More reviews of The Color Purple

Linda Winer

'The Color Purple," which opened last night at the Broadway Theatre with Oprah Winfrey's approving brand on the marquee, is a big, beautifully cast and produced, middle-of-the-road musical adaptation of Alice Walker's 1982 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.

It also is awfully nicey-nice for an epic about racism and black-on-black sexual abuse in Georgia in the first half of the 20th century. The show loses its way in the second act and, ultimately, leaves no cliche unturned. But this is not merely the first new old-fashioned American musical of the season. It may well be built to last.

For all its familiar story and sensibility, this is surely the first mainstream musical to make a first-act curtain number from a lesbian kiss and love ballad - something Steven Spielberg hardly dared to touch in his 1985 movie. And for all the obvious expense of this handsome production, Gary Griffin's direction and Donald Byrd's exuberantly lyrical choreography seldom feel hard-sell.

For much of the evening, director Griffin - a Sondheim specialist from Chicago making his impressive Broadway debut - locates the perilous balance between the vitality and oppression that drove Walker's haunting story about the male-dominated, post-slavery African-American culture. When a series of upbeat, unmotivated songs breaks the momentum in the last half, however, the pressures of the happy-face mentality make for palpable strain.

All the talent in the universe cannot make us see LaChanze as the girl everyone keeps calling ugly. But she is dynamite as Celie, whose 40-year crisis of faith takes her from passive 14-year-old backwoods girl - pregnant for the second time by the man she believes is her father - to a confident, loving woman who designs pants that look like something Katharine Hepburn could wear.

While Walker told Celie's journey through her letters to God, Marsha Norman's book smoothly moves us through the adventure's many chapters without skimping on the development of the multiple major supporting characters. The blues, gospel, swing, African and gutbucket work songs by pop veterans Brenda Russell, Allee Willis and Stephen Bray are open, accessible songs that are simply structured but not simpleminded.

Byrd's choreography thrusts them through the splendid dancers with the earth-rooted, taffy-torsoed effectiveness of an early ballet by Alvin Ailey. For the first time in too long, Broadway has a real dancing chorus again.

This all happens on a gorgeous John Lee Beatty set of wooden slats, leafy woods and magnificent skies (lit by Brian MacDevitt). Paul Tazewell's costumes are as character-driven as they are flattering.

Felicia P. Fields is terrific as the self-sufficient Sofia, the role defined by Winfrey in the movie, whose showstopping "Hell No!" to abuse is as poignant as it is defiant. Renee Elise Goldsberry is lovely as Celie's beloved missionary sister. Kingsley Leggs does everything but lick our faces to make us change our mind about the terrible Mister, who abuses Celie for years but somehow is redeemed. Brandon Victor Dixon makes us see Mister's son as the good side of life as the new man who can love strong women.

Throughout, there is an endearing Greek chorus of church ladies to gossip on the misfortunes and mourn only when absolutely necessary. Comic relief is also supplied by Krisha Marcano as Squeak, an Olive Oyl of a girl who talks as fast as she charms.

And then there is Elisabeth Withers-Mendes as Shug Avery, the blues singer whom everyone loves and who frequently loves in return. When she enters, listen for the wha-wha trumpet. But Withers-Mendes and company refuse to sanitize this rebel woman, who can lounge naked in a bathtub with the same easygoing confidence as she slinks through the juke-joint blues in a bangled golden slip dress. How delightful - and admirable - that the omnisexual woman doesn't get punished in the end for her wicked, wondrous ways.

THE COLOR PURPLE. Adaptation of Alice Walker's novel by Marsha Norman, with music and lyrics by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis and Stephen Bray, directed by Gary Griffin and choreographed by Donald Byrd. Broadway Theatre, 1681 Broadway. Tickets $26.25- $101.25. Call 212-239-6200. Seen at Tuesday's preview.