YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollectionsMusicals  'Elmer Gantry,' Born
Again : Director Des McAnuff breathes new life into producer
Joseph Cates' second try at a musical version--but don't mention
the 'B' word  October 20, 1991|RICHARD STAYTON | Richard Stayton
is a playwright and free-lance journalist  LA JOLLA —
Superstition insists that none dare speak its name.  "It" is the
Great White Way, Broadway, the promised land, which is beckoning
"Elmer Gantry," a musical adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel
that has its West Coast premiere tonight at La Jolla Playhouse.
Like actors in "Macbeth" who fearfully call Shakespeare's
accident-cursed tragedy "the Scottish play," the production team
for "Elmer Gantry" believes the mere mention of the "B" word
might sabotage this very promising, very ambitious and very
American venture.  Unlike the spectacle-oriented British
musicals "Miss Saigon" and "Phantom of the Opera," no helicopter
or chandelier hovers over the Playhouse production of "Elmer
Gantry."  Director Des McAnuf