Musical "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" relishes being crude and contemporary
"Dirty Rotten Scoundrels"
2 1/2
out of four
Location: Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University, 50 E. Congress Parkway, Chicago
Times: 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays and Aug. 5, 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays and Aug. 8; through Aug. 12
Running Time: 2 hours and 40 minutes with intermission
Parking: Area pay garages
Tickets: $18-$80
Phone: (312) 902-1400
Rating: Some profanity, plentiful sex jokes, lots of crude motions
"Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" is not a musical for the ages. In fact, this 2005 Broadway musical comedy adaptation of the 1988 MGM film starring Steve Martin and Michael Caine relishes being contemporary and crude.
Penned by composer/lyricist David Yazbek ("The Full Monty") and Emmy Award-winning sitcom writer Jeffrey Lane ("Mad About You"), "Scoundrels" is filled with name-dropping lyrics referencing name-changing hip hop stars like Sean Combs and double-meaning luxury items like Hummers -- stuff that will date the show in the future.
"Scoundrels" is also a self-mocking musical that constantly nudges and reminds the audience that they're watching an artificial stage musical where people can break into song and accordion-wielding musicians can appear out of nowhere. That's more than appropriate for its subject matter of gigolo con men bilking wealthy American women visiting the fictional French Riviera resort of Beaumont sur Mer.
It's all loads of fun. But at times, it feels that Yazbek and Lane are trying too hard to offer up the musical comedy equivalent of Farrelly brothers' gross-out films like "There's Something About Mary." (No one really needs the mental image of the song lyric in "All About Ruprecht" mentioning "milkshake enemas.") All this theatrical mockery also doesn't completely jibe when the characters take a sudden turn toward sincerity near the end.
If the basic text and score of "Scoundrels" aren't perfect, at least the show comes packaged in the stylish (if slightly scaled-down and over-amplified) touring production of Tony Award-winning director Jack O'Brien. It also helps to have a cast that loves wringing every laugh possible from all the script's built-in physical humor and sometimes groan-inducing plays on words.
D.B. Bonds has a ball as the young, crude crotch-thrusting American con man Freddy Benson, who demands to know all the winning ways of aging continental schemer Lawrence Jameson (a suavely handsome and hilarious Tom Hewitt). Watching Hewitt and Bonds duke it out over a wager to be the first to connive $50,000 out of ditsy blonde "Soap Queen" heiress Christine Colgate (a very charming Laura Marie Duncan) is a joy -- even if some bits, like all the comical whipping in the song "Rüffhousin' mit Shüffhausen," go on far too long.
Great funny bits also come from the supporting actors, particularly Joe Cassidy as the in-cahoots French Chief of Police Andre Thibault and Chicagoan Hollis Resnik as wealthy divorcee Muriel Eubanks.
So if you don't need your musicals to be earnest and sincere, "Scoundrels" will more than fit the bill for a great comic night out. But if your tolerance is short for phallic physical gags and knowing innuendo, the sometimes low-brow "Scoundrels" might make you feel cheated.