"Harold and Maude" the musical offers dark whimsy at Cain Park's Alma Theatre

by Tony Brown/Plain Dealer Theater Critic

Tuesday August 05, 2008, 6:21 PM

Roger MastroianniHarold (Corey Mach) and Maude (Maryann Nagel) are a couple that swings in the Cain Park production of the musical "Harold and Maude."

What: Cain Park presents the musical
by Tom Jones and Joseph Thalken.

When: Through Sunday, Aug. 17. Performances at 7:30 p.m.
Wednesdays-Sundays.

Where: Alma Theater, Superior and Lee roads, Cleveland Heights.

Tickets: $20-$24. Call 216-371-3000 or go to www.cainpark.com.

"Mamma Mia!" is getting all the attention: There's a huge new movie musical based on the huge 2002 Broadway hit based on the hugely popular songs of Swedish supergroup ABBA, and the North American tour is now playing the huge State Theatre at Cleveland's PlayhouseSquare.

But for the more adventurous, there's an obscure alternative to the hype, "Harold and Maude," a pocket musical based on a small 1971 cult film that's playing in Cain Park's intimate Alma Theater.

"Mamma Mia!" derives all its yuks and tears from a fairy-tale wedding between well-adjusted beautiful young people in the Greek isles.

"Harold and Maude," on the other hand, does the same with suicide and a weird May-December affair between a 20-year-old obsessed with death and septuagenarian swinger.

The original picture, dismissed at the time of its release but now ranked No. 45 on the American Film Institute's list of funniest movies, was a collaboration between two of the most influential,
underrated filmmakers of their time: director Hal Ashby and writer Colin Higgins.

Ashby was one of the farthest-left figures in the "New Hollywood" of the 1960s and '70s, directing the anti-establishment film "The Last Detail" and his masterpiece, the existentialist political comedy "Being There."

Higgins was a bit more mainstream, but he exhibited the same subversive tendencies in writing and directing "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas" and "Nine to Five."

They both died in 1988 (Ashby of pancreatic cancer after a long drug and drinking career; Higgins of complications of AIDS), a fact that suicidal Harold would surely have found of interest.

Speaking of death, an attempt to create a Broadway "Harold and
Maude" died a quick one in 1980. Now comes an off-Broadway-sized musical that played New Jersey's Paper Mill Playhouse in 2005 and is being revised by the authors in an attempt to get a New York booking.

With script and lyrics by Tom Jones, who wrote "The
Fantasticks," this little show has whimsy and poignancy.

But, with the repetitive, schmaltzy and sometimes inappropriate
music by Joseph Thalken (who, by the way, is attempting to compete with
the film's perfectly fitting score, by Cat Stevens), Jones cannot
approximate the film's bleak humor.

It's ably directed in Cleveland by Victoria Bussert, who has
brought many small shows full of possibilities to the intimate (if hot
and stuffy) Alma, and she does this one with her usual flair for the
unpredictable. But she's no wacky existentialist.

Neither, unfortunately, is the talented and vivacious Maryann
Nagel, who, in addition to being far too young for the role, doesn't
quite get the kookiness Ruth Gordon lavished on it.

Faring far better in the other title role, Corey Mach is a
gorgeous singer, cute as heck and completely nails the hilarious
morbidity in a part immortalized by Bud Cort.

Jacqueline Cummins has a chilly air as Harold's
Chardonnay-guzzling mom; Patrick Janson does a quick-change marathon as
all of Harold's male authority figures; and Devon Yates takes on
several roles, most hilariously as the strangest of the computer dates
Harold's mom arranges for him.

It's amusing and touching in parts, but it doesn't fulfill
the dark promises and premises of "Harold and Maude."