Alex: Anything Goes ‘a show-stopping dazzler’

A Broadway classic from 1934, this Tony-winning Best Musical revival is no relic. The show has today’s audiences cheering to the rafters.

Star Rachel York says people just cheer. “I think they’re so excited to see the end of the first act, this tap number, it’s like ‘oh my gosh, I haven’t seen this in so long, this is what people used to come to the theatre for, just to see these great tap numbers, to be blown away.’ You don’t see anything like that any more. There’s contemporary theatre, it seems there’s always an edge to it these days.”

This Cole Porter musical, like all shows from the 1930s, left a legacy of enduring melodies.

Co-star Chuck Wagner has special praise for Porter. “What we call ‘the great American songbook’ is probably 50 per cent Cole Porter. And Cole Porter was one of the rare geniuses who wrote his own lyrics to his own music.”

Porter’s romantic, witty and wicked lyrics, a frothy plot, mismatched characters in outrageous situations, dialogue-filled zingers, and a perfect storm of dancing, Anything Goes has it all. It’s old, yet new.

York says “my performance is not a contemporary performance, and it’s not dated. But I mean there was such a class and style to that period and the women of that period. I miss it, and so I’d like to bring it back.”

Anything Goes, a showstopping dazzler, comes from the golden age of Broadway, but it’s dazzling once again powered by Rachel York. Come see the show, who knows, anything goes!