(L-R) David Shrubsole and Simon Green in "Simon Green: Traveling Light." (Carol Rosegg)
Accompanying Green on the piano is his able musical director and arranger, David Shrubsole.
As the title suggests, all of the material presented in the show deals with the idea of traveling in some manner, shape, or form; often exploring the journey itself and the sensations experienced when arriving at one’s destination. Two such examples of this are the witty Noel Coward song “I like America,” and the jaunty “Rhode Island Is Famous For You,” by Howard Dietz and Arthur Schwartz.
Nicely put together, the show seamlessly blends moments both silly and sublime, with such songs as “Fabulous Places” and “Pure Imagination,” both by Leslie Bricusse. (The former is perhaps best known from the film “Dr. Doolittle,” and the latter is from “Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.”) There’s also the very touching “Children Will Listen” by Stephen Sondheim from the Broadway show “Into the Woods.”
One piece with an unexpected topical and ironic bent is the comic poem “No Alarm on the Flight Deck,” which asks what would happen if the pilot and co-pilot of an airplane fell asleep while the plane was in the air. (It’s a work that carries extra relevance these days, considering the Delta Airlines incident this past October where the pilots were so engrossed in what they were doing on their laptops that they overshot their landing site by approximately 150 miles.)
Simon Green sings in "Simon Green: Traveling Light." (Carol Rosegg)
What makes the entire program so entertaining is not only the wide variety of songs used (both familiar and obscure), but also Green’s sure-handed delivery of them. More than simply singing the various tunes, his face, mannerisms, and movements change to fit the material, thus allowing him to connect with the emotional aspect of the song (be it humorous, wistful, or stirring) and allowing the audience to do so as well.
His on-the-spot delivery is perhaps most visible in the poignant “Moving On,” from the musical “The Card,” about a man feeling it may be time to pack up and seek greener pastures before the truth about him is discovered.
Another high point in this regard is the hilarious “Let’s Go and Live in The Country,” where a city gentleman fantasizes about the simpler life, only to realize to his horror, as the song goes on, just what living in the country means—especially if one has a fear of horses and is allergic to hay.
Just as prominent in the show are the readings of works by Mark Twain, Rudyard Kipling, and Robert Frost, among others, as well as the “Poem of the Road” by Walt Whitman. There’s also the lovely “Going Down Hill on a Bicycle” by Henry Charles Beeching, with Green perfectly recreating the feeling of racing down a steep incline with the wind in your hair while the various objects on either side go whizzing by.
Both “Road” and “Bicycle” have additional material by Shrubsole, whose long association with Green shows in the easy way the two work together, allowing the various words, song melodies, and lyrics to shine through equally.
Two other works presented are deserving of mention: One is a piece by A.A. Gill, which notes that travel is a sort of great equalizer with people on the move often having more things in common with one another than they do differences. The other is Mark Twain’s musings that in twenty year’s time, one will regret more the things they didn’t do than the ones that they did.
It’s a thought that opens and closes the show and which nicely explains why so many of us yearn for the chance to see what can be found beyond the next hill or just over the horizon. Fortunately, Green and Shrubsole are the perfect guides to help one imagine what might be waiting there for us to find.
Simon Green: Traveling Light
59E59 Theaters
59 East 59th Street
Tickets: 212-279-4200, www.ticketcentral.com, or www.britsoffbroadway.com
Running time: 80 minutes
Closes: Jan. 3
Judd Hollander is the New York correspondent for the London publication The Stage.
