A Record Low

by David Anthony Fox

Growing up, my lefty parents tried to teach me that Disney was The Evil Empire, but I would have none of it. I adored Disneyland, Disney movies and TV shows, and most of all Disney music. I could be found pirouetting around the house trilling "Someday My Prince Will Come." (The implications of this would become clear later.)

So I was primed for On the Record, a new revue that packs 64(!) Disney tunes, written over 75 years, into a single evening. I looked forward to revisiting old friends and making new ones.

So much for that. To start, On The Record has a weird framing device that treats the action as if it's in a studio and we're watching a recording take shape. Four leading performers are making this "record," and they resemble soap opera archetypes: a full-of-herself diva and a hopeful ingenue; a primping leading man and a pretty surfer boy. They all sing the roles of many characters, including some unlikely ones: Surfer boy, looking ripped in a muscle-T, plays the Hunchback — er, Disabled Person — of Notre Dame. A backup vocal quartet accompanies the cast.

Scenarist Chad Beguelin and director Robert Longbottom make a stab at telling a soap opera story through these songs as well, but never mind. Scenes are called "sessions," with each session comprising one or (more often) four or five Disney songs, accompanied by a flashy onstage orchestra, with the singers surrounded by fake microphones. The record producer is never seen but is heard over the loudspeakers: He sounds like a demanding metrosexual, shades of A Chorus Line's Zack.

Yikes! The recording studio metaphor proves tragically perfect. As On the Record takes shape, it assumes glossy and shallow production values, overwhelming the performers and the material with sugary, resonant excess. (To be fair, these performers would be easily overwhelmed: only Ashley Brown, a winning soprano, seems destined for something greater than a cruise ship show — the other three all appear less talented than the backup singers.)

I suppose the intention behind 64 songs (normal revues have more like 20) is to dazzle us with the high quality of the Disney oeuvre. In fact, it's just the opposite. As medley after medley whizzes by, the whole assumes a mind-numbing sameness. Even good material (and there's a lot of it: "The Bare Necessities," "When You Wish Upon a Star," "Under the Sea," etc.) fails to register. Feeling inundated and only midway through the first act, I briefly closed my eyes and suddenly realized what I had been reminded of all along: an '80s exercise tape.

In the interest of fairness, I should say that a few numbers are done with an amusing twist ("Be Our Guest" in assorted languages), and finally in the second act, we get a couple of piano-accompanied songs ("Baby Mine," "Will the Sun Ever Shine Again?") that have some much-needed simplicity.

But mostly, On the Record is just theme-park entertainment … in a very expensive theme park.