Catch me if you can

        What did I do the night before Hurricane Irene? I took in a Broadway show of course. I've been putting this one off as long as humanely possible, because everything I've seen about this show has made me not want to see it. The clips and song performances have been terrible or mediocre at best. Word of mouth has been the same. So, needless to say I went in with the absolute lowest of expectations.

       I can now say that Catch me if  you can is one of the worst 5 Broadway Musicals I have ever seen. Let's start with what is good though. The music is actually pretty good. By music, I mean the the notes without words (The lyrics are laughable). Marc Shaiman is an extremely talented composer and he has written some wonderfully tuneful melodies for this show.
  
     The next best thing about Catch me if you can is Terrence McNallys book. It's no Master Class or Kiss of the spider woman that is for sure, but he did the best he could with what was available to him. You can tell that some of the songs were written before the book, and he was basically told "ok make these fit into the scene" and he did what he could.

     Norbert Leo Butz is doing the same thing with Agent Carl Hanratty (played memorably on film by Tom Hanks). Norbert doesn't completely erase the memory of Tom Hanks performance, but he does succeed in making you accept him in the role. Also, he does very well with his material, adding a bit of fine acting to some terrible songs.

   Tom Wopat and Kerry Butler also shine as Frank Sr. and Brenda, respectively. The rest of the supporting cast is doing their best. Where Catch me if you can fails miserably is with Frank William Abignale Jr. which is pretty disappointing considering the entire show is about him.

   From the very beginning Frank Jr. is portrayed as a thieving, conniving, womanizing playboy who just did all this for kicks and pussy, pardon my language. This makes the character exceptionally unlikeable. It does not help that his songs are the worst in the show, and that he is constantly surrounded by a bevy of long legged show girls who do not add to the plot in any way. There is very little vulnerability written into the character, which makes him seem inhuman. On top of that, as played by Aaron Tveit, the character is extremely one dimensional.

    Unfortunately this musical is based on very familiar source material. Whereas the film presented the story of a kid whose family was so torn apart that he ran away from it, and entered into a life of crime at first out of necessity, and continued because he was convinced it was the only way to save the family he held so dear, which eventually led to his capture, the musical sacrifices all of this human drama and family relationship for catchy tunes that do not fit into the story or advance the plot in any way.

   The most enjoyable moment of the show comes late in act II when Brenda is given a wonderful solo, which is preceded and followed by two very well written scenes, and the one and only good song given to Frank Jr. This 20 minutes of good musical theater comes 2 hours in and 20 minutes before the curtain comes down.

      Catch me if you can  is closing Sunday Sept 4th at The Neil Simon Theater. The same day as Master Class. The play Master Class is for more enjoyable, and far more musical than Catch me if you can. Don't waste your money on Catch me.