The musical "Chicago" is about to finger-snap its way into the record books.
The matinee performance on Aug. 27 will mark the musical's 6,138 show, meaning it vaults over the original version of "A Chorus Line" to become the fourth longest-running show in Broadway history.
"It's amazing this show. It goes on and on and on," says actress Charlotte d'Amboise, who has been in and out of the musical about a dozen times over the past 14 years. "I've done other shows and you look around and go, 'Where's the audience?' With this show, it just never happens."
That record-breaking matinee will also mark the John Kander and Fred Ebb musical becoming the longest-running American show in Broadway history. Ahead of it are "The Phantom of the Opera," "Cats" and "Les Miserables" — all British imports.
Set in the 1920s, "Chicago" is a scathing satire of how show business and the media make celebrities out of criminals. It has Bob Fosse-inspired choreography, skimpy outfits and killer songs such as "All That Jazz," "Cell Block Tango" and "Mr. Cellophane."
"It's a toe-tapping exploration of getting away with murder," says Walter Bobbie, the director. "It is the abuse of celebrity. And there is genuine thematic and narrative muscle underneath all of this fantastically sassy music."
The vaudeville-flecked musical snagged six Tony Awards — including for best musical revival — and a Grammy Award. Since then, it has been performed in 30 countries across the world since 1996 and been translated into 12 languages. More than 10 million people are believed to have seen the show.
Few expected that success back in 1996 when Bobbie and choreographer Ann Reinking first worked on the show at City Center's "Encores!" concert series. It was booked for only four performances and few thought it had a future without adding a lot of razzle-dazzle.
"When we were first doing it, everyone said, 'We don't know if you should do it because it doesn't have a helicopter. It doesn't have a chandelier dropping. It doesn't have any of those things,'" recalls Fran Weissler, one of the producers.
"I remember saying, 'You're right, those things were production-driven. We've seen them, they're great. This is performance-driven. This is about the actors,'" she adds. "It is a lean-and-mean show."
Others in the theater community were cool to the idea of the revival. Some said it was too soon to restage or that the material wasn't stunning enough. The original made its debut in 1975 and was overshadowed by "A Chorus Line," which also came out that year and wowed the critics.
"We got pretty mediocre reviews," recalls Kander. "'A Chorus Line,' was, of course, a huge hit — so much so that none of us went to the Tonys. Why go and have your face rubbed in it? And we were right. To think that all these years later this is happening is really ironic."
Bobbie, who was artistic director of the "Encores!" series that summer in 1996, says the pitch-dark cynicism of the script — murdering women on death row competing for press attention — seemed ahead of its time back then, when O.J. Simpson dominated the headlines.
"I was watching the O.J. trial and I started to read 'Chicago,' and I went, 'Oh my God. This feels like it was written today.' It was prescient," says Bobbie. "What started out as a satire in the 1970s, felt like it had turned into a documentary with music."
Kander, who with Ebb wrote such brilliant musicals as "Cabaret, "Kiss of the Spider Woman" and "The Scottsboro Boys," says they wanted to say something profound about the celebrity-obsessed world but also keep the show interesting.
"'Chicago,' if you think about it, is a really nasty piece of work. And it's also nasty to the audience, what you're saying about them," he says. "But somehow or other, by keeping them entertained, they ... receive the medicine without grimacing."
Reinking, who saw a first-rate creative team emerge at the "Encores!" series, isn't too surprised at the show's longevity. She saw John Lee Beatty's set emerge as spare and functional. She saw William Ivey Long given just $2,000 for costumes but emerge with sexy outfits after having raided friends' closets.
"It just fell into place," says Reinking, whose choreography was modeled after the work of the legendary Fosse, who directed, choreographed and co-wrote the book for the original. (The show has outlived Fosse, who died in 1987, and Ebb, who died in 2004.)
"You know how you hear sometimes a woman goes into labor and 10 minutes later she's got this beautiful baby? You couldn't believe that it was materializing in such a beautiful way."
Another reason the revival has managed to last is the decision to cast celebrity replacements in a show about the venality of celebrities. Just some of the stars who have done stints in the show include Sofia Vergara, Melanie Griffith, Brooke Shields, Ashlee Simpson, Paige Davis, Marilu Henner, Rita Wilson, Usher, Huey Lewis, Michael C. Hall, Jerry Springer, Billy Zane and Christie Brinkley.
Bobbie says the roles bend for each person who plays them but allows each personality to emerge. The show is also structured so that no single performer has to carry it, meaning it doesn't rise or fall on one actor.
"You can steal the show if you want to, but it's on no one's back to sustain it," says Bobbie, who often returns to the Ambassador Theatre to check on new actors or conduct rehearsals. "In some cases, we've had talent in the show who really have gotten away with murder, theatrically."
Even a 2002 film version starring Renee Zellweger, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Queen Latifah and Richard Gere didn't dampen ticket sales. In fact, the box office boomed for years as interest increased, thanks to national attention and advertising.
"People, interestingly, instead of saying, 'Oh, I've seen it,' came to see the Broadway show and then have a whole different experience. As good as the film is, it is very different from the Broadway show," says Bobbie.
Fittingly, d'Amboise plans to be on stage when the show beats the original version of "A Chorus Line," which ran from 1975-1990. She's been in and out of "Chicago" as the conniving Roxie Hart at least 2,000 times.
"I don't count," says the actress, who got her second Tony Award nomination as Cassie in the recent revival of "A Chorus Line" on Broadway. "I come back for a couple of months, get in shape, feel sexy and fabulous and people applaud — there's nothing better than that."
D'Amboise, who was originally cast in the show's first national tour, says she has the show now in her body. She's raised two children while playing Roxie and recalls singing "Me and My Baby" while secretly pregnant.
She's also watched as the audiences' reaction to the show changes depending on what's going on outside the theater. The night President Obama was elected, she says, some of the more cynical lines bombed. In more dark times, the laughter is loud.
"It's timeless," she says. "It has to do with America."
Reinking agrees. It is, after all as the opening line says, "a story of murder, greed, corruption, violence, exploitation, adultery, and treachery — all those things we all hold near and dear to our hearts."
"It is classically American," she says. "Even though we poke fun at ourselves and the characters have raw edges, we're a country that has the best and the worst — the rawness as well as the elegance. We're very much a paradox."
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Online:
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