Hell is Other Players

Damn Yankees at the Paper Mill Playhouse

            Whose side is the Devil really on?

            An interesting question.  Certainly Applegate, the Devil’s suave, debonair alter ego (Howard McGillin, who played the Phantom of the Opera on Broadway for over ten years) in Adler and Ross’s Damn Yankees (running through April 1), is on the audience’s good side.  McGillin pours so much sickly-sweet core evil—not to mention incredible talent—into the performance that he becomes the demon in the pinstriped suit the American audience just loves to hate.  But he is on the bad side of the protagonist, Joe Boyd (Joseph Kolinski), whom he swindles into handing over the deed for his soul in exchange for his transformation into “Shoeless” Joe Hardy (Christopher Charles Wood), the slugger who can lead Joe’s team, the Washington Senators, to victory over those damn Yankees.  Applegate’s plan is to bring the hopes of the Senators’ fans unbearably high, only to crush them when he takes possession of Boyd’s soul and makes him throw the pennant-deciding game against New York in late September.  Yes, it’s pretty clear that no matter who may seek to please or displease the silver-haired Applegate, the only team he’s on is his own.

            Damn Yankees has earned its renown for an array of reasons over the course of its many productions, but perhaps most famously for the portrayal of the two Mephistophelean antagonists, Applegate and his personal home-wrecker, Lola, played in this production by Chryssie Whitehead.  Lola, of course, was played in the original 1955 production and 1958 film by Fosse wife #2 Gwen Verdon, then Bebe Neuwirth in 1994, and, most recently, Jane Krakowski of 30 Rock fame in the 2008 Encores! revival.  Perhaps boasting an even more star-studded list, however, is Satan himself, who’s been played by Ray Walston, Vincent Price, Jerry Lewis, and Sean Hayes, in that order.  It’s difficult to put the current Applegate and associate up against their colleagues—if they can even be called that—but McMillan does very well, maintaining a boastful bravado and simmering wickedness that Jack from Will and Grace couldn’t muster even if he tried.  Whitehead is less memorable, mainly due to pure star power—that is to say, lack of.  She tries, but she doesn’t match up to most of the main characters, especially her brimstone-soaked boss and Christopher Charles Wood, a brilliant dancer and singer who acts circles around his chubby counterpart Joseph Kolinski, who dulls “Six Months Out of Every Year” unbearably.

            Not only that, but the adaption of the Faust legend has been warped considerably from its original Broadway plot.  Song locations are shifted and lines like Applegate’s “Don’t you have another version of that thing?” when forced to take the oath in court are cut entirely.  It’s enjoyable; hugely so, but any audience member can tell from the start how much more the Playhouse could have done with it.  Richard Adler and Jerry Ross are also responsible for another epic of musical theater, The Pajama Game, and they deserve better than what the company and director have to offer.

            But don’t let me put you off.  If there’s one reason to go see Damn Yankees before April Fool’s Day—or perhaps it should be two reasons—it’s the leads on both sides of the Force, as it were: Wood and McMillan.  The two are shining stars in their respective roles, talented in all quadrants of the stage actor’s portfolio, and their duels not only represent the battles between good and evil, but are also vastly entertaining.  Look for Wood’s performance in his duet with Lola (although he originally shared it with Applegate), “Two Lost Souls,” and McMillan’s show-stealing, house-collapsing rendition of “Those Were the Good Old Days,” wherein Old Nick recounts the many abominations in human history he’s had a hand in.

            Damn Yankees is a more recent classic than most, written in the mid-fifties when theater had begun to approach its dropping-off point into the quagmires of adaptions from film and Andrew Lloyd Weber, and the history behind it is more than enough justification for becoming absorbed in its love-of-the-game magic.  Baseball is more than a plot point, however, it’s also a motif—an overriding theme that overtakes the audience as they settle into their seats.  The lights dim, the curtain rises… Play ball!