Classic Crooners’ Proves Too Marvelous For Words’

By Larry Alexander

From Rudy Vallee to the Rat Pack to Michael Bubl , the American Music Theatre’s original show Classic Crooners is a delightful evening of pop music at its best.

Brad Moranz, the show’s creator, tries to hit as many of music’s top crooners as he can in two hours, and he does it pretty well.

Needless to say, the show is heavy on Frank Sinatra. Old Blue Eyes is represented by Wess Cooke singing The Lady Is A Tramp, Michael Minor doing New York, New York and Johnny Fortuno rendering Sinatra’s signature number, My Way.

Another Rat Pack member, the smooth-voiced Dean Martin, is remembered through his signature piece, That’s Amore, with Michael Minor singing the song while video of Martin, holding his ever- present glass of booze, plays on video screens flanking the stage.

Too Marvelous For Words, the 1937 pop tune sung by, among others, Rosemary Clooney, Ella Fitzgerald, Bing Crosby and Nat King Cole, is sung as a duet by Minor and Mishler, while Randall Frizado gives life to Top Hat, White Tie and Tails, done a la Fred Astaire.

The lady crooners are also present in this wonderful show.

Michelle Mishler croons her way through the Keely Smith hit It’s Been A Long, Long Time, and Amy Banks gives an excellent treatment to the Ella Fitzgerald hit, Paper Moon.

Banks, whose voice is made for this type of music, also does an excellent version of Hoagy Carmichael’s In the Cool, Cool, Cool Of the Evening and Tony Bennett’s signature song, I Left My Heart In San Francisco.

Fortuno, a newcomer to the AMT’s magnificent cast, does Come Fly With Me, written for Sinatra and made a hit again in 2003 by Bubl .

Fortuno also does an amazing job with Elvis Presley’ Now Or Never.

Comedy is provided by Minor and Frizado doing a passable version of Abbott and Costello’s classic Who’s On First shtick, and Minor, who has developed into a fine ventriloquist, introduces a new puppet, Guido, a large rat who helps introduce the audience to the Rat Pack portion of this wonderful show.

The AMT’s musical genius, orchestra leader Charles Ancheta, performs a wonderful medley of Henry Mancini tunes.

A stellar cast and fine orchestra, led by Ancheta, make Classic Crooners a classic show.

The production also is greatly enhanced by its feel. Renee Bouchard’s elegant costume design blends with the music, and Don Evanisko’s lighting is, as usual, terrific.

Perhaps best of all is Randall Leipart’s set design, which reflects the Art Deco style so popular in the 1920s and ’30s.

Classic Crooners is a truly delightful and nostalgic way to spend two hours – and a not-to-be-missed show.

Classic Crooners runs Tuesdays, Wednesday, Thursdays and Sundays through Oct. 12.

E-mail: lalexander@lnpnews.com

(c) 2008 Intelligencer Journal. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.