Baseball, song mix for musical in Eisenhower

All of a sudden, it's 1955 again, and the Washington Senators are dead last in the race for the pennant.

The Yankees have had a stranglehold on the rest of the competition, and only a deal with the Devil will kick those Damn Yankees out of first place and vindicate the Senators.

Well, at least that will be the scene in Eisenhower Auditorium tonight and tomorrow when a touring revival of the hit 1955 musical Damn Yankees brings the baseball diamond to the stage.

The touring show is representative of another era in history, said Amy Dupain Vashaw, educational director for the Center for the Performing Arts.

"It's just a funny, warm, piece of genuine American theater," Vashaw said.

The show offers a different kind of experience than the more flashy New York musical productions, Vashaw said.

"It is old-fashioned, so it's free of the modern trappings of a Broadway show," she said. "It would be ridiculous to try to bring in the baseball equivalent of the crashing helicopter (from Miss Saigon.)"

- Amy Dupain Vashaw, educational director for the Center for the Performing Arts

"I know there were a few popular songs, ones that were written for the show and then became radio hits," MacLaughlin said. "That doesn't happen anymore."

Another indicator of the show's relative age is the timeliness of its script, MacLaughlin said.

"I was surprised to see it revived when it came to Broadway again a few years ago," he said. "Some of the material is very dated. Many of the jokes applied then and not now, to a certain extent."

That effectiveness was probably offset by another important factor in a successful revival, MacLaughlin said -- the star performer.

"Jerry Lewis was in it a few years ago, so I would assume some of the humor revolved around Lewis's comedy," MacLaughlin said, "rather than the dated jokes."

Though Lewis won't be coming to campus, the show should still give audiences a professional, New York feel, Vashaw said.

"The quality of the productions is usually excellent; of course, the tours are put together by a producing company in New York," she said. "I don't think you can really tell the difference between the Broadway show and the national tour."

Damn Yankees is playing at 8 p.m. tonight and tomorrow night in Eisenhower Auditorium. Tickets are $32.50, $27.50, and $23.50 for the general public, and $27.50, $23.50, and $20.50 for students and children. There will be an artistic viewpoints discussion at 7 p.m. in the Eisenhower Auditorium Conference Room.