Samuel Johnson was no fan of opera. In his 1755 Dictionary, he infamously defined it as "exotick and irrational entertainment." He considered the popular genre a spectacle of no enduring value, mere mass entertainment.
Johnson was, however, a partisan of Shakespeare, whose works he compiled and edited. Shakespeare's plays were common entertainment in their time, only a century and a half earlier. Opera and Shakespeare no longer are popular diversions. At times they seem the arcane enthusiasms of a relatively narrow caste. We know this instinctively, even those of us who enjoy Shakespeare and opera. For confirmation, we need only imagine a thrust-stage theater on the Strip, or La Scala at The Milanese Hotel & Casino.
It would be interesting, though, to speculate what a future Dr. Johnson might conclude about Cirque du Soleil. Fortunately, we do not need to survive the century to know, for Chicago Tribune arts critic Chris Jones has seen the future, and reports back breathlessly:
When they write the history of how the center of the American commercial theater industry moved slowly but inexorably to Nevada in the first decade of the 21st century, they'll probably memorialize Robert LaPage's dark, intense, $165 million Cirque du Soleil production of Kà at the MGM Grand Hotel as the spawner of the perfect desert storm.
Jones goes on to assert "a seismic shift in America's cultural landscape," away from Broadway and toward Las Vegas, which, thanks to Cirque du Soleil, "is running full-tilt toward experimental, high-end art ..."
So we might expect the Rio to pull the Scintas for a rockin' production of Ubu Roi.
Perhaps a spawner of perspective is needed here. "It's a lot of nonsense. You shouldn't have to compare the two," says veteran stage producer Mike Merrick, who teaches at UNLV. "Realistically speaking, Broadway will be good for Las Vegas, and Las Vegas will be good for Broadway."
That's because, says Merrick, whose résumé includes The Belle of Amherst and revivals of Camelot and My Fair Lady, Las Vegas is proving to be a profitable second home for Broadway musicals. A show might earn its producers as much as two-thirds of its revenue on the road, long the salvation of Broadway investors. Houses are bigger and cheaper to rent, and often producers dispatch nonunion actors and stagehands.
Still, touring has its costs, too, and audiences have become more discerning, according to some reports. So it's quite a boon when Steve Wynn simply imports your production to his new resort, as happened with the Tony-winning musical, Avenue Q. A truncated Hairspray opens this fall at Luxor, and The Phantom of the Opera settles in next year at the Venetian. With the exception of the nontouring Cirque shows, Las Vegas looks to become Broadway's pasture, not its replacement.
But what about Cirque and its new show? Jones sees Kà "aimed squarely at internationalized young people—especially young men—who have a natural acceptance of such adventure-driven, multimedia work." Merrick says he has yet to see it, but praises Cirque du Soleil in general: "What they do is brilliant. The production values, the money involved, the visual effects ... it's just outstanding."
I haven't seen Kà either, but expect to be astonished when I do, as I have been with the other Cirque shows. Jones' praise whets my appetite. But I'll be looking for how well Robert Lepage, the acclaimed avant-garde director, has integrated narrative into a Cirque production. Preliminary reports are not encouraging. Even Jones admits Kà is "hard to follow."
That was my reaction to the extravaganza at London's ill-fated Millennium Dome, the last time Lepage collaborated with architect/stage designer Mark Fisher. Scored by Peter Gabriel, that show involved bungee-cording acrobats and a nominal fairy-tale narrative little more than superfluous. But I suspect most Kà audiences will endure the perplexity and savor the spectacle.
"I don't think there's any question we out-Broadway Broadway in the spectacle we are capable of producing," observes UNLV Fine Arts Dean Jeffrey Koep. Indeed, the scale of what is possible here is at the core of Jones' argument—the $165 million MGM/Mirage sunk into Kà, compared with $10 million to $14 million for a Broadway musical. Jones quotes Lepage exulting in the freedom to spend the money of deep-pocketed, strings-free producers—"filthy rich people all wanting to impress each other with who they are working with." It's the Renaissance all over for Lepage. Well, the Medici were beneficent, but not always benign.
"I think probably the best thing is theater is getting some attention," says Koep, who also thinks a Downtown performing arts center will complement the panoplies of the Strip.
Koep appeared recently in the Nevada Conservatory Theatre production of Robert Bolt's A Man for All Seasons, which teases Thomas More's nuanced grip on principle. Although uneven, the production testified to the power of verbal theater, which is precisely what Las Vegas needs to produce if it is to become anything like Broadway. But, as Jones dismissively acknowledges: "... No casino is about to do Chekhov. New York, at least, will have the likes of Edward Albee to itself for time immemorial."
There are worse fates.
Samuel Johnson held that the purpose of theater—of all art—was to "instruct by pleasing," which biographer W. Jackson Bate defines as "to heighten awareness and deepen or extend the experience of life." I hope Kà does just that. But if the future of theater is multimedia gymnastics spectacle, I'll take Manhattan.
Chuck Twardy is a really smart guy who has written for several daily newspapers and for magazines such as Metropolis.