Presented by Sara Miller McCune. At The Granada Theatre, Sat., Oct. 23.
This joyous production brought something truly unprecedented to the Granada stage. While we have had touring Broadway performances, ballets, and symphony orchestra concerts in the past, this was all that rolled into one, and more, since it heralded the return of two beloved organizations to their home stage for the first time since the pandemic struck in March 2020.
Kismet, a Broadway musical of the old school, features a love story, memorable melodies, great dancing, and plenty of wisecracks. The fact that it is set in a medieval Muslim community comes second to the various traditional Broadway roles these fine actors were cast to play. As Hajj, the poet, Jonathan Raviv sang and connived his way out of a dozen tight situations with the kind of zany ingenuity associated with Groucho Marx. As his nemesis, the Wazir of Police, Austin Durant delivered a top-flight comic performance, including the broadly amusing second act number “Was I Wazir?”