At the St. James Theatre, 44th St., through Jan. 7
Kids have the book read to them as toddlers. They've seen the 1966 Chuck Jones animated version on TV, or later on DVD. Maybe they went to the live-action Ron Howard film of 2000, with Jim Carrey as the nasty, wasty skunk. So here, in its fifth medium, and on the 50th anniversary of the story's original publication, is Ted Geisel's green meanie, live on Broadway, with Patrick Page as the Grinch.
At the instigation of Tony-winning director Jack O'Brien, who first staged the show at the Children's Theatre Company in Minneapolis, Timothy Mason expanded the 25-min. TV cartoon to 80 mins., using the songs that Geisel wrote with Albert Hague and adding quite a few more with music by Mel Marvin. The narrator is now the Grinch's put-upon dog, Max — the one who had branches strapped to his head as reindeer antlers and was forced to drag the Grinch's sleigh into Whoville to remove all the presents from under the Whos' Christmas trees. Max is played as an old dog by Ed Dixon and as a pup by Rusty Ross; both deserve minor awards for declaiming their recitative as children in the audience chatter away restlessly. Kids want to see two things on stage: other kids and the Grinch.
Cindy Lou (Caroline London in the cast I saw) and her brother Boo Who (Jordan Samuels) must both be under 10, but they carry the show's heavy burden of cuteness, which is augmented by John Lee Beatty's cleverly whimsical sets. With their vertical spitcurls and capacious, Jennifer Love Hewitt–size hips, the Whos seem kin to the Munchkins in Judy Garland's Wizard of Oz; even the men seem pregnant. Relentlessly cheerful, they are addicted to shopping and singing and shopping some more. Then there's the noise all those little boys make with their toys. Indeed, the show makes so much fun of these sweet villagers, it might almost be accused of Who-baiting.
That's the flicker of genius in this production: being true to the tale's Christmas Carol moral while giving voice, in the person of the Grinch, to the cynicism and emotional exhaustion many adults feel at this time of year. Out, ever so briefly, with Santa Claus and his genial generosity; in with the anti-Claus, plotting his evil Christmas Eve heist. The Grinch literally chokes on the very word Christmas; it is the turkey bone in his scrawny throat. Snarling and strutting in his ratty, puke-colored fur, this villain is an equal-opportunity bigot. It's not just the Whos he hates; it's the children in the audience. He heckles them, blows raspberries at them, runs down the aisles trying to "scare" them. ("I love it when the little ones cry.") He is a consummate performer, a well-cooked Christmas ham.
Physically and vocally, Page is the Grinchiest. He uses his oleaginous voice, with its roller-coaster timbre, to lovely and ornate comic effect. He channels a flock of overripe actors — Cyril Ritchard as Captain Hook, Alistair Sim as Scrooge, Bert Lahr as the Cowardly Lion, Tim Curry in The Rocky Horror (Picture) Show, George Sanders in All About (Christmas) Eve — while stamping the role with his own effusive personality. Page belts out the generic show-stopper "One of a Kind," milking the applause at the end and pointing to the balcony: "Thank you in the cheap seats!" He tops that number with "I Hate Being One of a Kind," an I've-looked-into-my-heart-and-I-don't-like-what-I-see ballad in the style of "Rose's Turn" from Gypsy. Pure, self-pitying showbiz magic.
Of course, the monster must be redeemed by a child's good heart. (They have them in shows like these.) The Whos are just as jolly without their presents as they are with them, because, Cindy Lou tells the Grinch, "Really the only thing missing was you." Confetti showers the audience, which leaves feeling buoyantly Who-ish. Only the pre-redemption Grinch of a critic would say, "Yeah, but I still prefer the Chuck Jones version."