At first, the thought of bringing this long-deceased pop-culture artifact to the stage seems like a classic case of "What were they thinking?" Are people really clamoring for a live resurrection of an innocuous TV game show that debuted during the Truman administration and hasn't been produced since 1975? Well, apparently they are -- and if not, they should be.
Maybe it's due to the glut of increasingly mercenary game shows and mean-spirited reality TV that has clotted the airwaves recently, but What's My Line? -- Live on Stage, which ran for three years in Los Angeles, feels like a refreshing blast from a more genteel past. It is an idea whose time, strangely enough, has come.
The original show, which featured a panel of four semi-celebrities trying to guess a contestant's occupation by asking questions that can only have yes or no for an answer, ran for an incredible 25 years, beginning in 1950. Producer and host J. Keith van Straaten has kept the original format -- including the formal evening wear -- and resisted any temptation to camp up the proceedings. The result is an agreeable, often surprising evening of sophisticated silliness, a glamorized version of the sorts of games adults used to play at parties not so very long ago.
The opening-night panelists were Barry Saltzman, stage actor and veteran of the L.A. production; New York Post theatre columnist Michael Riedel; Avenue Q star Stephanie D'Abruzzo; and original I've Got a Secret and What's My Line? panelist Betsy Palmer, 81 years old and cute as a button. (Things may get peculiar in subsequent weeks, with such random entities as the Amazing Kreskin and cult actor Mink Stole scheduled to appear.)
Van Straaten and director Jim Newman concocted an idiosyncratically New York show this time around; contestants included an oboist with the New York Philharmonic who graced the audience with a solo and a baker at Brooklyn's legendary Junior's who provided free cheesecake for everyone. The hands-down highlight was the first contestant, a former hat-check girl at the Stork Club -- and, touchingly, the first contestant on the debut episode of the original series. The evening concluded with the panelists donning blindfolds and trying to guess the identity of a celebrity mystery guest -- in this case, George Wendt of Cheers and, currently, Hairspray fame. Everyone had an unforced good time, and van Straaten dispatched his hostly duties with aplomb.
Presented by van Straaten Entertainment
at the Barrow Street Theatre, 27 Barrow St., NYC.
March 24-May 26. Mon., 8 p.m.
(212) 239-6200 or (800) 432-7250 or www.telecharge.com.