Theater: Old Old Vienna

The Gay Life (book by Fay and Michael Kanin; music and lyrics by Arthur Schwartz and Howard Dietz) is one of those musicals that seem to spring from back numbers of the National Geographic. It is full of scenic wonders—a Carlsbad spa with fountains spouting real water, a Christmas vision of Old Vienna filigreed in confectioner’s icing, a wedding extravaganza such as only Broadway angels can afford. In and about these Oliver Smith settings cavort the Wiener Burger, garbed by Lucinda Ballard in resplendent turn-of-the-century costumes. Unfortunately, there is little more to this comic operetta than meets the eye, or greets the ear in a waltzy-schmalzy score. The best way to simulate an evening at The Gay Life is to do what is done onstage: open two bottles of flat champagne.

The basic idea, maladapted from Schnitzler’s The Affairs of Anatol, was far from flat. The Gay Life hints at what it might have been, a reverse My Fair Lady. Where Henry Higgins is a confirmed bachelor, Anatol von Huber (Walter Chiari) is a confirmed boulevardier. It is hard to get either hero to the altar, but for opposing reasons: Higgins rejects women, Anatol collects them. My Fair Lady turns a guttersnippet into a duchess; The Gay Life turns a wealthy, well-bred girl (Barbara Cook) into a beddable wench who will fight like a fishwife for her male. Unfortunately, Actress Cook, who is as wholesome as sunshine, resists this metamorphosis, and Italy’s Chiari, though he clowns likably in his U.S. debut, acts as if the throb in his heart has gone to his head. There is more bricklayer than boudoir in his voice. As the hero’s pal, Comic Jules Munshin is as frisky as a seal at feeding time, and the dialogue he gets is just as fishy (“How did she take it?” “Lying down”). Maybe Old Vienna should be given back to the National Geographic.