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    Catching Up With Hillary Clinton at “Bob Fosse’s Dancin’”

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    The former secretary of state celebrated the opening on Broadway and shared her thoughts on those drag show bans.On Sunday night, Hillary Clinton, fresh from attending the opening night of “Bob Fosse’s Dancin’” on Broadway at the Music Box Theater, swept into the Rosevale Cocktail Room at the Civilian Hotel on West 48th Street.As candles flickered on tables, with miniature models from productions like “Hadestown” and “Dear Evan Hansen” displayed on a back wall, a few dozen guests at the private after-party sipped glasses of white wine from the bar. Mrs. Clinton mingled among guests including David Rockwell, the architect and Tony Award-winning show designer who designed the hotel; the actress Jane Krakowski; Huma Abedin, Mrs. Clinton’s longtime aide; and the “Dancin’” director, Wayne Cilento.“I loved it,” she told Mr. Cilento, who also danced in the original 1978 production of the show. “The dancers were so charismatic and magnetic. That energy was so needed.”Mrs. Clinton had attended the opening at the invitation of Rob Russo, a co-producer on the show who has worked with her in some capacity for nearly two decades. He hardly had to twist her arm, though: Mrs. Clinton, a noted Broadway superfan, has seen numerous shows in the past few months, including “POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive” in July, “The Phantom of the Opera” in December and, last week, the new revival of “Some Like It Hot.”From left: Jamie DuMont, Nicole Fosse and Rob Russo. Mr. Russo, a co-producer of the show and a longtime associate of Mrs. Clinton’s, was the one to invite the former secretary of state to the show’s opening.Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesSo when asked to consider the idea that a touring production of the latter show, in which two men dress as women to escape the mob, could be banned from playing in a state like Tennessee, which recently passed a law limiting “cabaret” shows, part of a wave of legislation across the country by conservative lawmakers against drag performances, Mrs. Clinton’s reaction was clear.“It’s a very sad commentary on what people think is important in our country,” Mrs. Clinton said. “I hope that it goes the way of the dinosaur because people will recognize that it’s just a political stunt.”The range of shows that could potentially be banned under such legislation — such as Shakespeare plays, in which a number of characters cross-dress; “Hairspray,” the popular musical in which the protagonist’s mother is usually played by a man in a dress; and “1776,” whose current touring company features an all-female, trans and nonbinary cast, was, she said, “absurd.”“I guess they’re going to shut the state borders to anything that is Shakespearean?” she said. “Are we going to stop exporting any kind of entertainment?”Ms. Fosse, far left, the daughter of the director-choreographer Bob Fosse, talked to a dancer in the show, Yeman Brown.Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesAt around 9:10 p.m., Mrs. Clinton departed the party. Some guests followed her lead, while others moved upstairs to the Starchild Rooftop Bar & Lounge on the 27th floor, where Nicole Fosse — the daughter of the director-choreographer Bob Fosse and the actress Gwen Verdon — and Mr. Cilento, the director, were hosting a second party for the show’s creative team and cast of 22 dancers.The dancer Karli Dinardo wore a sleeveless silver gown with cutouts by the Australian designer Portia and Scarlett, while Yeman Brown donned a green Who Decides War cathedral sweatshirt with cutouts across the front. They sipped “Dancin’ Man” mocktails — roots divino bianco, cucumber, pink peppercorn and lemon-lime soda — and munched on “Fosse’s Breakfast” (granola) and shrimp cocktails furnished by waiters on silver platters. (For those with less highbrow tastes, there were also bags of M&M’s by the bar with the dancers’ names printed on them.)Karli Dinardo, a dancer in the show.Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesKolton Krouse, who leads the number “Spring Chicken.”Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesKolton Krouse, a nonbinary dancer in the production whose face-slapping kicks earned a shout-out from the New York Times critic Jesse Green in his review, wore an asymmetrical black dress, gold heels, glittering gold eye shadow and bright red lipstick.“I wanted to do a modern take on Ann Reinking’s original trumpet solo dress,” they said of their sparkling one-shoulder gown.Mx. Krouse, who is among a cast of dancers that is noticeably more diverse in age, ethnicity, body type and gender presentation than a typical Fosse cast, said the best part of the new production was that “we can all be ourselves while we’re doing it.”Mr. Cilento said he purposefully sought a more diverse cast for the revival.“I did a very eclectic, really exciting group of dancers because I felt like you had to embrace the whole culture and not just make it, you know, white bread,” he said.Mx. Krouse, who leads the number “Spring Chicken” in the show, said: “It’s weird doing a show where I can be me, and it’s OK.”M&M’s celebrating the show’s opening night featured dancers’ names.Krista Schlueter for The New York TimesQuick Question is a collection of dispatches from red carpets, gala dinners and other events that coax celebrities out of hiding. More

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      Review: In Bob Fosse’s ‘Dancin’,’ a Wiggle Is Worth a Thousand Words

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      A revival of the 1978 dancical has been substantially revamped to argue for Bob Fosse’s pure dance cred. It’s a joy anyway.Right from the start, we’re advised that “Bob Fosse’s Dancin’,” which opened on Sunday at the Music Box Theater, will be “almost plotless” and include “no messages.”Is that a challenge or an apology?In the often-thrilling, often-frustrating revival of the 1978 dancical, which reincarnates the spirit and choreography of Bob Fosse, the two possibilities are much the same. Substantially revamped and restaged by Wayne Cilento, a standout in the original production, this “Dancin’” argues that Fosse’s genius was constrained by the pedestrian storytelling of musical theater, with its “villains,” “baritone heroes” and “Christmas trees.” True Fosseism, it seems, can fully thrive only in the abstract, Olympian realms of George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins.The dichotomy is false, and the insistence a little embarrassing; when judged only as a brief for that point, “Dancin’” stumbles. Particularly in a long concluding section drawn from his final musical, “Big Deal,” the new material meant to bolster Fosse’s reputation doesn’t. And the periodic intrusion of ax-grinding Fosse avatars, quoting him at his most maudlin, suggests an inferiority complex not only about his talent but also about the kind of storytelling, in shows like “Chicago,” and movies like “Cabaret,” for which he was best known and deeply admired.But in the spirit of plotlessness and nonmessaging, let me not argue that too much. The show is a joy every time it puts down its ax. In any case, its 16 dancers, representing a wider range by age, ethnicity, body type and gender presentation than you typically see in a Fosse cast, make a much better case for the pure dance qualities of his style than the text does. (Kirsten Childs, herself a former Fosse dancer, provided the additional material.) A wiggle is worth a thousand words.In the sublime “Dancin’ Man,” our critic writes, the dancers synchronize blissfully with the music and with one another.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesThat wiggle — of the fingers, of the hips — joins the familiar Fosse vocabulary here: the isolated shoulder rotations, the off-center jumps, the pelvic contractions that look as if the dancer is being hit in the stomach with a cannonball. But in a context mostly stripped of overt story, the movements feel more extreme, and even overexuberant, as if let loose from jail: not just high kicks but kicks so high the shins bang the face.The first number after the opening sequence, a holdover from 1978, is in fact set in jail. “Recollections of an Old Dancer,” built on the Jerry Jeff Walker tune “Mr. Bojangles,” seems to be about the foundational legacy of Black dance in American culture, as the spirit of Bill Robinson shares his moves with a prisoner. I say “seems” because the effort to reframe numbers like this one as plotless when they clearly aren’t sometimes renders them merely murky, no matter how good the dancing. (It’s excellent.)The persistence of story is even more noticeable in the sequences that are new, newish or substantially altered. They make up perhaps half of the revival’s 14 numbers.“Big City Mime,” the 21-minute centerpiece of Act I, is one of the newish ones. Cut in Boston in 1978, it has been recreated from Fosse’s written scenario and snippets of his choreography for other works. The scenario is an exaggerated Fosse autobiography in dance, depositing a wide-eyed rube — the curly haired, lean-lined Peter John Chursin — in a modern-day Sodom. After encounters with prostitutes, masseuses and a naughty bookstore clerk, he emerges from his urban initiation ready to embrace the lessons of the body.Those lessons reach a sublime climax in the Act I finale, “Dancin’ Man,” the first time (and, until the curtain call, the last time) we see a unison number for the full ensemble. Dressed identically in pale blue suits, bow ties and straw hats, the dancers synchronize blissfully with the music (a soft-shoe tune by Harry Warren and Johnny Mercer) and with one another.Ron Todorowski is among the eclectic cast of 16 dancers and six understudies. Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesBut Act II, even leaving aside the “Big Deal” letdown, is a bumpier ride once you get past its astonishing opening: “Sing, Sing, Sing,” built on the Louis Prima number made famous by Benny Goodman. “The Female Star Spot,” a weak feminist comedy sketch in which singers question the woman-as-doormat lyrics of the 1977 Dolly Parton hit “Here You Come Again,” immediately lets the dance energy out of the room.A bit later, a long sequence set to a medley of patriotic songs, updated to include quotes from the likes of Martin Luther King Jr. and Amanda Gorman — and to remove the objectionable “Dixie,” which was part of the original — suffers from the grim feeling that it’s stepping around land mines.Though many of the interstitial numbers are entirely successful — and the hot arrangements by Jim Abbott for a 14-person band are ceaselessly exciting — they cannot always compensate for the larger missteps. The drama doesn’t accumulate, as it does in a musical, making “Dancin’” more like a variety show with guest stars. The design, too, is deliberately more presentational than theatrical, with arena lighting (by David Grill), a 49-by-28-foot LED wall (video design by Finn Ross) and four three-story towers (by Robert Brill) engaged in a kind of choreography themselves.But it’s the costumes, by Reid Bartelme and Harriet Jung, a team known mostly for its work with ballet companies, that slip the leash of narrative most successfully. Strappy crop tops with strategic cutouts and peekaboo panels are perhaps to be expected in a Fosse show. But did I really see bumblebees, beekeepers, knights in body-baring armor, a sexy chicken with backup roosters and clowns with chartreuse polka-dot pussy bows?Happily, even airy whimsy cannot suppress the dancers’ specificity. If we do not know the story, they certainly do. Your favorites may depend on the night you see it (six understudies are part of the company as well) but of the 16 I saw on Friday I can highlight, aside from Chursin, Dylis Croman for her humor, Yeman Brown for his poetry, Jacob Guzman for his ferocity, Ron Todorowski for his athleticism, Manuel Herrera for his poignancy and Kolton Krouse for, well, their everything. (Krouse is the one with the face-slapping kicks.)Face-slapping kick: Kolton Krouse during the Act II opener set to “Sing, Sing, Sing.”Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesIf that list seems male dominated, so is “Dancin’,” despite its new sprinkling of gay, lesbian and nonbinary content. Fosse, after all, was creating in his own image, whether rendering himself as a satyr, a sot or a snake. Absent a text that makes a woman the star, he makes himself one, over and over. He was an interesting guy, so it’s an interesting story.Ah, but there’s that word “story” again. To me it seems that Fosse, however limited he may have felt by the specificities of musical theater, was best when working at the place where pure movement is pulled down from Olympus to meet real people, with lit cigarettes dangling from their lips. It’s there (and in so much of “Dancin’”) that he reliably finds what passes, despite all warnings, for a message: the necessity of sharing the body’s expressiveness and its endless capacity for pleasure.Bob Fosse’s Dancin’At the Music Box Theater, Manhattan; dancinbway.com. Running time: 2 hours 10 minutes. More