Mangaloreans have a Ball with ‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’?
Mangaluru: Every time Leila Alvares-a Mangaluru origin now settled in Bengaluru, and who is the Director of CAUSE Foundation organizes a musical play in Mangaluru it gets “Better and Better” and the audience gets “Larger and Larger”- and this time it was no exception, where a large number of Mangaloreans stormed the Town Hall-Mangaluru on Sunday, 10 September to have a glimpse of the “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”- I mean to say, the Musical play “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”-which enthralled and mesmerized the opera/musical play lovers.
The CAUSE Foundation-Bengaluru a non-profit organization, for the past 20 years has been bringing quality Broadway musicals to the Bengaluru stage and has also staged many shows in Mangaluru. The Foundation primary objective is to promote local talent with profits donated to local charities. It’s been 20 years since Leila Alvares, a well-known name in Bengaluru’s theatre circles, staged her first annual musical. Now,19 different musicals later, Leila was back in the city with an adaptation of “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”, based on the 1988 film of the same name. And the play was simply the “Best” among the “Rest ” that Mangaluru has ever witnessed from choreography, superb performances by the artists, the sound, the lighting and what not?
The Musical Play- “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”, based on the popular 1988 MGM film, took the audience to the French Riviera for high jinks and hilarity. Sophisticated, suave with a good dash of mischief, this hysterical comedy featured a delightfully jazzy score by David Yazbek (The Full Monty) who was nominated for a staggering eleven Tony Awards. Lawrence Jamieson makes his lavish living by talking rich ladies out of their money. Freddy Benson more humbly swindled women by waking their compassion with fabricated stories about his grandmother’s failing health. After a brief meeting, they attempt to work together. When the town becomes too small for both of them to operate side by side, they devise a way to decide who stays and who must leave.
The Musical play comprising of Two Act parts- In Act 1, the musical opens at a lively Casino near the French Riviera (“Overture”). Inside the casino, con-artist Lawrence Jameson is tricking wealthy women out of their money with his “bodyguard” Andre (“Give Them What They Want”). One such woman named Muriel and a few other women express their devotion and amorous feelings for Lawrence (“What Was a Woman To Do”). Andre warns Lawrence about a con-artist, known as “The Jackal”. While on a train, Lawrence watches an American named Freddy Benson swindle money out of a woman, but making much less money than Lawrence does. Lawrence ends up bringing Freddy to his lavish mansion, where Freddy envies how Lawrence has made a living out of swindling.
Then he talks of all the things he wants when he’s rich (“Great Big Stuff”). Freddy asks Lawrence to “show [him] his ways.” Andre thinks Freddy is unworthy of Lawrence’s attention, and compares Freddy to a (“Chimp in a Suit”). Lawrence doesn’t think much of it until Jolene Oakes, a woman he’s swindled, informs him at gunpoint that the two of them will be getting married and moving to Oklahoma (“Oklahoma?”). Lawrence decides to use Freddy’s help. Freddy poses as Lawrence’s repulsive brother Ruprecht (“All About Ruprecht”). Seeing that Lawrence plans to make Ruprecht a large part of their life together, Jolene calls off the wedding.
Lawrence begins to think that there isn’t enough room in town for both him and Freddy. They make a deal: The first to get $50,000 out of a woman gets to stay in town, while the other has to leave. Immediately after making the deal the arrival of “The American Soap Queen, Christine Colgate” is announced (“Here I Am”). Both con men decide to make her the target of their scams. Freddy creates an alias as a man paralyzed from the waist down. She and Freddy become deep in conversation and he says there is a therapist, Dr. Shuffhausen, who can help him, but he doesn’t have the money that Dr. Shuffhausen charges, $50,000. Christine tells him to keep his hopes up (“Nothing Is Too Wonderful To Be True”). She tells Freddy she has the money to pay for the therapist, as Freddy had hoped (“The Miracle”). She then tells him that Dr. Shuffhausen is at the hotel. Freddy is shocked when he sees it is none other than Lawrence.
In Act 2, after a 15 minutes break where the audience feasted on some snacks and drinks sold at the stalls put up by Mangalore Round Table – 115 and Mangalore Ladies Circle – 82, it was once again hilarious and fun time- After a quick reintroduction (“Entr’acte”), Lawrence performs several torturous tests on Freddy’s legs who has to endure them silently while in front of Christine (“Ruffhousin’ Mit Shuffhausen”). In the side show Muriel meets Andre and the two fall in love (“Like Zis/Like Zat”). Lawrence is trying in every effort to get close to Christine (“The More We Dance”), when he realizes that Christine is not as rich as they thought. Lawrence tells Freddy that he thinks they should call off the deal. Freddy reluctantly agrees the bet will be changed to whether or not he sleeps with her, then hires two sailors to kidnap Lawrence so that he can get Christine alone.
Freddy meets back with Christine at the hotel where he tells her he needs motivation to get out of his chair. She says she’ll be his motivation (“Love is My Legs”). She sits on the bed till he is finally able to stand up out of his chair and walk to her on the bed (where he “accidentally” falls on top of her in exhaustion), when Lawrence shows up and it turns out to be a test planned by him and Christine. Lawrence has the same two sailors kidnap Freddy while he takes Christine to the train station so she can leave (“Love Sneaks In”). Freddy shows up, having escaped the sailors too late to get to Christine.
The next day Freddy meets Christine back at the hotel who says she couldn’t leave “without seeing you again.” (“Son of Great Big Stuff”) The two get in bed together before the scene is switched to Lawrence’s mansion where Christine shows up, telling him tearfully how she came back to see Freddy, how they made love, and then when she woke up all her money was gone: “I’m beginning to think he was never really paralyzed.” Out of remorse, Lawrence packs 50 thousand dollars in a suitcase and tells her to take it. Christine takes it, but returns and gives him back the suitcase saying, ‘I’ll have something so much better to remember you by” before leaving.
A few minutes later Freddy shows up in his underwear. Lawrence is angry at him for taking Christine’s money. Freddy, however, claims that they never made love at all; they were about to when she knocked him out. When he woke up all his belongings were gone. Lawrence then opens up the suitcase to find the money gone, replaced by Freddy’s clothes and a note that reads, “Goodbye boys. It was fun! Love, ‘The Jackal’”, thus revealing that she knew about their scam the entire time, and instead ended up scamming them (“The Reckoning”). A while later Christine returns to Lawrence’s chateau, bringing a group of other people with her. The guys finally admit the scam was a good adventure for them (“Dirty Rotten Number”) and they hatch a scheme to scam the crowd of people together in the “Finale”.
With nearly 20 musical numbers in this production well performed by the 30 plus cast of the Play, took the audience into the world of music and entertainment, which they have been longing for months, after “Fiddler On The Roof” was staged last year. This hilarious battle of cons ensues kept audience laughing, humming and guessing to the end! After all it was really a story of two lovable conmen and how they lived their lives. At the end of the day, it was all about how love triumphs over all else- which the audience liked and showered thunderous applauds throughout the Play. The play explored the themes of deception, love, friendship and competition. While the original Broadway script was over two hours long, Leila Alvares’s version was cut short to one hour and 40 minutes- and that was quite enough to entertain the musical play buffs of Mangaluru.
The play cast was a mix of students, doctors and corporate professionals and the lead roles were played by Arvind Kasthuri ( Lawrence Jamieson), Rahael Thomas ( Freddy Benson); Nithya Samuel ( Christine Colgate); Prem Koshy (Concierge); among others. Accompanied by a live band with Vivek Menzel as Music Director/Drums, with choreography/Dance sets for the musical done by Rhea Thomas, Alisha D’Souza and Lionel De Nazareth. At the end of the Play, Leila Alvares came on to the stage and thanked everyone for making this production/play a grand success. She also remembered and paid homage to one of their musician friend, 29-year-old musician Karan Joseph from Bengaluru, who allegedly committed suicide on Saturday by jumping off the 12th floor of a high-rise building in suburban Bandra in Mumbai.
Kudos to Leila Alvares and her troupe for unleashing their magnificent talents in the form of Dance, Music and Act. Simply Amazing! Simply Marvellous! and that was the Musical Play “Dirty rotten Scoundrels”! And to those who missed to see this hilarious play, it’s no use now to “Cry over spilled Milk”?
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‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’- A Musical Play by Leila Alvares at Town Hall