There’s just one word to describe Kitty Skillman Hilsabeck: Showoff.
Actually it would take dozens to adequately summate her accomplishment as choreographer, co-director and lead dancer in “Swing!” the crowning achievement at the Country Dinner Playhouse in years. That’s saying something, considering the upswing that’s already preceded “Swing!” there. And that this pulsating, 1930s big-band-and-blues dance spectacular has no plot and very little dialogue.
It helps that Hilsabeck has a 16-person ensemble of all-stars and ringers, most smartly casting well-known fellow chorographers Stephen Bertles and Alann Estes. It helps to have sultry, smoking torch singers like Mercedes Perez and Shannan Steele. A crooner like Jeffrey Roark. And a triple threat in General McArthur Hambrick, who is high-voltage from his glistening smile to his soft shoe.
And it really helps that CDP has finally hired a bona fide band – and what a band this five-piece is. By any measure – costumes, chorography, vocals, rhythm, pace, imagination, sophistication, heart and humor – “Swing!” brother, swings.
The initial draw is, of course, the familiar songs. And why not, when the catalog includes Ellington, Basie, Calloway, Mercer, Dorsey, Goodman and Prima – with a little countrified Bob Wills to boot.
But it’s what Hilsabeck and co-director Paul Dwyer do with these numbers that quickens the pulse. Hilsabeck is a veteran of Chicago’s internationally renowned Hubbard Street Dance Company, and since moving to Colorado she’s mostly lent her talents to the Lake Dillon and Arvada Center theaters.
But it’s “Swing!” that really shows us what she’s got. Her numbers are thrilling, perilous, playful, gymnastic, sweaty, elegant, comic and … OK, I’m running out of adjectives. Throw in the faintworthy lungpower of Steele on “Blues in the Night” and Perez on “Cry Me a River” – not to mention more butt-cheeks than “The Full Monty” – and it all makes for the sexiest night ever at the barn. No offense to “Oklahoma!” and those warhorses that butter CDP’s bread, but “Swing!” is a shot of adrenaline that has this joint jumpin’ like never before.
“Swing!” is one of the few musical titles to have earned its exclamation point. The 2000 Tony nominee was conceived as more than just a dance showcase. It adds an urgent theatricality and athleticism to lure younger audiences who harbor a more staid association with big-band’s glory days.
Though “Swing!” is plotless, every song has its own story to tell, some outrageously clever – such as Perez and Hambrick conducting an entire date in scat (“Bli-Blip”), or Juliana Black and Robert Hoppe as geeky, bumbling dance-contest rejects (“Dancers in Love”).
Perhaps the best thing about this “Swing!,” though, is watching veterans Hilsabeck, Bertles and Estes nail move after move with fervor and precision, disproving any notion that a dancer peaks at 18. Not that there aren’t plenty of impressive, 18-looking kids whirling in the wings. Fafa Blagogee and Martha Urquidi bring a welcome Latin infusion. Their red-hot “Show Me What You Got” is a West Coast vs. Latin swing battle that puts the “West Side Story” gym dance to shame.
With one knockout number after another, this may just be the best locally produced, dance-oriented musical any area company has ever unleashed.
Theater critic John Moore can be reached at 303-820-1056 or jmoore@denverpost.com.
“Swing!” | **** RATING
MUSICAL|Count- ry Dinner Playhouse, 6875 S. Clinton St., Greenwood Village|Directed by Kitty Skillman Hilsabeck and Paul Dwyer|THROUGH SEPT. 10|7:45 p.m. Wednesdays-Sundays; 1:45 p.m. Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays (dinner 90 minutes before)|2 hours, 5 minutes|$38-$44| 303-799-1410
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“AS YOU LIKE IT” The Colorado Shakespeare Festival continues Sunday with this pastoral comedy about feuding brothers, staged through the lens of madcap 1930s screwball-comedy films. Outdoors in rep with “The Tempest” through Aug. 18 at the University of Colorado’s Mary Rippon amphitheater in Boulder. $10-$52. Plays begin at 8:30 p.m. (303-492-0554 or go to coloradoshakes.org for dates).
“STEEL MAGNOLIAS” The Victorian Playhouse takes on the story of a circle of women in Louisiana. 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays through Aug. 12 at 4201 Hooker St. $16-20 (303-433-4343 or den vervic.com).
-John Moore
