Tuesday, Dec. 08, 2009

Finian's Rainbow

A Broadway revival for this 1947 musical was a long time coming. And with good reason: its book, featuring a leprechaun looking for a pot of gold and a bigoted Southern politician who is turned black, is just too loony to take seriously. But director Warren Carlyle's spunky Broadway revival does right by the great Burton Lane-Yip Harburg score, whose mixture of Irish lyricism, social commentary and Tin Pan Alley pizzazz is something really grandish.