Review: ‘Victor/Victoria’ reigns victorious

CEDAR RAPIDS - 'Victor/Victoria” is tres magnifique. It's as close to perfection as you're going to find on an Eastern Iowa stage - or anywhere from Steamboat Springs to La Paz.

Fortunately, you only have to go so far as the Dows Fine Arts Center at Coe College to see it. Unfortunately, it only plays through Sunday afternoon, so don't wait to snap up a ticket to the hottest show in town. Thursday's opening night performance was sold out, and the rest of the run is likely to follow suit.

It's an opulent production full of 'jazzamatazz” from beginning to end, firmly establishing the three-year-old Revival Theatre Company as a major player in the Corridor arts scene. And this show is full of major players.

Nobody embodies a song like Nina Swanson. She simply is Victor, and Victoria, from every low note to glass-shattering high note.

Set in 1931, it's the story of a down-and-out British soprano trying to plant a foot on a Parisian stage. All bedraggled and full of wobbly, warbly 'trained” technique, she's getting nowhere fast. Until she meets Carroll 'Toddy” Todd, an impresario impressed with her pluck, who hatches an ingenious plan to pluck her from obscurity to the brightest lights - with a colossal twist.

He will pass her off as Victor Grazinski, a gay Polish count and celebrated female impersonator. So with a snip of her long locks and a deepening of her speaking voice, she becomes a woman pretending to be a man pretending to be a woman.

And it works. He/she's the toast of the town, but the charade begins to crack when dashing mobster King Marchan (Joe Wetrich) and his ditsy dame Norma (the pitch-perfect Jen Ford) come to town.

Smitten by the stage version of Victoria, he's confounded by the thought that he might actually be attracted to a man. So Marchan embarks on a mission to uncover the truth - that beneath the facade lies an actual woman - which sends him and others diving under beds, scaling balconies and slamming doors in a hilarious cat-and-mouse caper.

Amid all whip-cracking action are lavish production numbers bathed in moody lighting by Kristen Geisler; a versatile, quick-changing set by Scott Olinger; spectacular costumes by April Bonasera; jaw-dropping, high-kicking choreography by Tallis Strub; and a top-notch orchestra led by Michelle Perrin Blair.

Artistic director Brian Glick, music director Cameron Sullenberger and Strub have prepared their players well, surrounding themselves with an A-list group of artists and technicians.

Swanson is the heart and soul of any show she graces. While the story is faithful to the movie plot points, and keeps the most stunning production number, 'Le Jazz Hot,” the new music by Henry Mancini, Frank Wildhorn and lyricist Leslie Bricusse is much more contemplative. It allows Swanson to plumb the emotional depths not only of her heart, but also what it means to be a woman at a time when women seldom were allowed to step out of the shadows.

Toddy is all about stepping out of the shadows, and Larry Newman imbues the valiant impresario with rakish sophistication, from a flip of his cape to the flick of his fleet feet. Newman spent his 20s as a professional actor in California, and it shows. He is a real find for the local theater scene, performing with equal parts bravado and tenderness.

Follies audiences have basked in Jen Ford's glorious singing, and now she's shimmying out of the shadows into a comedic turn. She owns every scene she's in, as King Marchan's curvaceous moll, bubbling over like a shaken bottle of cheap, yet yummy, champagne. Wetrich keeps Marchan in a subtle shadow as a cynical observer, but lets his inner turmoil bubble and flow during a showstopping solo turn in 'King's Dilemma.”

A tip of the hat goes to David Morton, too, as Henri Labisse, the bumbling cabaret owner who acquires a new injury and body brace every time he's around Victoria. The only injuries audiences are likely to incur will be from laughing and clapping so hard from beginning to end.

IF YOU GO

- What: Revival Theatre Company presents 'Victor/Victoria”

- Where: Dows Fine Arts Center, Coe College, 1220 First Ave. NE, Cedar Rapids

- When: 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 2:30 p.m. Sunday

- Tickets: $35, Paramount Ticket Office, (319) 366-8203 or Artsiowa.com/tickets/concerts/victorvictoria/

- Information: Revivaltheatrecompany.com/victor-victoria/

l Comments: (319) 368-8508; diana.nollen@thegazette.com