By SHARON EBERSON
What a treat, to take trip to the tropics, just a few miles from home, and feel the warmth emanating from the Heinz Hall stage, now aglow with a staged concert of South Pacific.
The wonderfully woven tapestry of the Rodgers and Hammerstein masterwork teams Pittsburgh’s world-class orchestra, Broadway star power, local musical theater talent and Carnegie Mellon’s stars of tomorrow, today.
It was a rapturous feeling on Friday, coming in from the bitter cold to the “Some Enchanted Evening” overture, played by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Pops, the welcoming prelude to a staged-concert collab with Pittsburgh CLO and the CMU School of Drama.
Janessa Minta, a CMU senior, is an exuberant Nellie Forbush, the Navy nurse who captures the heart of a lonely French plantation owner during World War II. She holds her own opposite Ben Crawford, a veteran of Broadway’s The Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserable and more, who is heading into the new The Lost Boys musical later this season.
As Emil, Crawford’s sonorous bass-baritone was the highlight among highlights of the night.
at Heinz Hall. (Image by Sharon Eberson)
Cáitlín Burke, a long-time interpreter of Rodgers and Hammerstein characters, has a showstopping vocal range as hard-sell Bloody Mary. Deceptively comedic, she embodies a character who balances survival instinct and a mother’s determination, as she pushes her daughter Liat (angelic Alex Manalo, reprising a role she played for Pittsburgh CLO in 2016) into a relationship with Matty Palmer’s Lieutenant Joe Cable. Another CMU senior, Palmer beautifully captured the longing of “Younger than Springtime.”
The impact of “You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught,” also sung by Palmer, is as strong a statement about racial prejudice today as it was when South Pacific debuted in 1949. That message is tag-teamed and amplified, leading into “This Nearly Was Mine” – with “Some Enchanted Evening,” a tour de force for Crawford.
An awareness of local performers working their magic alongside newcomers can be a treat, such as Ryan Cavanaugh, a devilishly sweet Luther Billis, and J. Alex Noble (Stewpot) formed a trio of scheming sailors with CMU’s Grant Pace (Professor).
As I walked back into the cold night on Friday, fond thoughts were widespread. I recalled that Ben Davis had been an incredibly charismatic Emil for Pittsburgh CLO’s South Pacific in 2016, and Ben Crawford was equal to the task.
And aren’t Pittsburgh musical theater patrons lucky to have the PSO turn its sights to the American Songbook, with a little help from its friends?
the PSO Pops, in the opening of South Pacific. (Image by Sharon Eberson)
PCLO’s Mark Fleischer directs the staged concert – meeting the challenges of a book-in-hand-or-on stands, in the limited space fronting dozens of musicians. Conductor and music director Rob Berman, an Emmy- and Grammy Award-winner based in New York, with an assist from CMU’s Rick Edinger, leads a lush interpretation of a bountiful score. Moving seamlessly from the bouncy (“Honey Bun”), to the exotic (“Bali Ha’i”), to heavy drama (“This Nearly Was Mine”), the orchestra is a powerful presence without overpowering the performers.
The staging includes a couple of full-scale, satisfying production numbers for the ensemble, another mix of veterans and newcomers. The sailors get their due in “There Is Nothing Like a Dame,” and Minta’s Nellie does not actually wash that man right out of her hair (no water or suds), but her small army of nurses are awash in exhilarated support for their friend.
This is the second musical theater collaboration by the PSO Pops with Pittsburgh CLO, following Fiddler on the Roof in 2024. Stripped to its barebones, but maintaining the musical integrity and emotion of a full production, Fiddler and South Pacific are at the pinnacle of an artform I can watch again and again, with this team steering the ship.
TICKETS AND DETAILS
South Pacific in Concert, a collaboration of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Pops with Pittsburgh CLO and Carnegie Mellon School of Drama, continues at Heinz Hall, Downtown, Saturday, January 31, at 7:30 p.m., and Sunday, February 1, at 2:30 p.m. Tickets: Visit https://pittsburghsymphony.org/production/99125/rodgers-and-hammersteins-south-pacific-in-concert.
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