Creative Wiz

DES MCANUFF, IN HIS ROLE as artistic director of La Jolla Playhouse, has often been bicoastal. In the next phase of his career, to begin in April, he’ll also be binational. Along with assuming the new Playhouse title of director emeritus, McAnuff will become part of an unprecedented triumvirate of artistic directors for the esteemed Stratford Festival in Ontario, Canada.

Born in Illinois of Canadian parents, McAnuff has been wooed by Canada’s prestigious national theater before—including in 1982, when he chose instead to come to the Playhouse and preside over the theater’s resurrection. It had been dormant for decades after its ’60s heyday as a summer venue for Hollywood stars wanting to work on the stage. McAnuff’s decision, as we know, made Playhouse history. His leadership—divided by a 1994-2001 interregnum, during which he braved the wilds of Hollywood—brought local and national acclaim to him and the theater. Among the plethora of awards were Tonys for McAnuff’s direction of Big River (’85) and The Who’s Tommy (’93) and the 1993 Tony to the Playhouse for outstanding regional theater.

The good times will keep on rolling. McAnuff is helming a new version of 1975’s seven-Tony-winning musical, The Wiz (September 26–November 12 in the Mandell Weiss Theatre), and, in the future, will return for occasional directing assignments—and some fund-raising. “The main thing is, I’ll be a director,” McAnuff says, “as well as a supporter.”

The Wiz is the popular and tuneful African-American version of the classic L. Frank Baum tale The Wizard of Oz. It will have the same Charlie Smalls score, with updated orchestrations by Harold Wheeler to give a 21st-century beat to the ’70s music. “It’s set in today,” McAnuff says, “and will feel contemporary, although its theme is timeless. It’s an expression of a girl’s anxiety at leaving home. What defines ‘home’ is particularly pertinent.” Another feature is a reconfigured Weiss Theatre, with onstage seating and a yellow brick road that wends its way through the audience.

McAnuff is eagerly anticipating his Stratford duties. As to the unusual circumstance of sharing artistic directorship with two others (Marti Maraden and Don Shipley), he says, “What makes it exciting is that we all have a passion for the Stratford Festival.” And he doesn’t foresee any clash of egos, because he’s used to making group decisions. “Even at the Playhouse,” he says, “there were damn few times when I said, ‘My way or the highway.’ ” With McAnuff’s new connections, a joint Stratford–La Jolla production would seem a natural. And he foresees just such a possibility. “It would work well,” he says. “The audiences are different and distinct.”

IN 2002, THE TONYS PRODUCED one of those award-show quirks. Thoroughly Modern Millie, which originated at La Jolla Playhouse, was picked as outstanding musical. Yet the Tony statuettes for musical direction, book and score went to another tuner, causing bemused observers to wonder how one show could be deemed best if another topped it in the three major elements.

Whatever the imponderables, that show was Urinetown, a punnily named spoof about a futuristic city with a water shortage so dire, citizens have to pay to pee. And its first local viewing will be at, of all places, Starlight (September 7-17). It continues a welcome trend by the outdoor Balboa Park theater, for decades a repository of tried-and-true favorites, to present newer and edgier shows.

Urinetown, with music by Mark Hollman and book and lyrics by Hollman and Greg Kotis, is described as “a neo-Brechtian absurdist melodrama.” In it, a serious drought has allowed a greedy corporation to take control of a city’s toilet facilities, charging the citizens to use them. Naturally, rebellion ensues. And also naturally in such pufferies, the rebel leader falls for the corporate boss’s daughter. So if you like a love story mixed with a musical message and a bit of bathroom humor—well, urine luck.

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