Civic’s ‘Cabaret’ still relevant more than 50 years after premiere

As soon as you step into the Spokane Civic Theatre’s Firth J. Chew Studio Theatre, you enter the Kit Kat Club.

For their production of “Cabaret,” director Heather McHenry-Kroetch and assistant director Dominick Betts made the fun choice to do away with standard seating and seat audience members at one of about two dozen small tables, making the “Cabaret” audience and Kit Kat Club audience one in the same.

It helped, too, that the club emcee (a fantastic Mathias Oliver), the gorgeous Kit Kat Girls (Marlee Melinda Andrews, Brianna Lynn, Elizabeth Martin, Torey Routson, Dana Sammond and Kimberly Sharon) and the handsome Kit Kat Boys (David Archer, Jerrod Galles and Denny Taylor) roamed the aisles and interacted with the audience throughout the show.

“Cabaret” focuses on American writer Cliff Bradshaw (Joshua Baig), who has traveled to Berlin looking for inspiration, and English cabaret performer Sally Bowles (Aubree Peterson), a regular at the Kit Kat Club.

The musical, which features a book by Joe Masteroff, music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb, is set in Berlin in 1931 just as the Nazis are beginning to rise to power.

The show begins on a high, hopeful note, though, as Oliver and the talented Kit Kat Girls and Boys perform the classic song “Willkommen” accompanied by the equally talented Kit Kat Band: pianist Tonya Ballman (assistant music director), accordionist Henry McNulty (music director), bassist and tuba player Rob Peterson, drummer Taylor Belote and wind musician Bryan Swenland.

Sassy yet sophisticated choreography from Heidy Cartwright (“Willkommen,” “Money” and “Entr’acte”), Jillian Kehne (“Don’t Tell Mama,” “Mein Herr” and “If You Could See Her”) and Nicole Shek (“Don’t Tell Mama,” “Mein Herr,” “Two Ladies” and other musical staging) throughout the show really made it feel like audiences were watching a show within a show.

The costumes, courtesy of Madison Taylor-Hendricks and Erin Sellers, in her Civic debut, were gorgeous and looked luxurious, fitting of top-notch cabaret performers.

Speaking of top-notch cabaret performers, Peterson really shined as Bowles, able to both command the stage at the Kit Kat Club and show some vulnerability when alone with Baig.

Baig made for a strong Bradshaw, showing his evolution from optimistic writer to concerned and heartbroken, and Peterson and Baig played well off each other throughout the show, as did Rebecca Craven as Fräulein Schneider (Craven’s “So What” was a fun song) and Kim Berg as Herr Schultz. The trajectory of their relationship really helped illustrate how times were changing in Germany over the course of the musical.

Dylan Brown, Jay Patrick Emmingham and Nicholas Roy Morgan III adeptly handled a variety of roles as the male ensemble, Karlin Marie Kahler was a lot of fun as the cheeky Fräulein Kost, and Chad Herrmann made Ernst Ludwig easy to like from the get-go, making the reveal of his true identity even more surprising.

There seemed to be a few issues with a microphone or two during the first act, but it was cleared up quickly, and I chalked it up to opening night bugs that have surely since been worked out.

As McHenry-Kroetch wrote in her director’s note, “Cabaret” was originally produced in 1966, and the story told was then 37 years old. Now more than 50 years since the musical’s debut, the story told in “Cabaret,” one of fear, denial and a divided nation, is, unfortunately, still relevant.

But it’s heartening to know the musical’s other elements, such as love and friendship, are likewise still going strong.