Theatre in Review: After Midnight (Brooks Atkinson Theatre)After Midnight brings back to Broadway an idea so old it is new again: adult entertainment. I don't mean heavy-breathing drama filled with graphic sex and violence. Indeed, restraint is the watchword of this new musical revue, celebrating the music of the Cotton Club; the members of the sensationally gifted company are, collectively, the spirit of nonchalance. That so much talent has taken over the Brooks Atkinson stage is a given; nobody feels the need to make the slightest fuss about it. Thus, a trio of ladies make sweet harmony out of "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea," suggesting a world of innuendo with a simple lift of their shoulders and an insinuating swaying of their hips. A quintet of men in top hats and tuxedos slides around the stage in close formation, like a hepcat version of "The March of the Wooden Soldiers," joined by Everett Bradley, in a gold lame tux jacket, to lead a sassy little Harry James ditty called "Peckin'." In numbers like "Raisin' the Rent" and "East St. Louis Toodle-oo," some of the most fiendish footwork you've ever seen is delivered with a smile and shrug. Time and again, the audience is roused by a well-turned musical phrase, a single grand gesture, an intricately executed time step. The show's devil-may-care attitude can be traced to its guiding spirit, Duke Ellington, the long-running bandleader at the Cotton Club, which, first in Harlem and later in the Theatre District, featured sophisticated black revues for all-white audiences. (In addition to selections by him, there are contributions by the likes of Harold Arlen, Dorothy Fields, Jimmy McHugh, Cab Calloway, and other masters of the American songbook.) Ellington delivered some of the most sophisticated jazz music ever heard, and his guiding principle was to never, ever let the audience see him sweat. It's a principle embraced by Warren Carlyle, the evening's director and choreographer, and his talented team. Dulé Hill, the evening's emcee, tosses off verses by Langston Hughes with conversational ease, then slips into a rendition of "I've Got the World on a String" as helium-light as the balloon he is carrying; the number segues into an elegant parade of balloon-toting beauties and their consorts, all dressed to the nines in black and white -- one of the many lively period creations supplied by the costume designer, Isabel Toledo. Virgil "Lil' O" Gadson leaps about the stage with happy abandon, hoping to land one of the ladies of the ensemble (including a delightfully uninhibited Karine Plantadit) with a great big diamond ring. Julius "iGlide" Chisolm, having apparently left his skeleton in his dressing room, slides across the stage with rubbery grace. Jared Grimes leaps like an Olympic athlete, then jumps up onto a tiny table, proving he can work the same dance magic in an extremely confined space. Whenever a laugh is needed, Adriane Lenox is trotted out to ball her hands into fists, strike a sardonic pose, and offer a skeptical bark while delivering such priceless bits of romantic advice as "Women Be Wise" and "Go Back to Where You Stayed Last Night." And in an especially impudent bit of staging, a jazz funeral is interrupted when the dear departed (Plantadit again) leaps out of her coffin for one more dance. Presiding over all this elegant foolery is the star of the evening, Fantasia Barrino, who works her way through "I Can't Give You Anything But Love," "On the Sunny Side of the Street" (aided by the dancers C. K. Edwards and Christopher Broughton), and "Stormy Weather" with school-of-Billie-Holiday vocals marked by sly phrasing and impeccable diction. And completing the spell of enchantment are The Jazz at Lincoln Center All-Stars, a superb collection of musicians assembled by Wynton Marsalis. Under the baton of conductor Daryl Waters, they sail through such Ellington instrumental works as "Daybreak Express," "Braggin' in Brass," and "Creole Love Call," the latter with a silken-smooth vocal assist by Carmen Ruby Floyd. After Midnight is fast on its feet, aided by Carlyle's seemingly endless gift for inventive staging ideas and his ability to maintain an informal, this-is-happening-for-the-first-time atmosphere. John Lee Beatty provides a nonstop parade of backdrops -- elegantly swagged lavender drapery, a flashy rain curtain -- all framed in a portal of Swarovski crystal. The most eye-catching item is an almost-cubist mural of musical instruments and notes, by Ruben Toledo, husband of the costume designer; pulled across the stage by Fantasia, it earns a hand before the accompanying number begins. Isabel Toledo's costumes range from a chorus line of flappers in cloche hats and masks to long skirts and sweat socks for jitterbugging bobby soxers -- and each new gown for Fantasia is more stunning than its predecessor. Howell Binkley's lighting scatters colorful LEDs all over the place -- he treats one of Beatty's drops, a silver lame curtain, so that it becomes iridescent with color. He also makes excellent use of simple, highly theatrical looks using a couple of stark white beams; it goes without saying that his cueing is beautifully aligned with the wildly syncopated music. Peter Hylenski's sound design is one of the two or three finest I've ever experienced on Broadway. So subtly achieved is his work that one can fully appreciate a number with a soloist, three backup singers performing in counterpoint, and a stunning Ellington instrumental arrangement -- and every word of the lyrics is intelligible. One or two reviewers have faulted After Midnight for not probing the racial realities that informed the life of the Cotton Club, especially the segregation that kept blacks on stage (and on the service staff) and whites in the audience. That would be another show -- one that I hope someday to see. In the meantime, this chic and casual entertainment is its own best argument. The work of Ellington and his colleagues remains one of the miracles of 20th-century American art; this is an excellent chance to get to know it better. --David Barbour 
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