Sweet Charity (review)

Spoilers ahoy! 

Not often performed anymore, Sweet Charity was maybe the first musical I recall listening to via eight-track (yep I am that old).  Watching the current production at the Jaxx Theatre on Santa Monica Blvd. felt...bittersweet.  Then joyous.  And I'll even say that by the end I felt glorious. 

Essentially the show, based on an Italian film, follows our title character Charity (Kasey Henz) in New York City, a charming and deeply naive--or maybe just eternally hopeful--dance hall hostess who keeps finding herself screwed over by life.  One of the first things we see happen is a boyfriend who mugs her, then tosses into a lake, with passers-by ultimately unsure about what to do.  Charity cannot swim, but finds ultimate rescue.  Barely.  Honestly any bare description makes her seem like a really severe door mat, yet--she isn't.  She is kind.  She remains hopeful.  She takes her life seriously, which includes the fact she tries to help others.  When she accidentally meets a big movie star (Brian Whisenant) who finds her utterly charming beyond words, Charity helps him re-unite with another woman she recognizes has this man's heart (Jill Marie Burke).  Later, stuck in an elevator with a handsome young man who promptly has a hilariously over-the-top panic attack when the elevator gets stuck, Charity successfully talks him down.  This is Oscar (Tom Sys), who falls in love with Charity within a cloud of total misunderstanding about who she is and what she does.

PHOTOGRAPHY BY Ren Shelburne

Now, each and every person in the cast does a very fine job, not only in terms of acting, singing, and dancing but the more subtle trick of maintaining the world of the show, a subtler and more vital skill than many might presume.  I really want to emphasize that.  In a marvelous ensemble, Sys is a standout, because in many ways he has the most difficult role.  The motion picture, which began Bob Fosse's career as a film director, frankly got the wrong note with this character, so he stuck out like a sore thumb, not at all fitting into the rest of the story.  Not in this production!  He was hilarious, human, different from absolutely everyone else yet fit into a world where characters burst into these songs and dances!

Thankfully I pretty much forgot about the movie while watching this version of Sweet Charity.  Not that the movie was at all bad!  Rather this was so totally itself!  Even when trying to capture the Fosse general style of choreography, it remained anything but a copy.  Performers like Amor Christiansen as Daddy, Aryiel Hartman as Madame Herman, and especially Ai Yamato and Natalie Reff as Charity's best pals at the dance hall, they made these roles their own and helped knock it out of the park.  Numbers like "Hey Big Spender!" "Rhymth of Life" "If They Could See Me Now" and "I Love To Cry at Weddings" all united in making a splendid show, full of passion and joy and fear and cynicism and pretty much an entire rainbow of human experience!

Which, it seems to be, is the whole point of the show.  So kudos not only to cast members Ellis Meng, Andrew Sear, J.D. Morabito, Charlotte Nevins, KiSea Katikka, Anna Gagliardo, Talor Bailey, Juliana DeSilva, Sofia Gutierrez and Genvieve Gray but also director/choreographer Jeremy Lucas and Music Director James Lent.  Frankly, I am now very eager to see each and every new show by this theatre group, so impressive was this show.

I will note that in over two hours of energy, showmanship, humor as well as genuine human feeling, the last thirty seconds of this script IMHO do not quite land.  And for all practical purposes that is the only criticism I have of the entire show.  Which is there, but I want to emphasize that is thirty seconds.  More important is the journey, not the destination.  Or at least so it seems to me.

Last time I had a chance to see a show by the Jaxx Theatre, my schedule did not allow it.  I am kicking myself for that now.  Hard! 

As of this writing, Sweet Charity has performances March 28 and 29, 2026 at The Jaxx Theatre is located at 5432 Santa Monica Blvd. in East Hollywood, 90029. Parking is available at 1110 N. Western Ave.