Chita Rivera

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Chita Rivera

Feinstein’s/54 Below, NYC, October 10, 2019

Reviewed by Bart Greenberg for Cabaret Scene

Chita Rivera

The lights dim. A simple announcement. The on-stage combo starts playing “Nowadays,” and a spotlight finds the star in the audience. Not just any headliner but a true star, perhaps the last from the golden age of Broadway still performing. And if the voice is a bit husky and the legendary high kicks aren’t so high anymore, that really is irrelevant. It takes the diva no more than a sung phrase to embrace the audience, to make them not just admirers but friends. Her know-how allows her to arrive at a table of “extraordinary young men,” as Noël Coward put it, just as she reached the lyrics that announce “there are men everywhere” to large, knowing laughter from all and especially from the adoring young men. Then she is dancing across the stage, flirting with her band, as she launches into a song that sums up her approach to life, “A Lot of Livin’ to Do.” And there is no doubt—Chita is back!
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The song list held few surprises; it’s a cornucopia of the lady’s career highlights. Still, when that means such songwriters as Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim, Charles Strouse and Lee Adams, Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields, and especially John Kander and Fred Ebb, the numbers never get old, and Rivera’s delivery is always fresh. The despairing passion of “Where Am I Going?,” the hypnotic “Carousel,” and the sweet regret of “I Don’t Remember You,” all were expressingly offered to the audience. Her tales of Jerome Robbins, Gwen Verdon, Helen Gallagher, and Bob Fosse, among others, remain funny and revealing but never mean-spirited.

One of her fun stories was about how, despite director Robbins’ dictum that the two “gangs” of West Side Story should not associate, she not only associated with a Jet but married him; together they created the only “Jet/Shark baby”—Lisa Mordente, who joined her mother on stage for a solo, “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me” and several duets. One of the highlights of the evening was their joining in on a full version of “Nowadays” with Mordente adding a pitch-perfect imitation of Verdon. Together they recreated the original Fosse choreography.
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Backing up these delightful divas were music director Gary Adler, bassist Jim Donica, and percussionist Eric Poland. They all did yeoman work joining in the fun. This was truly a memorable evening that had a master of confidence, theatricality, and talent exactly where she belongs, in the middle of it all. Chita!

Bart Greenberg

Bart Greenberg first discovered cabaret a few weeks after arriving in New York City by seeing Julie Wilson and William Roy performing Stephen Sondheim and Cole Porter outdoors at Rockefeller Center. It was instant love for both Ms. Wilson and the art form. Some years later, he was given the opportunity to create his own series of cabaret shows while working at Tower Records. "Any Wednesday" was born, a weekly half-hour performance by a singer promoting a new CD release. Ann Hampton Callaway launched the series. When Tower shut down, Bart was lucky to move the program across the street to Barnes & Noble, where it thrived under the generous support of the company. The series received both The MAC Board of Directors Award and The Bistro Award. Some of the performers who took part in "Any Wednesday" include Barbara Fasano and Eric Comstock, Tony Desare, Andrea Marcovicci, Carole Bufford, the Karens, Akers, Mason and Oberlin, and Julie Wilson. Privately, Greenberg is happily married to writer/photographer Mark Wallis, who as a performance artist in his native England gathered a major following as "I Am Cereal Killer."