Arts
The ’Long’ road a pleasant journey at the BCA by Jules Becker
MySouthEnd.com ContributorFriday Oct 23, 2009 Maureen McGovern takes the crowd along for a trip down memory lane
If you only think of "The Morning After" and "We May Never Love This Way Again" when you hear the name Maureen McGovern, think again.
Although dubbed the "disaster theme queen" for Oscar-winning songs from "The Poseidon Adventure" and the "Towering Inferno," this four-octave stylist has not only brought rich interpretation to a variety of musical genres but also demonstrated sharp acting skills in Broadway musicals as different as "Nine" and a New York edition of "The Pirates of Penzance." Now she is chronicling her long, distinguished, and on-going performing career in an informative musical memoir called "A Long and Winding Road," in an engaging Huntington Theatre Company world premiere at the Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts. If the text by writer/director Philip Himberg and McGovern often comes across as a standard bio-play, it still resonates with great feeling and exuberance thanks to the latter’s wide-ranging talents and appealing way with an audience.
As the fitting title suggests, McGovern certainly paid her dues as a singer and performer on the way to becoming a singer’s singer and a respected actress. Without the slightest disingenuousness, she recalls her childhood as "a good Midwest Catholic school girl minding my own business," the encouragement of her musical father-who sang in a barbershop quartet-and a modest late 1960s stint as a part-time folk singer while at Kent State. Even as she sang Oscar winners, she candidly reminds the Huntington audience, she had to deal with gigs at unglamorous venues with names like the Trolley Bar Lounge and being dropped by a record company. Eventually her "Stradivarius Voice," a title she still deserves as a 60-year-old songbird, could not be denied, and albums, concerts and stage roles came her way ever more frequently. Early in the memoir, she counts jazz giant Ella Fitzgerald, Broadway first lady Mary Martin and opera diva Montserrat Caballe among her role models. Surely there are budding vocalists throughout America who speak as admiringly of her.
Longtime fans and newcomers alike know that her multi-decade success has never gone to her head, and that her stage demeanor remains delightfully unassuming. Never do her personal responses and connections to historical events-among them the assassination of JFK, the arrival of the Beatles and the Vietnam War-seem self-serving or glib. Along the way, there are fond remembrances of Ringo Starr (her favorite Beatle) and western film star Roy Rogers. Smoothly interacting with the audience, she calls on theatergoers to fill in the words "Gideon’s Bible" as she sings the Beatles hit "Rocky Raccoon." A sonorous rendition of "Let It Be" ends with an impressively high, extended delivery of the final title word. Another highlight is a brief tribute to Carole King and her multi-hit album "Tapestries," including a warm version of the enormous hit "You’ve Got a Friend."
McGovern never loses sight of the more serious themes and elements that have affected her life and art. Here her father figures prominently. Praising his army air corps heroism during World War II, she provides a beautifully understated rendition of "The White Cliffs of Dover." Later, she frankly describes "a wall between my father and me" over the Vietnam War. Happily, they later agreed to disagree about it. With regard to her career, there are telling passages about her exploitation by her manipulative early agent/husband and difficulties collecting royalties.
While the narrative sometimes sounds overly schematic about the various decades, her consummate musicianship-along with longtime piano accompanist Jeff Harris-trumps any soft stretches in the writing.
Look for a snappy "Feelin’ Groovy" (Simon and Garfunkel), a smartly reflective "And When I Die " (Laura Nyro), and a breezy "Sweet Dreams" (Eurythmics). For those who are wondering, she does include "The Morning After" with a delivery as fresh as her approach to life and career. A standout highpoint is McGovern’s heart-wrenching delivery of the irony-rich Stephen Schwartz song "Life Goes On" during a touching stretch recalling such AIDS victims as entertainer/composer Peter Allen and actor Larry Kert, which features footage of the AIDS Quilt (credit to Maya Ciarrocchi’s evocative projection design).
At one point in "A Long and Winding Road," the indomitable talent invokes the view that life has "Infinite Joys." The same instantly will be said of McGovern and her limitless musical repertoire.
"A Long and Winding Road," presented by Huntington Theatre Company, Calderwood Pavilion, Boston Center for the Arts, runs through Nov. 15.
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