Kiss Me Kate (Broadway Revival - PBS Great Performances)

From the Editors

The first Broadway revival in nearly 50 years of the musical comedy masterpiece by composer Cole Porter and book writers Sam and Bella Spewack not only enchanted critics and delighted audiences, but went on to triumph as one of the biggest prize winners of the 2000 season. Taking its inspiration from Shakespeare, this hilarious romp recounts the backstage and on-stage antics of two feuding romances during an out-of-town tryout for a musical adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew. Sparkling with 18 classic Cole Porter songs including "Another Op'nin', Another Show," "Wunderbar," "So in Love," "Always True to You in My Fashion," "Too Darn Hot," and "Brush Up Your Shakespeare" this is Broadway musical comedy at its irresistible best. Directed by Michael Blakemore, this Tony winner for "Best Revival" stars Brent Barrett, Rachel York (Victor/Victoria), Nancy Anderson and Michael Berresse as the squabbling couples whose offstage disputes entangle them with a pair of song-and-dance gangsters and a pompous U.S. army general.
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Customer Response

BRUSHING UP MY PORTER
A classic is something constituting, serving as, or worthy of being a pattern to be imitated. And Shakespeare knew how to write them, but Cole Porter too. So if we get the both of them together we can never get wrong.

Porter and Samuel & Bella Spewack made a great use of the original play and went a little further. They used it to create a play inside a play. So we have a Taming of The Shrew on the stage and another one outside.
It is the opening night of a new production of The Taming of the Shrew and the two stars Lilli Vanessi and Fred C. Graham are going to work together again after a bitter divorce. Both are temperamental, vain and in love with each other.We also have a secondary love story between Lois and Bill who are Bianca and Lucentio in the play. She is the protegee of Fred and can we say a little more, but of course she loves a rascal. And finally our third couple, a pair of gansters who are there to get the money from an IOU.

Personally I have always loved the film version, if only for that wonderful scene of Fron This Moment On, with a glorious Bob Fosse and an spectacular Carol Henley, but this version is funnier.
Rachel York who plays Lilli has been a favourite of mine since The Scarlett Pimpernel. She has a great voice, strong and with a wide range of registers. Not in the vocal sense only but in the performing part. She is daring playing Lilli also funny and obnoxious. Personally I think she is better than Marie Mazzie, who is a little too bland for me. Her So In Love is great, and even when the tempo is faster than the usual versions I have heard I love it.
And Brent! what can I say about Brent? I simply adore the man. I liked him even more than I liked Howard Keel, and that my friends is saying a lot.He sings everything perfectly, and in the reprise of So In Love...well I am speechless Mitchell , I think, is at a lost playing Fred. Brent just shines. He is mean, funny even rude but he is Petruchio/Fred!. He owns the show and I can only say Bravo!

The rest of the cast is excellent Nolan Frederick as Paul shows us how It's Too Darn Hot must be sung, although Ann Miller will always have aplace in my heart.
Kaye Morgan plays a convincing Hattie and the rest of the cast is great. So why not 5 stars?
Well, maybe it is me , and maybe I am still too much in love with the Hermes Pan choreography of the 1953 film but honestly the scene of Tom, Dick and Harry was painful to watch . Michael Berresse is a competent dancer but the other two are just like me...and that is not a good thing. It was excruciating to watch. No rythm, no choreography, no nothing! Bad, very bad. Fortunately there were Rachel and Brent to save me for more pain.

All in all I think is a wonderful version of this musical and a keeper for any musicals lover.

kiss me kate (pbs revival)
The show is spectacular - the performers excellent - only one problem - there is a flaw in the dvd that must be in the master from which the copies are made. During the "brush up your shakespear" act performed by the "gangsters", in their last "reprise" the act is interrupted and must be bypassed to finish the show. I returned the first copy as "damaged", but the new one sent me had the same problem. I kept it, since otherwise the show is wonderful. DHB

Broadway in my living room.
Classic show, great cast and well filmed! I saw this revival on broadway with the original cast. The replacements are first rate. Brent Barrett (no relation) is superb. "It's too darn hot!"
Mike Barrett/Baltimore

Kiss Me Kate is Simply Great!
As a high school musical pit director, I was fascinated by this show from early on, as I am big Cole Porter fan. Since we are planning to do this show with high school kids I was worried that this show was "over the top" for a "G" rated audience. Yes, it is bawdy but it is surely beautiful! The acting, singing and staging is fantastic; You feel like you are sitting in the Broadway audience in the third row center. The wide cuts of a huge audience giving applause was the only thing that was a bit silly- but otherwise it is a terrific production with great costumes, sets, lighting and music. The chamber orchestra made it sound more intimate and every singer was first rate. This is my 17 year old daughter's favorite movie musical show of all time. We highly recommend it to everyone!

Love Marin and Brian together!
I had the good fortune to see the production on Broadway! Fabulous. Love the two of them together. You will love the performance. I also saw them in "Ragtime" together on Broadway. What extradinary voices they both have. Together they are dynamite!!!!

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