There’s a new stark, gritty, and more “natural” version of the 1970s Broadway smash “ANNIE” and no, I’m not making it up.
A “populist theater” (populist is from the Latin for “poor but proud hardworkin’ good country folks”) in Providence, RI, is staging a revised production that begins with homeless people moving lethargically to a suicidally down tempo “Tomorrow” and ends with Annie waking up back in the orphanage to discover
that her happy life with Daddy Warbucks was only a dream, and that she would never escape poverty, loneliness and despair
The show’s creators aren’t happy, but that’s because they have less vision than Ray Charles taking a nap in a sensory deprivation tank. I think they shouldn’t stop there. I think they should give the play over to Sam Mendes, the man who completely revamped CABARET in such a way as to send hurtling from the cliffs of collective memes and into the dustbins of anonymity and shameful memory (where they still landed 83 levels higher than Joel’s facially modified daughter Jennifer).
Keep the 1930s worldwide Depression thing, but move Annie out of that orphanage and over the seas to Europe under the Nazi juggernaut. I’m talking about Broadway’s Next Great Hit,
LITTLE ORPHAN ANNIE FRANK
I can see it now. A poor Jewish orphan in an attic (yes, I know Anne Frank wasn’t an orphan, but this is more musical) who’s taken away to the Berlin palace of billionaire speculator Daddi Kriegmarks John Stamos and his preoperative transsexual common-law-secretary* Grace von Fahrenkopf Neil Patrick Harris) who need good PR in order to win Luftwaffe contracts but ends up teaching them about life. In the show’s climax she’s flown by Göring down to Berchtesgaden where she sings “TOMORROW (Belongs to Me)” with Adolf and Eva, who suddenly realize that there’s more to life than global domination and they stop the war and open the Passion8 Bett und Frühstück in Oberammergau. Unfortunately at the end she learns it’s just a dream, she’s still in her attic, and Daddi Kriegmarks is still unable to shed his Full House curse.
Or you can revamp ANNIE WARBUCKS (the ill fated sequel to ANNIE) as a paean to drug use and teen pregnancy while featuring Sally Struthers as a singing bag lady with a bit to say about global warming.
Or on second thought leave it as it is. People who want gritty reality when they go to the theater can go see something by Tennessee Williams.
*Plagiarism from “THE PRODUCERS” acknowledged
I’ve read that the same theater, no-joke, has done a version of SOUND OF MUSIC that ends with a concentration camp and a production of CATS that ends with a gassing in a pound.
So, what other alternate endings could you imagine? Some suggestions:
FIDDLER ON THE ROOF- in this one they’re not Jewish but Armenian, and it ends at the Act I finale when Tevyian and his family are slaughtered by the Turks.
ARSENIC AND OLD LACE- in this one, euthanasia is more fully explored and ultimately the two sisters begin taking orders to kill from a dog.
RENT- Mimi survives AIDS, but dies of monkey pox.
SOUTH PACIFIC- survives the Japs but they all catch disease from the Americans.
OKLAHOMA- ends with a nice slaughter by the Cheyenne, then Laurie awakes to find she really is married to Jud.
YOU’RE A GOOD MAN CHILDHOOD- it’s revealed that childhood sexual abuse has made Linus cling to the blanket as a relic from a more secure time, while Snoopy must address the anti-Semitism that causes him to want to shoot down planes for the Fatherland.
Fiddler on the Roof - all of the characters are devoured by unholy monstrosities from beyond time and space. * Byakhee Byakhee fly me through space . . . *
It’s an in-joke involving “Annie”'s composer, Charles Strouse, who has composed (I believe) 8 or 9 musicals after “Annie”, with a combined total of 17 performances on Broadway.
