Theater review: Giant at Wyly Theatre in Dallas

by Christopher Soden of Christopher Soden, Dallas GLBT Arts Examiner

• Tweet
• Email
• Print
• 0 Comments

The overall effect of Giant didn’t knock me out, or always connect me to deeper concerns.

Unlike so many recent musicals, Giant (presented by Dallas Theater Center at Wyly Theatre through February 19) is not a transference of film to stage. Creators Michael John LaChiusa (Music and Lyrics) and Sybille Pearson (Book) returned to Edna Ferber’s 1952 novel of the same title (i.e. the source material). Now, the George Stevens film, Giant, certainly did justice to Ferber’s unflinching story of Leslie Lynnton, a liberal progressive who marries a Texas rancher in 1925, and proceeds to knock new husband Bick Benedict flat on his ass. But appropriating the structure and/or screenplay from the film would have invited comparisons to screen legends: Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, and the notorious James Dean. And comparisons to established successes almost never work. The movie may be long, but it’s juicy, brash, confrontational, irresistible, and lofty without being didactic. Tawdry yet noble. So instead of constructing an homage, Pearson and LaChiusa set out to reinvent the wheel, using the same characters, raising the same issues, and the giving the actors the opportunity to make the roles their own.

One can’t help but admire Ferber’s frank, ironic approach to the marriage of Leslie and Bick Benedict. After a whirlwind courtship, they return to Texas, already hitched, and Leslie realizes her husband (and his sister, Luz) prevail over a congenial fiefdom. Bick isn’t a despot, but his treatment of Mexican servants and ranch hands leaves much to be desired, and Leslie isn’t one to surrender for the sake of harmony. What follows is a lifelong relationship, by turns stormy and conciliatory, in which the two must navigate the terms of peaceful attachment. Ferber never backs down from issues like racism, capitalism, socialized medicine, gender identity or the part that sex plays in the resolution of conflicts, for good or ill. She challenges the idea that successful marriages are predicated on continuous, inevitable subjugation. She doesn’t believe that disagreement and happiness are necessarily mutually exclusive.

LaChiusa and Pearson’s Giant is an intelligent, carefully considered piece. It runs three hours (after much reflection and distillation) attempting to capture the essence of the narrative without bogging down, dealing with abstractions like “love of the land” which in Texas means a raw, intense, emotional response to a bleached-out, harsh, scrubby expanse, overwhelmed by an empty, other-worldly horizon. Especially in the 1920s. Sometimes the lyrics have more sensibility than sense, and devices like conversations between Bick and the ghost of his departed sister, may spark for you or not at all. The overall effect of Giant didn’t knock me out, or always connect me to deeper concerns. Yet I must confess there were times when the sweeping music and poignant conviction of the actors brought me to tears. There were times when Giant articulated the complicated damage and delight the world imposes with exquisite clarity and grace.

Anyone who has endured a merciless Texas summer, with its endless, deceptively pretty blue sky, that looms like a portal to oblivion (with occasional, effulgent clouds) can tell you it has a profound, if gradual impact on the psyche. Scenic Designer Allen Moyer grasps this, I think, and to strong, vivid effect. Unfortunately, by placing the orchestra on the top half of the stage, and bifurcating the space, you lose much of that crucial opportunity. If ever a show needed to create a sense of capacious grandeur, it’s Giant, and they need to rethink this strategy. I realize there may be logistical issues I’m unaware of, but a different tactic could help immensely.

The raucous, simmering energy of the cast is a joy, and the principals, intriguing. Aaron Lazar (Bick) is affable and virile, and confident enough to hit the high notes. Kate Baldwin (Leslie) is regal and urbane, but also personable and sharp. PJ Griffith (Jett Rink) does well by this morally ambiguous character. Ferber actually makes Jett more sinister than he appears here but he has a tangible charisma that Griffith exploits with finesse. We’re supposed to like Jett in spite of ourselves and Griffith makes that happen, with his sly, serpentine appeal. Dee Hoty (Luz) rocks as the cantankerous matriarch of the Reata. She raises Bick when they lose their mother at an early age, and must adopt a toughness to get her through the practical demands of running an enormous cattle ranch. Hoty has the unenviable task of making Luz genuine without alienating the audience (Luz can be a bit gruff), but Hoty lets her best qualities permeate and it’s an excellent performance.

Tweet