If you've haven't had the pleasure of seeing Charlotte d'Amboise steal the show in the Los Angeles production of Chicago, which recently moved from the Ahmanson to the Shubert Theatre, you're missing one of the great musical performances to hit the L.A. stages in quite a while.
As the celebrity murderess Roxie Hart in Chicago, the Bob Fosse period musical about the Windy City's seediest and most seductive characters, d'Amboise exposes her myriad talents as a dancer, actress, singer, and especially as a comedienne. For her bravura turn, the 33-year-old performer has been compared to a young Shirley MacLaine, as well as veteran stage actresses Chita Rivera and Gwen Verdon.
In fact, it was Verdon who originated the role of Roxie when Chicago premiered in 1975. Anne Reinking, who choreographed the current L.A. production, took over for Verdon in 1976, and played Roxie again in the 1996 City Center revival that won six Tonys. The torch was passed to d'Amboise last year when she stepped into Roxie's shoes for Chicago's national tour.
What is so apparent in seeing d'Amboise onstage is just how much she has made this role her own. On the night I witnessed her performance at the Ahmanson, she had the audience in the palm of her hand--her comic timing was impeccable, her vivacious energy infectious.
"The thing that I enjoy most about it is that Roxie is so many colors and you get to see them all," said d'Amboise. "In most musicals, you only get one or two sides of a character and that's it. In Roxie, there's so much you can play with. The role has been played by several other people, and it's played completely different by each one of them. There's a lot of freedom for where you can take the role."
Indeed, d'Amboise has brought her unique stamp to Roxie's vulnerable allure.
"The central thing about Roxie is that she's self-centered and out for herself," said the actress. "Then you can go about it any way you want on how she gets her way. Everyone has been seductive in different ways. Anne Reinking played Roxie in a mature kind of been-around-the-block, conniving way, and I play her as more of an innocent. I play seductive in a child-like way--also in a sexy way, but my Roxie gets her way by being cute, funny, and charming."
After seeing her take on Roxie, it comes as no surprise that d'Amboise has long been an enthusiast of Bob Fosse's sensual work. Chicago is, in fact, her second Fosse musical. In 1994, she replaced Bebe Neuwirth as Lola in the Broadway revival of Damn Yankees.
"I'm a huge fan," noted d'Amboise of the late director/choreographer. "I saw Dancing when I was 16 years old and I went, 'That's was I want to do.' I'd done ballet, jazz, and modern, but not that kind of jazz. It was the sexiest thing I'd ever seen. I started to study around and that was it. I just learned it."
She grew up on Manhattan's Upper West Side, the daughter of the famed dancers Jacques d'Amboise and Carolyn George, both principals with George Balanchine's New York City Ballet. While she seemed destined to follow a career in dance and began studying ballet at age eight, acting quickly became her true love. While attending New York City's Professional Children's School, she honed her skills at the Neighborhood Playhouse and the Academy of Dramatic Arts.
After high school, d'Amboise cut her teeth on a variety of Off-Broadway productions, and at age 18, she landed her breakthrough role as a prowling Siamese in Cats, where she met her husband-to-be Terrence Mann--the male lead in Beauty and Beast on Broadway and at the Shubert.
D'Amboise went on to perform in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Song and Dance and Carrie, the unsuccessful musical adaptation of the Stephen King novel. Her second break came with a Tony nomination for her work in Jerome Robbins' Broadway, followed by Damn Yankees and Company at the Roundabout Theater. Her dramatic work includes Non-Pasquale at the New York Shakespeare Festival, The Dolphin Position at Primary Stages in New York, and regional productions of Speed the Plow and Italian-American Reconciliation.
While d'Amboise has certainly earned her share of acclaim, she is by no means a household name, especially in Los Angeles. She has done some film and television work, such as the Penny Marshall-directed The Preacher's Wife. But, her career has primarily been centered in musical theatre, which rarely offers a triple-threat like d'Amboise an opportunity to do what she does best--combine dance, song, and acting into a powerhouse performance.
"There are very few good Broadway musicals, and then you're competing against all of New York City because everybody wants those roles," lamented the actress, who did not work for two years after Jerome Robbin's Broadway. "So if you do get the role, you're very lucky, and the right role for me comes around once in a blue moon. Now I realize that I can go a long time without working. It's tough."
While one would hope that d'Amboise will be offered more opportunities in the future to show off her immense talents, she is certain that nothing will rival her current experience in Chicago.
"I'm sure there will be other Broadway things that I'll do, but it's not going to be like this," she said. "I'm never going to get a role that's written more perfectly for me. I feel like this is the height as far as that's concerned."
--Jamie Painte