All Shook Up

Hollywood long ago discovered the benefits of a built in audience. Remakes, musicalizations, color versions, sound versions, and so on. Why has it taken Broadway so long to discover that audiences want the familiar? They're willing to pay to see movie versions of CHARLIE'S ANGELS, STARSKY AND HUTCH, and, surely, the soon to be released DUKES OF HAZARD, so why not bring some of the familiar to the stage?

In the last few years, however, live theater has figured out that getting butts in the seats is as easy as ABC. Or, more accurately, ABBA. MAMA MIA, still playing all over the globe, opened producers' eyes to the fact that baby boomers (and, remember, they're the ones who have the cash to buy the $100+ tickets) want to relive their glory days, before they had beer bellies, kids, and crappy jobs. So, Billy Joel trotted out his favorites in MOVIN' ON, FOOTLOOSE and SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER were turned into sub-par stage versions, and Queen's songs have been utilized for WE WILL ROCK YOU, which is skipping Broadway altogether, for the more forgiving surrounds of Las Vegas.

Now, golden oldie Elvis is the latest draw, with the pre-Broadway run of ALL SHOOK UP, at the Cadillac Palace Theatre. Rather than line up his songs to tell the story of Presley, ALL SHOOK UP is a lighthearted look back at the Presley era, using his classic tunes to tell the story of Chad, a roustabout, who travels from town to town with his guitar, shaking up the locals, and setting hearts aflutter. When he arrives in this unnamed Midwestern town, he draws the attentions of Jenn Gambatese's Natalie, a grease monkey, who fixes his bike and loses her heart. Too bad Chad has fallen hard ­ for Miss Sandra, the keeper of the local museum, housed in a trailer. Meanwhile, Natalie's old pal, the nebbishly meek Dennis, played by Merk Price, tries to summon up the courage to tell Natalie that he, too, is in love ­ with her.

The permutations continue, with hearts intertwining in the blink of an eye. Natalie's dad, the local bar owner (the powerful singer, Sharon Wilkins), the mayor's son, and more fall instantly in love, and ALL SHOOK UP acknowledges and plays up its own contrivances. What at first seems like it will be a satire, then settles into parody, before becoming nothing more more than a lvong tribute to all those Elvis presley movies of the past. It's a long Carol Burnett sketch with modern sensibilities. I mean that in the best way. Carol Burnett had some great movie send-ups, and the goings on here are delightfully ridiculous, especially in Act II, when the various lovers criss-cross in an abandoned fairground in a low rent version of A MIDSUMMER'S NIGHT DREAM.

That fairground is a wonderfully expressionistic space, designed by David Rockwell, who has taken his sets from HAIRSPRAY, and ratcheted up the sharp angles and forced perspectives to create magical spaces. That isn't the only thing taken from HAIRSPRAY for this show. The love story between Curtis Holbrook, a military cadet and Nikki M. James' Lorraine is a teen interracial story that is HAIRSPRAY lite, and then there's the whole No Dancing policy straight from FOOTLOOSE.

It eventually doesn't matter, though, as ALL SHOOK UP finds its footing the loopier it gets, all the way through a surprising same sex romance. Still, what's most important are those Elvis songs. Just how do they fit in "Hound Dog" and "Teddy Bear"? Well, surprisingly, the songs gel quite nicely. Remember, many of the King's songs were ballads, that translate nicely to the stage, and some numbers, like "Heartbreak Hotel", sung by lonelyhearts at the bar, sounds positively showtuney with the brassy orchestrations.

I resisted at first, knowing the shoehorning of songs was going to be jarring, but, really, they fit more naturally into the story here, than they do in MAMA MIA, and like that show, this big expensive production should lead a long life from coast to coast.