Rating: PG13
Genre:
Theater
Theatrical Release: 04/17/2009(USA
Release Date: 10/13/2009
SubTitles: English/French
Dubbed: English
Sound: DD5.1
Run Time: 93 min
Distributor/Studio: Sony Pictures
The central premise of the
Kirkwood-
Dante-
Kleban-
Hamlisch Broadway
musical A Chorus Line is by now overly familiar, examining as it does the 17 actors auditioning for spots in a chorus line on the Great White Way. Recalling
Donn Pennebaker's
Moon Over Broadway and other similar efforts, documentarians
Adam Del Deo and
James D. Stern's film
Every Little Step travels behind the scenes of the auditions for 2006 revival of
A Chorus Line to investigate the goings-on and the interplay among the hopefuls. The film thus establishes a neat corollary between the events of the play itself and the offstage experiences of the aspiring tryouts. On top of this,
Stern and
Del Deo work in a layer that pertains to the original genesis of the show, and its evolution from an idea by
Michael Bennett, who recorded an ensemble of dancers speaking confessionally and used that as the basis for everything else. Here, the filmmakers play those original tapes back, on-camera, thus resurrecting old ghosts; score composer
Marvin Hamlisch also turns up and revokes the past, courtesy of a revealing and racy little nugget about the history of the tune
"Dance: Ten; Looks: Three." Above all else, the film works in extensive footage of the auditions themselves, on songs such as
"At the Ballet" and
"I Can Do That" -- thus interweaving an aura of suspense throughout the narrative over who will eventually wind up in the production itself. The title of the
documentary, of course, is a reference to the lyric of the seminal tune
"One" ("One singular sensation,
every little step she takes").
~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
;)
