Carol Ann Walker as Liza Minnelli, Justin Genna as Peter Allen and Leandra Ramm as Judy Garland in “The Boy from Oz” (Photo: David Wilson)
In 1981, “Fly Away” flapped its way to a middling #55 on the the Billboard Hot 100.
The record was Aussie singer-songwriter Peter Allen’s biggest American hit. But it isn’t even included in “The Boy from Oz,” the jukebox-cum-junk drawer musical based on Allen’s life now being mounted by Theater Rhinoceros.
The presence of “Fly Away” is not missed. The tune is no more memorable than Allen’s paltry four other U.S. radio hits as a performer, all Adult Contemporary snoozers (Only two of those make the show).
On the songwriting front, “The Boy from Oz” would have you believe that Allen hit his peak with “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do).” Played by lanky, limber Justin Genna, he gloats that royalties from the Oscar-winning 1981 tune bought him a Malibu beach house.
In fact, that song, a smash for Christopher Cross, was composed by Burt Bacharach, with lyrics primarily by Carole Bayer Sager, his then-partner, who incorporated one line from a song she and Allen had abandoned years earlier. According to Sager’s 2016 biography, Allen insisted on writing credit, leading to major resentment from Bacharach.
A complicating wrinkle ignored in the show’s book—by “Bent”‘s Martin Sherman, apparently bent over backwards for a payday—is the fact that the female lead in “Arthur,” the movie, was played by Liza Minelli, Allen’s still supportive ex-wife. Making matters even worse is the fact that, in the show, the song is sloppily deployed to introduce Minnelli and Allen’s 1960s romance (15 years prior to the tune’s real life composition).
This is all characteristic of a smugness that typifies not just “Oz”‘s central character but the entire show, which is way overconfident in assuming Allen’s ultimate irresistibility.
Never the beloved pop-cultural juggernaut that “Oz” would have us imagine, Peter Allen was a reptilian carpetbagger and a coattail-hanger. When a young Allen meets Judy Garland while working as a lounge singer in Hong Kong, we watch him brown-nose his way under her tailfeathers to get hired on as her opening act in the U.S. His next move is to marry Minelli—despite knowing full well that he’s gay—further wheedling his way into a showbiz royal family. His success story amounts to little more than cunning and celebrity-adjacency.
Leandra Ramm turns in a strong performance as Garland, managing to capture the legend’s spirit without resorting to either mimicry or camp. And Carol Ann Walker pulls off a credible Liza, particularly in the show’s liveliest ensemble number, “She Loves to Hear the Music.”
But in “The Boy From Oz,” the real-life stars are turned to supporting characters and a charlatan is given the spotlight.
The production itself, directed by John Fisher, is not particularly noteworthy—there are no sets to speak of (the bulk of the show is played against a dull black wall) and the cast’s energy rarely rises above high school musical levels.
But the biggest problem is the material itself. The whole damn show should just “Fly Away.”
Originally published in the Bay Area Reporter
