Leonard Bernstein enthusiasts
may recall that, in 1998, EMI issued
an audio recording (EMI Classics 7743
5 56753 2 3 review)
by Simon Rattle, of Wonderful Town
with the London Voices, the Birmingham
Contemporary Music Group and the same
four soloists featured on this DVD.
The present DVD offers a live performance
recorded in Berlin as a 2002-03 New
Year celebration concert. Rattle and
his soloists, choir, orchestra - and
even the audience to judge by their
enthusiastic participation in the Conga
encore - are in merry festive mood.
Certainly Rattle is animated throughout,
sheer joy reflected in his face.
Wonderful Town
opened on Broadway in 1953 and ran for
559 performances. It starred Rosalind
Russell as Ruth, and Edith Adams as
Eileen. Today, Wonderful Town
is largely overshadowed by Bernstein’s
other stage works like On the Town
and West Side Story which is
a pity as this sparkling Rattle performance
proves. Its story is about two sisters
from Ohio and their wacky adventures
in New York’s Greenwich Village. Eileen’s
beauty enslaves the men, including half
the police force in the very witty ‘My
Darlin’ Eileen’ in which they insist
she is Irish because they think she
"comes from Killarney." But Sister Ruth
just wants to become a successful writer.
Bernstein’s exuberant,
jazz-based score is big and breezy especially
in the colourful celebration of the
larger-than-life characters of ‘Christopher
Street’. The score also embraces the
conga, swing and rag forms and even
the form that characterised the sort
of song that spilled from the lips of
Roy Rogers or Gene Autry as the sisters
Ruth and Eileen sing ‘Ohio’ and rue
abandoning their safe rural backwater
for the uncertainties of New York..
All the singers are excellent, attacking
their characterisations with great enthusiasm
and commitment, and relishing the sharp-witted
lyrics of Betty Comden and Adolph Green.
Audra McDonald as Eileen is sweetly
sentimental in ‘A Little Bit in Love’
while the animated, raucous, gravelly-voiced
Kim Criswell, as Ruth, is wickedly funny
in ‘One hundred easy ways to lose a
man’. The ever-versatile and impressive
Thomas Hampson is Howard Keel-like romantic
in ‘It’s Love’. Brent Barrett is wickedly
funny singing as the knuckle-headed
Wreck, and commenting that he might
be as thick as six planks but he "gets
through college and ‘passes’ exams,
and gets the best jobs because he can
‘Pass the football’".
Incidentally, Wonderful
Town, was based on the play My
Sister Eileen, which in turn, was
filmed by Columbia, in 1942, under that
name, starring Rosalind Russell (Ruth)
and Janet Blair (Eileen). It was filmed
again in 1955 using the same title,
this time with Betty Garrett, Janet
Leigh, Jack Lemmon, Bob Fosse and Tommy
Rall. Columbia were too mean to fork
out for the winning stage-score and
engaged Jule Styne and Leo Robin to
write a substitute. It was no match
for this Bernstein original.
Three cheers then for
Lenny and Simon Rattle et al.
This is wonderful light entertainment
for a summer’s evening. It really is
a Wonderful Town. It goes straight
to the top of my list of favourite recordings
for 2005.
Ian Lace
Berlin Philharmoniker/Sir Simon Rattle 
EUROARTS DVD 2052299 [76:00]
