Word: comically
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...farce? The dream sequence of a sitcom? A fraternity skit? A metaphysical romp? Martin is one of the most versatile comic artists in America: screenwriter (The Jerk, Roxanne), actor, brilliant stand-up comedian, as well as author of several short plays (four of which will be on a bill next month at New York City's Public Theater). While so many comics ossify by relying on a few dependable crowd-pleasing gags and catchphrases, Martin keeps evolving...
...Allen re-writing his tabloid sins at an age (he'll be 60 this year) when he looks like a pensive Rumpelstiltskin; boyish roguery ill suits him. In TV revivals of Broadway farces, he plays crabby geezers: the tourist with tsuris in Don't Drink the Water, a decrepit comic in a new version of The Sunshine Boys. Yet in his films Allen is the Woody of old--or, rather, of young. To Lenny, the raw, vibrant Linda makes Amanda seem stale and shrewish. Bonham Carter (who's a radiant 29 and certainly doesn't look shrewish) must play that...
...dancing mattresses, played by assorted Boston Ballet Artists, are the funniest part of the evening as they awkwardly shuffle around in their sleeping caps. One can only imagine how difficult it is to dance wearing a mattress but the sleepy bunch pull it off, milking every last comic moment of their costuming...
...outdone is Akhmanova's Princess, whose delicacy is tested when she has to climb up twenty mattresses to get to sleep, and ends up tossing and turning half the night. Akhmanova approaches the role with vaudevillian flair, she is superbly comic yet always charming and graceful...
...accent. Indeed, the show--conceived by Berlin restaurateur Hans-Peter Wodarz and a hit in Berlin, Venice and Paris--is stopping in New York City (through March) en route to the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. But the show, which offers a meal, a circus and a lot of comic milling for $150 per person (excluding drinks), means to be the ultimate upmarket version of show-biz spectacle. The decor is suitably lavish. The four-course dinner is ambitious, if too heavily salted. And the entertainment is strenuous in trying to please, offend and astonish all at once...