Theatre in Review: 50 Shades! The Musical (Elektra Theatre)All right, I confess: I've been to see 50 Shades! The Musical, a spoof of E L James' 50 Shades of Grey, the first in a trilogy of bondage porn novels that have been steaming up the reading glasses of American housewives for the last couple of years. You probably think I got what I deserve: After all, nobody made me go. But that doesn't mean you can't learn from my mistakes. I haven't read the novel -- there are limits to what I will do in this job -- but based on the online synopsis, it appears that the libretto, by Al Samuels, Amanda Blake Davis, Emily Dorezas, Jody Shelton, Dan Wessels, and Ashley Ward -- yes, it took six people to write this thing -- follows it fairly closely, tracing the romance of Anastasia Steele, college-age virgin, and Christian Grey, millionaire and S&M master. The major invention of the production is to cast Chris Grace as the tall and devastatingly handsome Christian. Grace is rather short and roly-poly, to say the least; this is confirmed when he appears on stage in a workout suit cut to the waist, allowing his considerable gut to stick out while he leaps around the stage, striking what are supposed to be menacingly seductive poses. It's not surprising that most of the humor in 50 Shades! lies well below the belt, but the near-total absence of wit is remarkable. Anastasia expresses her inchoate feelings of longing in a song called "There's a Hole Inside Me," adding repeatedly that her hole needs to be filled. Christian has a number that mostly consists of him shouting "I f--k" over and over again. Anastasia, appalled by some of Christian's requests, throws up several times, as if repeating the gag makes it funny. Katherine, Anastasia's roommate, is seen talking on the phone while being taken from behind by her boyfriend. Then there's Jose, who pines for Anastasia, and who, thanks to his thick Spanish accent, says things like "Jes. I junderstand." There is also a dream ballet about sperm, and if you think I'm going to explain that, then you've come to the wrong web site. This wildly unfunny fooling around is framed with a device in which the members of a book club weigh in on the action from time to time. Once or twice, they made me laugh -- I rather liked it when one of them justified time spent on the book by claiming, "You have to read it twice to get all the metaphors!" -- but otherwise, this was one of the more mortifying experiences I have had in the theatre in the last three decades. The songs, by Samuels, Davis, Shelton, Ward, and Wessels -- yes, it took five people to write the score -- are not any better, although even I was surprised when they went for a Gilbert and Sullivan parody in "Red Room," a kind of musical inventory of bondage devices. In addition to Grace, the rest of the cast is certainly enthusiastic, and, in a funny way, you have to admire the fortitude of Amber Petty, who puts herself through one degrading scene after another as Anastasia. Three pretty young things -- two shirtless men in leather pants and one woman lightly clad in fetish gear -- wander through the scenes, acting as a de facto chorus and providing some eye candy. I can testify that they are in tiptop shape. It all unfolds on John Dunnett's quilted black leather set, which, I gather, is supposed to evoke Christian's dungeon. Dunnett also provided the perfectly okay costumes. Herrick Goldman's lighting creates a variety of lurid Technicolor effects keyed to the seamy goings on. Matt Kraus' sound design is quite loud for the smallish Elektra Theatre; normally, I praise the sound designer for making the lyrics intelligible. This time, I would have been perfectly happy to do without. I must add that many in the audience at the performance I attended roared at each coarse gag, although I will also add that most of them made extensive use of the lobby bar. This is apparently the second attempt this season at spoofing James' books, and I have been told that the first one was no better. Is it such an impossible task? I keep thinking of Silence!, which also played the Elektra. A similarly X-rated spoof, in this case of the film The Silence of the Lambs, it was appallingly hilarious. 50 Shades!, I'm sorry to say, is merely appalling.--David Barbour 
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