My Thoughts On How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying Featuring Darren Criss
I rushed on January 11th and was fortunate to have been able to attend both the matinee and evening show that day. I can’t distinguish between the two shows I saw now weeks after I saw them, and I’m not sure I even noticed that many differences at the time, so I’ll be talking about the show as a whole and it will include both performances.
The opening orchestral music is lovely, and in general I found the music of the show to be really catchy, playful, and enjoyable. I’d really like to know if there are specific musical terms for the style or genre of music in the show. Initially, one of the reasons why I didn’t consider seeing H2$ is that, based on my past experience, I’m not a big fan of musical comedies or “song and dance” shows, cabaret type things, etc. I seem to enjoy dramatic musicals with real emotional consequences and serious plots more. So I figured H2$ was not going to be a big hit with me, and when I did decide to see the show, it was more to see Criss than to see the show itself. I found, though, that I ended up really, really enjoying the show, even numbers like “Coffee Break” that have no plot significance and are just for fun and an opportunity to do some group choreography. The music is so bouncy and rich and catchy, and the characters are so much fun, and there was some really top acting talent that I would eagerly see in other productions. So I ended up, if not loving, really, really liking the show a whole bunch just for itself independent of Criss’s involvement. I laughed heartily throughout the production to the point of needing to hold it in out of courtesy to my neighbors, which I was not expecting to do at all. I think, as much of a perk as seeing Criss himself was the fact that his involvement got me to see and come to really enjoy a musical that I probably would have never seen otherwise. The latter part of Act II kind of lost me and the whole filming of the treasure hunt scene dragged, going too much into meaningless fluff territory for me. I also wasn’t a huge fan of any scene that featured Hedy too heavily. So it had its problems for me, but overall I really enjoyed it.
The ensemble was really fantastic and I loved the choreography. All the dances were sharp and put together and visually interesting, somewhat spastic mirroring the individual’s rat race like experience within a company but also very conforming overall. They also all had very strong, laugh out loud individual character moments that I adored, always present in the scene and always acting, like how each of them react in “A Secretary Is Not A Toy”. I could watch any one of them through that scene and be thoroughly entertained. One thing, though, is that all the ensemble men fit a certain mold: tall (they were all similar height) and trim and classically handsome. Because of this, Criss’s Finch seemed young and tiny in comparison and as such it was kind of weird to see him getting promotion after promotion over all these other guys. But the show’s goal is definitely not realism, so it’s not that big of a deal.
While I came to see Criss, and while I don’t mean to slight him in anyway, in my opinion the three stars of the show were the three Hs of the main cast: Rose Hemingway as Rosemary, Christopher Hanke as Bud, and Ellen Harvey as Miss Jones. They each captivated me with their star talent in their own way, and when I hung around the stage door after the show, my main purpose other than ogling at the crowd out of curiosity was to get their autographs, not Criss’s, and I was saddened to see that, not only did they not come out or I missed them, but of the actors that did come out, they fled the area as quickly as they could, perhaps because they assumed that everyone there only cared about Criss (and, this is pure speculation on my part, but some of them seemed to actually dislike the crowd). As I’m sure most of the people there were there to see Criss, they wouldn’t be wrong, but it was a disappointing situation for me and others like me that was genuinely interested in the other talent in the show.
First, Hemingway. She has this crystal clear, larger than life, flawless Broadway voice that I was really wowed by. And she added this light affectation to her speaking and way of singing, not really a whine or full-on ditzy cheerleader sort of thing, but a little something that complemented the rest of her acting perfectly to create this sympathetic but shallow character. I can’t figure out many specific things to say about her for some reason, but her entire performance of Rosemary just blew my socks off, both singing and acting, and she carried the show in a lot of ways for me. I was particularly impressed with the extreme ease with which she navigated all the large interval jumps in “Happy To Keep His Dinner Warm”. Those are really tough to do perfectly in my amateur opinion. She is just an amount of talent. As for the character itself, I know Rosemary is pretty much the embodiment antifeminism and is not to be taken seriously, but I find it amusing that I actually really fell into liking her POV and light-heartedly empathizing with her. I’m kind of at that point in my life where I sometimes jokingly tell myself, “Screw this. I’m sick of having to strive so hard towards trying to be great. I just want to find a great man that I can support and be the more casually great woman behind him without the pressure.” So when Rosemary started singing “Happy To Keep His Dinner Warm”, I was like “YES, exactly. You sing my darkest desires into life. Why can’t I find someone for whom I can maintain the thermal energy of his sustenance at a threshold acceptable for consumption?” Haha.
Hanke was another standout for me as Bud Frump. His comedic acting, both physical and in behavior and dialogue, was outstanding and I thought all the things he did with his character were hilarious. He slayed me. I loved how his Bud just blatantly gave no fracks what other people thought of him, he was going to be his annoying self no matter what and expect things to go his way and when things blew up in his face he would take it, perhaps pouting a bit, but never losing that permanent smugness that clearly announced until the end of time that the world would on the receiving end of his contempt. I loved his Bud to death-he’s such an entertaining little weasel. I mean, Bud does to Finch what Finch is doing to everyone else, but we love seeing Bud knocked down a peg and like it when Finch wins, and it just all works somehow.
And, finally, Harvey also captivated me with her colorful comedic acting, bringing to life another enormously entertaining character. Her slightly rough, scornful manner of speaking, the way she could stare down a lion-I just loved Miss Jones. On top of that, I am such a sucker for the powerhouse soprano that is paraded out as an additional layer to the existing harmony in the climax of musical numbers, and Harvey has quite the set of lungs on her, so while she didn’t have any solo numbers, I loved her voice to pieces as well. I know how much breath support that takes, and I was extremely impressed that she could navigate those high notes seemingly effortlessly while being pushed around and manhandled and falling from side to side.
Also, let me just briefly mention Beau Bridges. I thought he was good and liked the funny and quirky and slight perviness that he brought to Bigley, but the one thing I would say is that he seemed not to completely commit to and follow through with the jokes and beats of the scenes. He’d lead into and hit the various beats, whether it was a smug, adulterous “heh heh heh” or whatnot, but then didn’t quite follow through with the acting choices and let it flow like he could have, instead skipping more from beat to beat, like he was hitting targets in the script. Which, given that he was relatively new to the part, is understandable, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he improved with a bit more time. Another amusing tidbit about Bigley from my perspective: in the office scenes where he is sitting behind his desk on the 2nd story part of the set that slides out from the wings, I was reminded very much of animatronic or muppet. That’s not a slight to his acting, but just the fact that he slides out, and then sits there where you can only see his upper half and then he just kind of grins as he slides back into the wings. Totally reminded me of an animatronic puppet used in theme parks and the like. I loved how he modeled his sweater.
Finally, I get around to the estimable Darren Criss. First let me describe some of his memorable moments and then I’ll step back and talk in more general terms. First of all, at the opening of the show, when the window washer seat is lowered down into the orchestra pit, it is such a tease and the anticipation it generated within me was savory. Trying not to be too fangirly in how I express myself, but it was exciting. My mind was racing, wondering if Criss was going to come up from the orchestra pit. WHAT IF HE IS IN THE ORCHESTRA PIT RIGHT NOW. OH MY GOD. Any moment now he’s going to appear. Keep your eyes fixed tirelessly to the stage. And then he did indeed come up from the pit and it was just so much fun. Oh, and OKAY. Dear Reader. With the plucky, jazzy, elevator-y music and Criss reading the book so intently and eagerly, and his confident yet after-school-special-innocent “I can!” just did me in. It’s hard for me to find an adjective, so I’ll just say it was adorable x 1000. ADORABLE. Really harkened back to the wide-eyed dapper puppy description that has been attributed to Blaine. If I could just watch “Dear Reader” on loop for the rest of my life I would die happy. He brought a lot of wide-eyed eagerness to the role throughout. That earnest, adorable quality that gets people eating out of Finch’s hands comes so naturally to him, and he really milks it where appropriate. Every time Finch introduced himself and made sure they knew exactly who he was: “Finch, sir/ma’am, F-I-N-C-H” I just wanted to smother Finch and tell him how cute he was, even though he’s really just being self-serving and obnoxious when looked at objectively.
I do remember that his “How To Succeed” was somewhat stronger in the evening. In the matinee he seemed to be searching for the note a little when the song jumps up on that awkward interval at “How to, how to, suc-CEEEEEEEEEEEEED”.
The whole “Grand Old Ivy” scene where Finch and Bigley meet up at the company on a Saturday was wonderful beyond words. There were so many comedic gems in this scene as Finch plays Bigley like a violin. When he bonds with Bigley over knitting, I pretty much died at the way he shouts “REALLY?” like he’s a 10 year-old that’s just been told that Santa Claus is real after all, and how his behavior becomes much more…I’m reluctant to use this wording but am not sure how else to describe it, so I’ll just say he adopts what I believe would be considered stereotypical gay body language, a little more coy, exuberant, and silly and the way he demurely covers his hand with his mouth as he looks over the work of art that is Bigley’s sweater. And then at the end of the scene where Bigley starts the Grand Old Ivy song again, engaging Finch with the dance, Criss gives this perfect, “You have got to be shitting me. AGAIN? FML.” face before joining in with a perfect smile. Now the music number itself. Wow, there is a lot going on there. That looked very physically demanding. In particular, I couldn’t quite believe my eyes when the ensemble cast flips Criss over in a slow-motion somersault in midair with their hands, a good number of feet off the ground. If my memory serves me correctly, it wasn’t quite a vertical head-over-feet somersault at the matinee, but it sure was for the evening show. I know they are all professionals and that every measure is taken to make the show safe, but that looked dangerous and I bet that takes a lot of trust on Criss’s part. If he were to fall and come down at the wrong angle, I imagine that he could potentially do damage to his neck and/or spine. It was one of the two numbers where you can see Criss very visibly sweating, the other one being Brotherhood of Man. I was very pleased that the audience recognized the effort in the number by sustaining their applause for probably the longest amount of time besides the end of the show, and it was fun to watch Criss and Bridges ad lib a bit as they waited for the lengthy applause to die down.
I admit I was a hypocrite when it came to the influence of Glee intruding in on H2$. On the one hand, I wasn’t thrilled when Finch’s jumping on top of the couch received such thunderous applause because it was yanking me out of the world of H2$ and extraneous, real-world things. On the other hand, though, I confess that when Finch says he is knitting a bird cage cover, the first thing I thought of was Kurt’s Burberry one, and I immediately thought that Blaine would wear the outfit of the cameraman in a heartbeat.
Another hilarious moment was when Bigley told Finch to bow or something like that, and Finch does, and then without further feedback he goes lower, and lower, and lower, until you think he can’t bow any further and then he just collapses like a ragdoll all the way down.
Finally, like most other people, it seems, I was completely mesmerized by Criss’s dancing in Brotherhood of Man. The lines he hits, the energy he puts into it, the fluidity with which he moves his body, he angles he makes with his legs...it was just fantastic and he just draws your eyes to him. If I may quote Artie: “Hot damn.” The evening show got such a lengthy applause after Brotherhood of Man that Criss had to start ad libbing by interacting with the cast around him and shaking people’s hands while he was still propped up on the guys’ shoulders, which was amusing, and Bud’s in the corner trying to scowl the audience into submission.
With regard to Criss’s voice, I think it’s pretty common knowledge and to be accepted that Criss doesn’t have a typical Broadway voice. His voice is sort of more rounded and a bit fuzzy and doesn’t really pop out from the orchestral music and/or background singers like some other Broadway talent that has a more clear, sharp edge to their voice, so, for example, at the end of “I Believe In You” I thought Criss’s voice got lost somewhat among the chorus. His projection and/or volume also was not as strong for some of the lower notes in his songs, and so the lyrics that fell on those lower notes would get swallowed somewhat. That said, he did a fine job and his singing certainly didn’t detract from the show in any way, and I won’t listen to any other actor, Broderick or Radcliffe, sing How To Succeed. It’s firmly ingrained in my mind with Criss’s voice.
In my opinion, and I’m not surprised by this given his predisposition toward composing and collaboration, the numbers that I was most impressed with his vocals were the ones where he was harmonizing: “Been A Long Day” and “Act One Finale”. I loved him to death in both of these. The last note of the Act One Finale was breathtaking. Criss really opened up and let loose on it unlike most of his other singing in the show and it showed and was just fantastic. I’m not sure I would say he was “playing it safe” on much of his other singing, but I would definitely agree with the sentiment that he expressed in one of his interviews where he stated something along the lines of how his first purpose in singing was to convey the story and character and only second to make it sound pretty.
So, now that I’ve gone through and mentioned some of the things that I really loved about Criss’s performance, I wanted to address why, for me, the big features/stars of the show were Hemingway, Hanke, and Harvey. For me, it’s about feeling blown away by the acting and singing, and also about being enthralled with and thoroughly entertained by their characters. I think Criss didn’t make that list for me because, partially because his voice isn’t really extraordinary (which isn’t a criticism when you realize that he’s competing with the top vocal talent in the country) and because I never really connected with Finch, and I think the book, directing, and acting all had some role in that. I know this sounds weird to say given that the whole show is about Finch scheming his way to the top of the company, but he comes off as a very one-dimensional, passive character. It’s very typical in musical theater to, early on in the show, have what’s called an “I Want” song for the main character to establish what they want and make them sympathetic to the audience. There are endless examples of this, particularly in Disney films. It’s “The Wizard and I” from Wicked and the “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid. Finch doesn’t have this. In fact, we never learn what Finch wants on an emotional level or really anything about him as a character even though he’s the main character. How did he feel about being a window washer? Why does he want to rise to the top of the corporate pyramid? Is it about the challenge and thrill of it? The prestige and respect? The money? Does his mother have a crippling disease that is putting their family into debt and he needed to find a way to provide for her? Does he have a mother? Who is this character? We are never told and never know what the stakes are for him, if he’s risking anything at all or whether this whole endeavor is just a big lark for him. I mean, Rosemary is a pretty one note character, but she is sympathetic and engaging because you know what she wants (unlike Finch, she does have an “I Want” song) and see her passion and emotion and even growth as a character as she discovers that she actually does have a threshold for the degree to which she is willing to be treated like a doormat. Honestly, I felt that she was more of the main character than Finch, but then the show ends with the focus on Finch, giving Rosemary a one line resolution of “Oh, by the way, they are married now”, which just further confused my sensibilities for what the show was / should have been. The whole show is about Finch scheming his way to the top but we are never told why he does it or how he feels about anything he does or accomplishes beyond his preening at having an office. And this is because of the book. I don’t know if the writers did this purposefully, but it is what it is.
Now, I say that the directing/acting also has a hand in this because even when the book is lacking, the performance itself can try to pave over some of those holes a little. But it didn’t and actually kind of exacerbated the issue. I have no idea how other actors have played Finch and certainly don’t have the insight to distinguish the roles of directing vs. acting in this, but Criss’s Finch is very one note. He’s always got his perfectly poised, on top of things and willing to please mask on, and very passively watches other characters talk, and so it is hard to determine the valence (a fancy way of saying whether it’s something he likes or dislikes) of anything going on or anyone on stage relative for Finch. You don’t often get a sense about how he feels about what’s happening around him or what’s going on in that head of his. The audience just has to sit there and watch him do. Actually, I need to modify that statement some. The second time I saw the show, I carefully watched his initial interactions with Bud in the mailroom because I really wanted to know how Finch felt about him, and at one point Criss did give a slight squint and frown that said “I’m not quite sure what to make of you yet but I’m pretty sure I don’t like you” before readopting Finch’s mask. It was a wonderful acting moment that I loved, but I only caught it the second time around, and only then because I was looking for it, and I was pretty much as close to the stage as you could be. In a large theater, subtlety in acting, though wonderful, isn’t always the most effective. Film and theater are very different in terms of how big you need to act (what is suitable for theater can come across as overacting on film what with the camera right there in the actor’s face).
On top of that, Finch as a character has very little continuity between scenes and therefore really lacks an arc of any sort and doesn’t have any growth, which I find really, really odd being that he is the main character. He’s very much someone who just reacts to the here-and-now without thinking about what he’s doing or taking a step back to see the bigger picture or consider any ideas that are more abstract than “How do I get promoted?”. He’s completely lukewarm to Rosemary until suddenly he’s IN LOVE WITH HER and then the next scene he’s back to being oblivious and distracted and Rosemary is nothing more to him than the woman that he is going to be married to and eventually cohabitate with, which makes all his obliviousness a non-issue for him because it doesn’t even matter if he has a connection with her. In the final board meeting scene he’s initially willing to take responsibility for his actions and show some maturity and vulnerability, and then as soon as he spots an opportunity he throws everyone else under a bus and covers everything in magical, blinding glitter.
In the end, Finch comes off as a soulless upstart wrapped up in an adorable container, and my brain was never really able to reconcile that dichotomy and form a coherent idea of Finch as a character. I was thoroughly entertained by seeing his scheming continue to pay off and how he managed to do it, but I never really cared about him or whether he would succeed or fail because the audience is never given the impression that there are any stakes for Finch. I think this is one reason why “I Believe In You” was my least favorite number in the whole show and by far the least memorable, which saddens me to admit because I feel like it’s supposed to be a poignant number where Criss can show off his acting chops. It was like all of a sudden in the fourth inning the writers wanted to make Finch more personable and vulnerable, but without any context of who he was as a character the song didn’t resonate with me at all. To be honest, that combined with Criss’s not terribly inspiring vocals made it really hard for me to focus on the content of the scene both times I saw it. Instead my attention drifted to imagining him scrambling to reassemble the razor in five seconds flat, which I found much more entertaining. On a similar note, when the treasure hunt plan collapsed around him I really didn’t care that Finch was upset and might possibly be fired because it wasn’t clear what the stakes were for him. Was he worried about losing the job because of the money, just didn’t want to stop working at WWW, or was he concerned, above all else, that losing his job would mean he would lose Rosemary? I still have no idea, but ‘hey it doesn’t matter cause he got promoted again and got the girl and wheeeeeee, *happy ending*’. So that is why I wasn’t as captivated by Finch and Criss as some of the other actors in the show.
If I were to objectively cast Finch without regard to any potential brand or fanbase that an actor could bring to the role, would I cast Criss? No, not considering that there are many other enormously, incredibly talented triple threats out there looking for work. But am I glad that he was cast and that I got to see H2$ with him in it? Absolutely 100% yes, no questions asked.
As a last thought, can I just say that I really want to see an Pillsbury pamphlet version of Finch's book, provocative title and all? Someone should get on that.