Susan Granger’s review of “The Woman in White” (Marquis Theater)
The most remarkable aspect of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s new $8.5 million musical, “The Woman in White,” is the scenery. And the star is really William Dudley, the show’s set and video designer and creator of the amazing visual effects. This is the first Broadway show in which spectacular computer-animated images dominate the stage.
Indeed, as the melodramatic thriller begins, a train – with its wheels rumbling – comes barreling toward the audience before it comes to a screeching halt. Off steps the young tutor Walter Hartright (Adam Brazier) who has been engaged by their uncle (Walter Charles) to teach art to the two Halcombe half-sisters, plain-but-clever Marian (Maria Friedman) and lovely-but-victimized Laura (Jill Paice), who marries the abusive, fortune-hunter Sir Percival Glyde (Ron Bohmer). Then there’s Glyde’s Italian amoral accomplice, Count Fosco (Michael Ball), and the eerie, mysterious titular character (Angela Christian).
Inspired by Wilkie Collins’ Victorian-era novel, playwright Charlotte Jones’ book stretches thin over the course of three hours, and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s melodic score, while lush, never comes close to his previous musicals, despite David Zippel’s lively libretto, particularly in the patter song, “You Can Get Away With Anything.” Director Trevor Nunn elicits remarkable performances from his cast, particularly Maria Friedman, who exudes dramatic power, and Michael Ball, whose exuberance for the sybaritic life is contagious.
Frankly, the off-stage drama of Maria Friedman’s courageous battle with breast cancer is far more moving than what’s on the stage at the Marquis Theater.