The production was quite good, for a very commercial theater. (Mind--wandering printably--thought: The good aspect of a Leninist takeover here would be an improvement in the musical theater.) A large portion of the audience thinks--and is welcomed to think--that the show is a celebration of American complacency on race, class and gender, though the script also offers eggheads a noble man-of-sweat-and-struggle:
Jud Fry (that's Rod Steiger playing him, above) is the best-loved character in Oklahoma!--among morose, non-McCarthyite Eden Prairie bloggers. I merely wish he didn't have to get offed in the final act. In a proto-state of enforcedly sunny, mediocre American hypocrites, he refuses to mask his multiple ambivalences. May he not have died in vain.
Another thing that bothers me about Oklahoma!: On quite a number of occasions, the territory's incipient statehood is espied with unwavering optimism. I don't like this, as it entirely sidesteps any other possible future; one isn't at all clear what problem statehood is supposed to solve, or what feared alternative gets circumvented with it. (On statehood, eggheads aren't thrown any measly bone.)
Another thing that bothers me about Oklahoma!: On quite a number of occasions, the territory's incipient statehood is espied with unwavering optimism. I don't like this, as it entirely sidesteps any other possible future; one isn't at all clear what problem statehood is supposed to solve, or what feared alternative gets circumvented with it. (On statehood, eggheads aren't thrown any measly bone.)
But as Oklahoma!s go, this was entirely fun. Tix $49 with steak dinner included thru eoy.
