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music by Scott White, book and lyrics by Denis McGrath, directed by Colin Viebrock

The TG!TM Co-Op, Factory Theatre, Toronto

June 5-22, 2003

"Rough Landing"

"Top Gun! The Musical", a satire of the current fad for turning movies into musicals, was the most popular show at the 2002 Toronto Fringe Festival.  This led to the show's US premiere at the Houston TheaterLab later that year.  Now the show returns to Toronto for a limited run.  "Top Gun" has been heaped with acclaim but one brings a more critical eye to bear when viewing the show during a commercial run than one does at the Fringe.  If the creators want the show to go any farther there is still a lot of fixing to do.  At present the book and music are highly uneven as is the production itself.

The show is set in a rehearsal hall as the director Billy runs through a new musical set to open in four weeks.  The show comprises both excerpts from "Top Gun!", the musical-within-the-musical, and the backstage scenes involving the actors themselves.  Billy's previous two efforts, "Die Hard: The Musical" and "Apocalypse Wow", have flopped and he needs a hit badly.  He and the cast soldier on even though neither rights to the film nor sufficient financial backing has been secured.

The most hilarious scenes in the show by far are the excerpts from "Top Gun!" that the cast is rehearsing.  Here lyricist Denis McGrath and composer Scott White are spot on in skewering the pretensions of modern musicals and action films by highlighting their worst dramatic and musical clichés.  Top gun Maverick holding his dead copilot Goose in his arms and coming to his Important Realization in the song "That Goose is Cooked" is almost worth the price of admission.  As portentous chords rise one horrid metaphor, one grating rhyme, follows the next convulsing the audience with laughter.  The witty "Public Domain Medley" where the cast tries to fit ideas from the plot to a series of well known, but inappropriate, tunes is another treat.  "We Got a Plane to Catch" has fun with the loud banality of Broadway songs and sexual connotations make the finale "You Can Ride My Tail" intentionally ridiculous.

It's when White and McGrath move away from parody that the results are less interesting.  None of the other seven songs really matches the four above in either musical invention or wit.  The same is true when the show shifts focus from the musical-within-a-musical to the actors themselves.  All the backstage characters--the dumb leading man, the prima donna, the harried director, the neglected stage manager--are also clichés, but McGrath and White seem to want us to take them seriously as the stage manager's song "Waiting in the Wings", the prima donna's "Something to Play" and the dénouement would indicate.  Here the humour becomes scattershot and, without a clear point of view, less effective.

The cast itself is uneven.  The star of the show, Dmitry Chepovetsky as Maverick is clearly brimming with talent.  As a dumb lunk who pours conviction into the meaningless "Top Gun " songs his performance is deliciously humorous on many levels.  He has the strongest singing voice and most consistent acting of the troupe.  Steve Gallagher as the Iceman, Maverick's main rival in "Top Gun", is hilarious at showing how his personal attraction for the actor playing Maverick undermines their characters' ultra macho scenes together.  Gallagher makes Iceman the only source of backstage humour that consistently works.

The strongest female singer is Racheal McCaig as Goose.  She knows how to belt out a song and is great at the mock seriousness of the "Top Gun" scenes.  It's too bad, then that McGrath has neglected to give her a definable character in the backstage scenes.  And why is there no explanation why Goose is male in the film but female in the musical?

Both Drew Carnwath as Billy and Mary Francis Moore as Charlie are miscast.  Carwath is too young to play a man who has directed so many shows and never conjures up enough authority to appear in charge.  There's a big build-up for Charlie as the prima donna, but Moore doesn't have the presence, diction or voice to carry it off.  It's no help that McGrath hasn't written her any zingers to match her supposedly acidic personality.

As Wendy the stage manager, Alison Lawrence's acting may be stronger than her singing but it benefits the show by being consistent.  David Collins as the producer called The General injects some much-needed energy towards the end when the show's creators seem to run out of ideas for the backstage scenes.  He expands the show's satire from musicals themselves to musicals as part of American cultural imperialism.  Unfortunately, when Collins get revved up it's hard to understand anything he says or sings.

Director Colin Viebrock could tighten the action and should help the cast towards a punchier delivery.  As it is they tend to swallow the ends of their lines.  Michael McGinn's musical staging needs to be much more precise.  As lighting and production designer Doug Morum accomplishes a lot with little.  Patrick Burwell does a heroic job at the piano.  He has enough to do, but it would be nice to integrate him more as a character into the backstage scenes.

There is a big market for small-scale musicals and "Top Gun! The Musical" has the potential to go on to more success.  At present the show feels more like a workshop of a musical than a finished product.  But, if the creators can bring the backstage scenes up to the same hilarious level as the "Top Gun!" excerpts, then they really will have a sure hit.   

©Christopher Hoile

Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.

Photo: Dmitry Chepovetsky and Racheal McCaig. ©2003.