Sarasota’s Asolo Rep starts season with ‘Guys and Dolls’

Among casual theater-goers, Frank Loesser doesn’t have the name recognition of some of the other greats of his era, such as teams Rodgers and Hammerstein and Lerner and Loewe.

But if you look at the number of great songs he wrote that have entered into our collective cultural subconscious, no one is greater than Loesser. There’s “Luck Be a Lady Tonight,” “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” “Spring Will Be a Little Late This Year,” “What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve?” and so many others.

“Any contemporary songwriter,” Josh Rhodes said, “would kill for any two of those songs.”

Rhodes is directing and choreographing what may be Loesser’s most well-known musical, “Guys and Dolls,” for Asolo Repertory Theatre. The new production opens Friday in the Mertz Theatre at the FSU Center for the Performing Arts in Sarasota.

“Guys and Dolls” premiered in 1950 and was an immediate critical and popular success. It ran for 1,200 performances — an exceptional run for a musical at that time — and it has had at least 10 revivals in New York and London since then. In 1955, it became a hit movie starring Marlon Brando, Frank Sinatra and Jean Simmons. The film has some significant differences from the stage musical, with three songs added and five omitted.

The plot and the characters are from short stories by Damon Runyon. Runyon wrote about gamblers and hustlers in New York City, who go by such colorful monikers as Nicely-Nicely Johnson, Benny Southstreet and Nathan Detroit.

The lore of “Guys and Dolls” holds that Jo Swerling wrote the original book, but for one reason another, it didn’t work. Abe Burrows wrote a new book, retro-fitting the story to Loesser’s songs. Swerkling and Burrows are credited as co-writers of the book.

The show was chosen to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, but Burrows was in trouble with the House Un-American Activities Committee, so the Pulitzer in Drama was not awarded that year. It did win the Tony Award for Best Musical, and it won the Tony for Best Revival in 1992.

The characters are colorful, Rhodes said, and even mildly criminal. But audiences through the decades have admired them and related to them.

“I think it’s wonderful to visit this alternate reality that you recognize,” Rhodes said. “It’s a little bolder, and a little more colorful than real life. These are guys who aren’t ready for the white picket fence and the 9-to-5 job. They’ve figured out how to live life on their own terms. They may pick a pocket when they have too, but they’re people you can like.”

The main thread of the story has to do with gambler Sky Masterson, who bets Nathan Detroit that he can take prim Salvation Amy Sgt. Sarah Brown for a dinner date in Havana. Sky and Sarah are surprised when they find themselves falling in love. Meanwhile, fellow gambler Nathan Detroit is backed into marrying Adelaide, his fiancee of 14 years.

“Everybody in this show doesn’t want to change, but they all want to be with the one they love,” Rhodes said. “In the end, they all change. I’m still amazed at the craft of the writing.”

Most people know the term “Runyonesque” or know what a “Damon Runyon character” is, but they know Runyon only through “Guys and Dolls,” or through film versions of Runyon’s “Little Miss Marker.” Not too many people read Damon Runyon’s stories these days, and Rhodes says that’s a shame.

“Do yourself a favor and read a couple of them,” he said. “They’re perfectly, perfectly written.”

Details: Nov. 18-Jan. 1, Mertz Theatre at the FSU Center for the Performing Arts, 5555 N. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota. 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, 1:30 and 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Sunday. $17-$82. 941-351-8000, asolorep.org.

This story was originally published November 16, 2016 at 5:46 PM with the headline "Sarasota’s Asolo Rep starts season with ‘Guys and Dolls’."