What I found most surprising about this modest, appealing two-person musical, whose title more or less sums up what happens, was the reaction to it on the night I attended – the ecstatic cheers at the start; the mobbed stage door afterwards.
The show’s social media marketing campaign won over a couple waiting at the stage door, they told me, but they also just liked the show.
I liked it as well, but I might be doing the musical a disservice by mentioning the audience enthusiasm, because it could set up misleading expectations. Opening tonight at Broadway’s Longacre Theater, “Two Strangers (Carrying A Cake Across New York)” is a low-key, tuneful, predictable if not entirely formulaic production that relies on the talent and charm of its two youthful performers, neither of whom are well-known: Sam Tutty, a British actor, is making a noteworthy Broadway debut; Christiani Pitts had a starring role previously on Broadway but was upstaged by a puppet (I nevertheless thought her “splendid”)
Tutty portrays Dougal Todd, an adorably naïve, blindly optimistic Brit who works in a movie theater and lives with his mother. He is visiting New York for the first time, having been invited to the wedding of his American father. Christiani Pitts is Robin Rainey, a seen-it-all native New Yorker, who works as a waitress at an East Village café. She is the younger sister of the bride, who asked Robin to pick up Dougal at the airport. She also asks her to pick up the four-layer wedding cake from a bakery in Flatbush.
Robin just wants to run the errands and go home. Dougal wants to go sight-seeing with her. He loves New York City, he tells her with a sigh: “The Empire State, The White House, The Golden Gate Bridge…”
“The Golden Gate is,,,” she tries to correct him, the first in a funny thread throughout the show of his misconceptions about the city. He launches eagerly into the first of the 16 songs, “New York,” an exuberant if ignorant paean:
It’s the capital city
of the USA
Robin: It’s not.
the city I swore I would see for myself one day
Robin:: But, you’ve actually been to New York before?
Dougal: Yes. [pause] Uh, no. But I have seen Home Alone 2 quite a few times, so…
Eventually we learn that Dougal has never met his father, who left before Dougal was born, and that Robin’s sister is not inviting her to the wedding; later, we learn the reason why.
She is pensive in the song “This is The Place,” when they go to Flatbush, which is where, we learn, she grew up, with a grandmother she now doesn’t talk to.
The revelations might be meant to add heft to the story, but “Two Strangers” remains light, which is not a bad thing (Some of the secrets hardly register.) Dougal’s relentless cheerfulness wears Robin down and wins her over — and us too. At the end of Act I, she decides for a night on the town with Dougal, using her future brother-in-law’s credit card,
It’s in part an act of defiance for her, but a happy adventure for him, as we learn in a jazzy musical number with the punning title “American Express”
On stage, Tutty and Pitts dance with great joy, as if they’re having fun – indeed, with an exaggerated, almost self-mocking panache that feels at times as if they are playing at being adults. I’m not sure this is what director and choreographer Tim Jackson intends, but if so, it would fit their characters. (Their age and station in life help explain the appeal of the show among theatergoers who appeared to be mostly in their twenties.)
Dougal and Robin’s cavorting and possible (albeit unseen) canoodling lead at the top of Act II to “The Hangover Duet,” delivered at the speed of sound. Only “Hamilton” has anything faster.
That number is supposed to take place at the Plaza Hotel. But, like all the other scenes in the show, scenic designer Soutra Gilmour (who is also the costume designer) has furnished the stage with grey suitcases of varying sizes. This particular set-up is cleverer than most; one of the suitcases has become a luxurious sunken bed; another opens to reveal a hotel refrigerator. I’ll confess that I didn’t find it especially thrilling to spend two hours looking at luggage.
But then I thought: It’s symbolic of the unsettled lives of these two young characters. And it shows a bit of resourcefulness: Sometimes the piles of luggage seem to suggest a Manhattan avenue lined with skyscrapers, sometimes a hill in Central Park in a snowy Central Park. And I suppose one might consider the whole production — those trunks, only two actors, the five-piece band visible on stage — to be so different in many ways (not including top ticket price) from the more usual big-budget would-be blockbusters on Broadway that it’s almost refreshing.
Two Strangers (Carry A Cake Across New York)
Longacre Theater
Running time: About two and a half hours including one 15-minute intermission
Tickets: $59 – $399
by Jim Barne and Kit Buchan
Directed and choreographed by Tim Jackson
Scenic and costume design by Soutra Gilmour; Lighting Design by Jack Knowles; Sound Design by Tony Gayle
Cast: Christiani Pitts as Robin, Sam Tutty as Dougal
Photographs by Matthew Murphy
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