SPOTLIGHT: 'DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS'

It surely goes without saying that in a season like this one--- whose previous musical openings have been (in order) The Frogs, Dracula, Brooklyn, Little Women, and Good Vibrations--- Dirty Rotten Scoundrels feels like a gem. Last Thursday at the Imperial Theater, Scoundrels, Broadway's first anticipated musical (and, likely, first Best Musical nominee) of the season opened to a chorus of moderately pleased to considerably underwhelmed reviews. While a good sign for the state of intelligence and judiciousness among theater critics, it's quite another kind of sign for the state of Broadway musicals.

Scoundrels is the kind of show where a man--- a straight man, mind you--- stumbles into a room late in Act Two dressed like a woman. He's even wearing pink. Oh, the hilarity. So why doesn't anybody laugh?

Because it's not very funny. And neither is the show--- in fact, it's pretty tedious at moments. It has a few virtues--- mainly, its gifted headliners, John Lithgow, Norbert Leo Butz, Sheri Rene Scott, and Joanna Gleason--- but freshness and spontaneity are not among them. The same could be said for David Yazbek's score, which clunkily spans faux-genres, from faux hip-hop to faux 40's standard. The only successful songs, to this critic, are: a pleasant faux classic rock ballad that deliberately mixes banal metaphors like "Love is Your Legs" and features an candle-weilding ensemble; and an upbeat gag number called "All About Ruprecht," which sticks firmly to the melodic conventions of musical theater and also features some of Butz' best work.

The hope, then, is that among Monty Python's Spamalot, A Light in the Piazza, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang will arise a winner. Should we hold our breath?