THE MORNING LINE

DATE: Wednesday, July 20, 2016

FROM: Melissa Cohen, Michelle Farabaugh

Clare Lockhart

PAGES: 9, including this page

July 20, 2016

Patti LuPone and Christine Ebersole in a Battle of Lipstick Titans

By Ben Brantley

CHICAGO — For a musical that covers so many years — and so many shades of lipstick — “War Paint” never

really seems to move forward. This portrait of battling cosmetic titans, which opened on Monday at the

Goodman Theater here starring a deliciously paired Patti LuPone and Christine Ebersole, doesn’t just show its

whole hand from the get-go; it does so as eagerly as a debutante with a fabulous new manicure.

Written by Doug Wright (book), Scott Frankel (music) and Michael Korie (lyrics), and directed by Michael

Greif, “War Paint” lets you know exactly what it is and where it’s going (or not going) in a prologue, so you can

decide right away if it’s your cup of skin toner. Seated on opposite sides of the stage at vanity tables are two

middle-aged women in peignoirs appraising themselves in the mirror and applying the ritualistic goo of the

show’s title — that is, their makeup.

They are, it turns out, Helena Rubinstein (1872-1965) and Elizabeth Arden (1881-1966), masters of self-

invention who ruled the American beauty market during the mid-20th century. As embodied here, these

glamorous gals look as joltingly different as, well, Ms. LuPone (playing Rubinstein) and Ms. Ebersole (Arden),

marquee Broadway performers who have dominated many a musical, though in utterly dissimilar styles. (For

the record, they are both in top form here.)

But wait a minute. The Polish-born Rubinstein may have the exotic and imperious countenance of an aging

silent-movie vamp (crossed with Cloris Leachman’s Frau Blücher in “Young Frankenstein”), while the perky,

blond Arden could pass as Beaver Cleaver’s mother. And throughout the show, David Korins’s set, which

conjures period opulence with efficient minimalism, and Catherine Zuber’s luxe costumes (not minimalist at

all) underscore the gap between the leading divas.

Yet don’t these women have a lot in common, too? After all, they’re singing the same tune and sharing lyrics

about the difficulty of being women who must put on masks to face the world. Though they may be born to

clash, Rubinstein and Arden are, as the script has it, “sisters in suffering.”

It will take them and two-and-a-half more hours of similarly symmetrical scenes, usually played in direct,

crosscutting counterpoint, to confess their bond to each other. (The show’s rhythms can be boiled down to:

They’re totally different! No, they’re totally alike!) The production seems to have taken to heart one of Arden’s

marketing mantras to her sales staff: “Remember girls! Repetition makes reputation.”

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The title of the opening number is “A Woman’s Face,” which also happens to be the name of a 1941 film

directed by George Cukor and starring Joan Crawford. This is appropriate, since “War Paint” brings to mind

many movies of that period, hen flicks (its stars were too regal to be chicks) like “The Women” and “Old

Acquaintance,” in which female antagonists in to-die-for dresses did fierce battle with one another, tooth and

clawed quip.

The creators of “War Paint” appreciate the pulpy appeal of such cinematic fare, in which exaggerated artificial

surfaces and badinage conceal ravenous ambition and broken hearts. But “War Paint” also pauses to question

the social values of a system that forces women to conceal their imperfections. Or, as a lyric from the end of the

show asks, “Did we make women freer, or did we enslave them?”

It is safe to assume that such sociological debate is not what will hold the attention of audiences for “War

Paint,” which has been selling fast in Chicago and is possibly bound for Broadway. No, that would be the sight

and sound of Ms. LuPone and Ms. Ebersole, both two-time Tony winners, as their characters pursue rigid

parallel paths for four decades, never actually meeting but always emulously aware of each other. They are, as

another character wildly describes them, “locked in a malevolent tango, sailing over a cliff.”

Arden on Rubinstein: “Royalty? She’s as common as a cabbage.” Rubinstein on Arden: “Pedigreed? Ha! She —

what? — stepped off the Pilgrim boat in her Chanel pumps? I know the truth, Harry. She’s Canadian!” (Ms.

LuPone, as you may imagine, milks the comic potential of Rubinstein’s Polish accent and malapropisms for all

they’re worth.)

Such zingers — along with more accounts of the packaging and marketing of cosmetics than you surely ever

expected from a musical — punctuate scenes in which both women face the same obstacles. These include

congressional hearings on the misrepresentation of their products, social rejection, World War II (a sequence

that flirts with bad taste), the advent of vulgar hard-sell advertising (rendered in a “Mad Men”-style production

number snappily choreographed by Christopher Gattelli) and the cruel march of changing times.

They also can’t hold onto their guys, who in this version are Arden’s husband (and business manager), Tommy

Lewis (John Dossett), and Rubinstein’s business manager, Harry Fleming (Douglas Sills), who is gay, snarky

and adoring. (You may draw parallels with part of this show’s target demographic only if you choose.)

Played with hangdog miens by the gifted Mr. Dossett and Mr. Sills, these men soon betray their bosses and

switch sides. Please note that though the musical was inspired by the biography “War Paint” by Lindy

Woodhead and the documentary film “The Powder & the Glory,” the script by Mr. Wright (“I Am My Own

Wife”) telescopes, rearranges and modifies history in the service of blunt thematic tidiness.

As a study in contrasts, “War Paint” quickly turns monochrome. Fortunately, Mr. Frankel and Mr. Korie’s score

plays knowingly to its stars’ respective strengths, with swirling, lyrical melodies for Arden and jagged, Kurt

Weillian ones for Rubinstein.

Ms. Ebersole — who collaborated previously with the “War Paint” team to Tony-winning brilliance in “Grey

Gardens” — brings not just enameled chipperness but also a startling glimpse of genuine, self-surprising pain to

her singing. Her climactic solo of reckoning, “Pink,” is a knockout.

So is Ms. LuPone’s parallel number. (You can imagine the show’s writers dividing up the star turns very

carefully.) Of course, these women each have their own sui generis approaches to a song. Ms. LuPone, an

idiosyncratic belter, wrestles melodies to the mat in freestyle, while Ms. Ebersole is a sparkling precisionist.

It is all the more surprising that on the occasions they sing together, their voices flow into a single powerful,

poignant stream. Like the dominating women they portray, these actresses have more in common than you

might think. That includes a blessed gift for finding emotional substance, and animating variety, in what is

otherwise a frozen diptych. And no, that is not the name of a spa treatment.

July 20, 2016

Review: A Restaged ‘Small Mouth Sounds’ Still Sparkles

By Charles Isherwood

“Small Mouth Sounds,” a quiet gem of a play by Bess Wohl that was first seen Off Broadway at Ars Nova last

year, has been restaged at the Pershing Square Signature Center with all its wit, compassion and sparkle fully

intact. The sound of silence onstage has rarely made such sweet music.

For much of the play’s 100 minutes, most of the characters do not speak. It takes place at a weeklong spiritual

retreat where silence is enjoined, although Ms. Wohl’s ingenuity and the sympathetic direction of Rachel

Chavkin allow us to read the bleeding hearts of the characters with a lucidity that no amount of dialogue could

improve upon.

The men and women assembling for a psychic tuneup are a nicely varied bunch. At the head of the class would

seem to be the yoga rock star Rodney (Babak Tafti), handsome, bearded, decked out in Buddhist-flavored

clothing and prone to twisting his body into elaborate poses.

This mildly prickles his assigned roommate, the slightly insecure Ned, who alone among the characters is given

a self-explanatory monologue. He deserves a chance to unload. A few years ago poor Ned, who is played with a

plangent ache by the terrific Brad Heberlee, fell when rock climbing and shattered his skull. While he was in

and out of the hospital, his wife began sleeping with his brother. And it got worse from there.

Ned cannot even find peace at this retreat. He takes a quiet shine to the grumpy Alicia (Zoë Winters), who is

perhaps the least spiritually evolved — or enthusiastic — of the participants. Reeling from a breakup, she taps

out angry texts on her phone whenever she can find a signal. To Ned’s dismay, his attempts to cozy up to her

are sidelined when Rodney, more obviously a candidate for hot rebound sex, gets in the way.

Also hitting relationship speed bumps recently are Joan (Marcia DeBonis) and Judy (Quincy Tyler Bernstine),

committed partners who nevertheless are feeling some understandable strains. Judy, we learn, has recently

learned she has cancer. In one of the play’s most tender passages, she has a moment of communion with Jan

(Max Baker); wordlessly, we learn that he is still mourning a painful loss.

Although the stage at the Signature Center is modestly larger than the one at Ars Nova, there’s no diminishment

of the play’s intimacy, which is enhanced by the staging. Most of the action takes place on a rectangular playing

space, with the audience seated in a few rows on either side of it. Only when they are receiving instruction from

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the leader of the retreat — who remains unseen but is voiced with hilariously oily piety by Jojo Gonzalez — do

the characters assemble on chairs at one end of the stage.

Although Mr. Baker, Ms. Bernstine and Ms. Winters are new to “Small Mouth Sounds,” they inhabit their

characters with the same full-hearted openness that marks the work of the actors who are returning to their

roles.

In a summer of disturbing discord and violence, it’s heartening to renew acquaintance with a play that leaves

you moved, refreshed and, yes, maybe even a little enlightened.

July 25 – August 1

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