The House of Usher Meets the Beatles

Those who were fortunate enough to attend shows from the Beatles American tour in 1964 for the most part can only attest to seeing them as opposed to hearing the by now classic tunes with all the relentless shrieking from the young females there. Female shrieking has since then become the indication of a celebrity's fame. It is that noise that makes awards shows and talk shows alike unwatchable and annoying. It is the reason that there were very, very few Beatles tours.

It is the noise filling the streets of New York's theater district near the Ambassador Theater on W. 49th St when Usher leaves his current place of employment. Witnessing it can only recall the hysteria that has accompanied the ascendancy of similar luminaries since the young Sinatra sang with the Tommy Dorsey orchestra. Usher's joining the cast has been the epitome of stunt casting but its the kind of thing that may be saving contemporary musical theater. There is a certain poignancy to witnessing it after being at Ellen's Stardust Diner where there is a gaggle of quite talented musical waiters and waitresses. Difficult right now to define the precise nature of the poignancy. Suffice it to say that there was more appreciative applause as opposed to shrieking for the unemployed actors -- very talented unemployed actors -- waiting tables. Discovering this article in the current New York Press was to the point. So, enjoy the latest pilfered journalism.

He Can Handle It
The rise of the House of Usher by Leonard Jacobs

What’s that cinematic fillip when someone smiles and there’s a little ping and then a little flash coming from someone’s front tooth? I’m sure there’s a name for it, and whatever it is, Usher Raymond has it. He smiles so often in Chicago—the long-running revival of the Broadway musical in which he’s now playing the role of Billy Flynn—that much of his performance is ping-ping-ping

In the audience, it’s ping-plus: his fans scream so loud each time Usher appears, they’re fairly creaming in their jeans just to see him stand there, ultra-dapper in a suit or tux. Truthfully, they’d be better off if they waited until he’s actually done something, like act (which he does, if stiffly), dance (which he does, bravely trying to foxy up the Bob Fosse choreography) or sing (which he does, terrifically).

As much as it may be a critic’s job to critique, it feels fundamentally unfair to criticize someone with such palpable stage presence who also is apparently under such palpable pressure—pressure of a kind that catapults itself over the footlights and lands in your lap. You don’t have to be jeans-creaming to notice that Usher is ingratiating and mad flirtatious. But at the same time, Usher’s really giving us the shaft, if you will, because he knows he’s tentative; he doesn’t own the part yet. It’s as if he’s extra conscious of wanting to play a character, not play an R&B music star playing a character. Good for him for knowing the difference.


Meanwhile, as Usher sizes and sexes up his audience to help mask something (maybe nervousness; maybe being 10 years too young for the role; maybe the fact that, smooth as he glides, he’s not perfectly executing those hip-and-ankle Fosse moves) he is also being used by the producers of Chicago, Fran and Barry Weissler. Insiders know the Weisslers perfected the idea of populating Broadway mega-hits with ever-growing lists of stars who sign on for short stints. In the ’90s, for their revival of Grease, they brought in: Jasmine Guy, Sheena Easton, Linda Blair, Debby Boone, Deborah Gibson, Lucy Lawless, Maureen McCormick, Mackenzie Phillips, Brooke Shields, Jody Watley and Joanne Worley.
Chicago’s replacement merry-go-round has been even nuttier. Usher is just the latest in a line of Billy Flynns that began with James Naughton, who won a Tony for the role, and has included Wayne Brady, Gregory Harrison, Huey Lewis, John O’Hurley, Kevin Richardson, Patrick Swayze and Tom Wopat. And that’s just half the list. The cold, hard difference now is that those names aren’t hot; Usher is hot. Those other guys are theater or TV actors; that sickly sweet meringue of not-quite-has-been pop star and not-quite-has-been boy-band star. Usher is in a different sphere; all seem aware of it. He holds in his hands the possibility of actually achieving what so many producers and self-proclaimed consciences of the theater talk about but rarely do: bringing new audiences to Broadway. It would help if the Weisslers weren’t acting like down-on-their-luck hobos and charging $100 a ticket for this cultural orgasm, but that’s another story.

Or is it? An idea struck me as I left the Ambassador Theater following Usher receiving, on salivary-gland cue, a standing ovation of a type that (I thought) was reserved for the return of Jesus Christ. On the train home, I wrote these notes: “The show doesn’t matter. What matters is sell, sell, sell.”

Then I read Ben Brantley’s review in the Times—which was an ejaculation of trivialization—and I was suddenly on the pop prince’s side: Who could blame Usher for not being as groin-stirringly magnetic and relaxed as this sultan of silk most likely will be when the critics go home? So I added to my notes: “In his bitchiest cynical-gay-man mode, Brantley daydreams about how else the Chicago producers could cast Billy Flynn: a silver Chicago starring Bea Arthur, a Scientology Chicago, yuk yuk yuk.”

Is the problem having an R&B star on Broadway? No, we should encourage that—after all, 50 Cent isn’t starring in Show Boat (or given his recent arrest, The Most Happy Fella) any time soon. Is the problem that producers are too eager to milk the cash cow, especially now that they’re abandoning the idea of replacement casting has-beens and never-weres in favor of very-hots? Well, who said producers were moral?

In the end, what may be lacking in Usher’s performance might be unhelped by the critics, who only care about cleverness. How sad that is and how ironic, too, when the scores of fans outside the theater, ready with their disposable cameras (a beautiful metaphor), only wish that they could croon along with Usher when he sings Billy Flynn’s signature song: “All I Care About Is Love.”