‘Legs’ Escapes From Gangland Ambush

“Legs Diamond” got murdered, but it’s still standing.

The new Peter Allen musical has been previewing for two months at Broadway’s Mark Hellinger Theater--at $50 a top seat. The word was that the show had problems.

Monday the critics paid it a little visit. Now it’s got real problems.

Clive Barnes of the New York Post said that “Legs” wasn’t as bad as rumored, but that it wasn’t very good, either, starting with Allen’s songs. “Most of the music appears to take unmemorability to the point of clinical amnesia.”

Allen also plays Legs Diamond. One of his nicer reviews came from Howard Kissel of the Daily News.

“His talent,” Kissel wrote, “is supperclub size--likeable, soft, intimate. As a gangster, even a singing gangster, he is hopeless.”

The show’s book (by Charles Suppon and Harvey Fierstein) also struck the reviewers as thin. Michael Kuchwara of the Associated Press called it “the skimpiest story this side of ‘Starlight Express.’ ”

Kuchwara did say that Julie Wilson was “terrific” as Legs’ shady-lady pal, an adjective also employed by UPI’s Frederick Winship regarding David Mitchell’s sets and Willa Kim’s glitzy costumes.

Beneath the camouflage, however, “Legs” was adjudged lifeless. Frank Rich of the New York Times didn’t even think it made the grade as a fiasco. He suggested that readers bring along something to do during the show--perhaps a crossword puzzle.

Gaghhhh. But “Legs” has a $10-million advance sale and has decided to hang in there. Which it seems to be doing. Press agent Shirley Herz reports that it has been playing to standing-room-only houses all week long.

She also reports a significant line change. Originally, the second act opened with Legs emerging from a coffin and saying “Only the critics can kill me.” Now he says “Not even the critics can kill me” and the house goes wild.

Actually, critics don’t kill shows. Producers do. It’s good that these producers are showing some faith in their product. Maybe they’ll keep “Legs” running until it has upgraded itself into a decent show, as happened 30 years ago with “Wish You Were Here.”

Anyway, it’s not on a slab yet.

The December issue of American Theatre magazine contains an attack on a resident-theater sacred cow: the post-play audience discussion.

Director Michael Bloom says that he is tired of “explaining” his work to the audience--and even more tired of having them explain it to him.

Discussions of plays-in-progress, Bloom says, are especially “noxious.” What a playwright needs at this point is the reaction of the audience as a group--not point-by-point comments from unqualified individuals.

IN QUOTES. Lighting designer Arden Fingerhut in the November issue of Theatre Crafts magazine: “Theater is not a collaborative art. By the time you’ve gained enough respect so that someone will pay attention to any idea you have, you’re burned out.”