Jill Paice) singing, "I have a dream, a song to sing," it could be Julie Andrews in "The Sound of Music."

Poppier tunes such as "Honey, Honey" get the job done by making room for dialogue, allowing Sophie to tell her friends she found her mother's diary from 1979, and invited all three men who just might be her mystery father to the wedding.

Other songs, such as "Thank You for the Music," are grafted onto situations where they are made to work through the staging. Sophie sings it to each of her potential dads as she welcomes them to the Greek island where mother Donna (Tina Walsh) labors to make her inn break even.

Bill (Mark Leydorf) is some sort of Australian writer and explorer. Harry (Michael Piontek) is a successful British businessman. Nick (Sam Cokas) is an American who is less excited by his present circumstances than by the fact that Donna is "living my dream."

Sophie thinks she will recognize which of them is her real dad the minute she sees him. Trouble is, she doesn't. And when confronted with the issue, Donna isn't sure either.

As the complications boil into comic musical fluff, the only real surprise is that not every song is deconstructed. "Souper Trouper," "Lay Your Love on Me" and "Does Your Mother Know" all unfold at full disco thump, some more effectively serving the story than others.

The opening night VIP audience held a lot of people who were there for other reasons than being ABBA fans in the '70s. That meant applause, which apparently comes at the start of many a tune, was here saved for "Chiquitita," "Take a Chance on Me" and "Dancing Queen." The latter unites Donna with her best friends Tanya (Karole Foreman) and Rosie (Jennifer Perry), her partners in a vocal trio during the platform boots era.

Seeing the show with a "downtown" crowd might also clarify whether the clunky dialogue and breathy, drama-class delivery -- "I want to get married knowing who I am!" -- is also intended as arch camp.

The charitable view would be that it's all part and parcel of a "Rocky Horror"-style in-joke, the gay version of the mustache-twirling 1900s melodramas now played for laughs in outdoor parks.

But that's probably assuming too much. Not when there are sitcom-style pauses where the actors posture and wait for laughs that may or may not come, or old jokes such as people throwing their backs out when they try to dance like they did in their glory days.

And if the whole thing's just a hoot, why bother with some effectively poignant moments, such as Cokas steering "Knowing Me, Knowing You" to the heart of its dark lyrics, or "Slipping Through My Fingers" becoming an effective mother-daughter moment?

Certainly there's a wide rift between the actors such as Piontek, who finds a way to ground his humorous character as a believable person, and those such as Perry and Foreman, who play their broad, stereotypical roles as written.

But Las Vegas' own Walsh and the vivacious Paice ultimately sell the two roles crucial to making "Mamma Mia!" hang together as a theater piece. It's also liberating to have what looks to be a sure-fire success on the Strip developed, written and directed by women (Judy Craymer, Catherine Johnson and Phyllida Lloyd, respectively).

Sure, they find lots of ways for the male cast members to shed their shirts. But in a town that's historically tilted toward such macho diversions as boxing and nudie bars, a ladies' night smash seems more than fair.