Fun, shock, awe and all that jazz

NEW ORLEANS—Watching the multiple Tony Award winner “Chicago The Musical” was sort of like reading the papers. It rankled, but only after one left the theater, much like the way reported news these days seem unreal at first, and then, as they say, reality bites: It could happen to anyone anywhere, any of it.

And this show was created in 1975.

Inside 87-year-old Saenger on Canal St., whose second-level interiors resemble a sculpture park, there was no such sense of foreboding, only fun (clever, clever lyrics), shock (how current still, the plot and premise) and awe (all that jazz, yet the production is stirring in its simplicity).

“Chicago’s” Broadway touring company, the one that’s coming to Manila in December, kicked off a US season on Oct. 8 in this historic city that is fueled by music (and several other quaintness-es), and the 2,700-seat Saenger was sold out for six days. Playbill listed the names of premium seat ticket holders. It was hard to imagine that proud stage under one foot of floodwater post-Katrina in 2005.

A small group of Filipino journalists made it to opening night, a Tuesday. Sunday, they had left Manila and local headlines of murder, greed corruption, violence, exploitation, adultery and treachery.

Wait a minute. That’s how the musical opens: “Ladies and gentlemen, you are about to see a story of (each one of the above)— all those things we hold near and dear to our hearts.” Gee.

The present parallels are not lost on lead star Bianca Marroquin. But she regards them from a personal perspective that springs from the story: Roxie Hart, a nightclub dancer who dreams of vaudeville stardom, kills her lover, then urges her pushover husband to cough up big bucks to hire Chicago’s “silver-tongued” lawyer who proceeds to turn the crime into celebrity news stories to get his client acquitted.

Director Walter Bobbie has pointed out: “This musical is based on the 1926 play by Maurine Dallas Watkins [but] looks like it was ripped from today’s headlines. In recent years, America has experienced a new wave of celebrity trials. The abuses, manipulation of and by [media], and the complexity of our judicial system can make the search for truth and justice seem like different goals. ‘Chicago’s’ plot was shocking in 1926, cynical and satirical in 1975, and today feels like a documentary.”

That sounds just a little familiar.

Roxie, ‘my hero’

“There are many ways I am a Roxie in real life,” Bianca told the Inquirer in a quick chat a day after the opening, “just as there are many people today who are like the people around Roxie.” She meant, among others, the sleek lawyer whose signature strategy is to “give ‘em the old razzle-dazzle,” and the female cell block warden who “puts out” for anyone who “puts in” for her.

Bianca continued, “Like Roxie, I am a warrior, defending my goals and what I believe in… I don’t give up easily. Roxie has a dream. Of course she takes the wrong turn, but she picks herself up and uses everything to her benefit, rather than letting them remain in her life as one big obstacle. Her hunger for the stage and dance, and her audience, I’ve known that since I was 3, since I started dancing. I knew that my place in life was the stage and I’ve always fought for that, no matter where life took me.”

Strictly speaking, Roxie Hart is no role model. “But she is like a hero to me,” Bianca said, “because she doesn’t care, she goes after what she wants… although I wouldn’t do many things the way she does them.”

Triple threat

The Broadway triple threat (dancer, singer, actress), also a Mexican TV superstar, speaks rapidly, occasionally melting into a seductive singsong to, curiously, drive home a point. Think Sofia Vergara, in “Modern Family.”

Bianca has played Roxie Hart for 13 years, in two languages. The very first time was in her own country, in her native tongue.

“When the producers came to Mexico (in 2001), they advertised for someone famous, between 37 and 45 years of age. I was 25, and I wasn’t famous. There were so many things going against me getting the role.

“Many celebrities came to the auditions… and then there was me. One of the producers told their Mexican [counterparts], ‘This is your Roxie.’ The producers, my people, said, ‘Uh, yeah, she’s great, she’s been with us in other productions’—that was true but I was always in the ensemble. They said, ‘She’s important to us, but she’s not a star.’”

The visitors insisted. Thus, at 25, Bianca became the youngest Roxie, and the first Latina. “They trusted me with the role, this little girl… my hair was long and I had lots of blonde highlights and I looked very young. They had my hair cut very short and colored red. My Velma (the other lead character) was from Argentina and 20 years older than I was. From her I learned to do interviews.”

 

Fosse’s choreography

So Roxie Hart’s story was told in Spanish. The count is 11 language versions now (the play has been staged in over 24 countries).

“It was pretty good, I guess,” Bianca said. “I started getting recognition in my country, wining awards for the role, and just when I thought things couldn’t get any better, I got the opportunity to work in New York. I became the first actress from Mexico to cross over to Broadway in a lead role.”

Whenever she took on Roxie, Bianca found another point of similarity between them. “I love her more each time, understand her more. It’s been crazy, the way life gave me this character to grow up with.”

Aside from the original choreography by the eminent Bob Fosse, “Chicago The Musical” is beloved for the “hummable” music by John Kander, with evocative words by Fred Ebb. “All That Jazz,” “Cell Block Tango” and “Razzle Dazzle” may as well be pop hits.

Bianca gets to sing some of the most memorable and humorous lines but takes exception to four from “Nowadays.” Two make her tear up (the other two make audiences chuckle): “You can like the life you’re living;/ you can live the life you like.”

Reviews, like tryouts…

“When I get to that part,” she said, “I just, oh… (snaps her fingers and goes into that singsong). I was living the life that my parents wanted for me. I got married at 22, stayed married for 12 years, divorced only four years ago in December. So when I get to that line, I feel like I’m telling the audience, ‘Live the life you like, live it today. Sometimes we’re afraid to say, ‘No, that is not okay,’ or ‘No, that is not fine with me,’ or to turn something down. It’s important to be honest with yourself. Sometimes that means rejecting something that pays a lot just to stay on your path.”

(For whatever it’s worth, the next two lines go, “You can even marry Harry,/ but mess around with Ike.”)

Bianca has always charmed critics, but is always the first to acknowledge she wasn’t always a complete package: “I am a dancer. The acting came later, as did the singing. I used to read all reviews. Now I think they’re always subjective, like auditions. Everything depends on what the reviewers or the people behind the table are going through in their own lives. You know? Si!”

Her Roxie is funny and vulnerable; she wasn’t like this from the get-go. “The character has always had a certain vulnerability,” Bianca said. I just gradually learned to not be afraid of going into that ugly place inside her, just because the audience may not like it. The audience has to know, so now I’m brave enough to do that. I learned to trust my instincts.”

Overall, she added, “I’m in a good, delicious place right now.” She sure is. Let alone sing, she has begun composing songs. She wrote five of 11 tracks in her first solo English-Spanish album, “El Mundo Era Mio (The World Was Mine),” released in May.

She was in Manila for a day recently to perform two numbers at the musical’s launch, with her current Velma, Terra MacLeod, another “Chicago” Broadway veteran.

“I was on the flight longer than I was in Manila,” Bianca recalled, laughing. “But I got a good taste of it and now I know I have to go back.” She’s so… Filipino!

(“Chicago The Musical,” produced in Manila by Lunchbox Theatrical Productions, Davit Atkins Enterprises and Concertus Manila, will be staged at The Theatre at Solaire, 1 Asean Avenue, Entertainment City. It opens Dec. 3 and runs till Dec. 21. Tickets from P2,000 to P7,500— call 8919999 or visit www.ticketworld.ph.)