Out of step with the 'Chorus Line'
Every Little Step
Running time: 96 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13 (harsh profanity)
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I'm a little surprised that I came away from "Every Little Step," the documentary about casting the recent Broadway revival of "A Chorus Line," thinking it falls a little short of being "one singular sensation."
Co-directed by seasoned documentary helmers James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo ("So Goes the Nation," "The Year of the Yao"), "Every Little Step" gets upstaged somewhat by the very process it's attempting to chronicle.
If you've ever been on a movie set, you know how boring that can be: Hours spent getting the light and camera just right before a camera even purrs, then the tedious process of movie making itself.
Auditions for a Broadway musical, especially one where 3,000 hopefuls show up with dance shoes in a bag and the tune "I Hope I Get It" ("God, I hope I get it. I hope I get it.") on their lips, appears to be even worse.
Combine the two and -- I think you get it -- it makes for challenging subject matter.
Actually, it gets even worse. "Every Little Step" regals original "Chorus Line" director Michael Bennett as the Broadway choreographer god he was in the early 1970s.
Bennett gathered some fellow "gypsies" (background musical dancers) for a 12 hour session to spill their guts about what drove them to the chorus lines of Broadway. He recorded that 1974 revealing gab session on audio tape.
While the outcome is not only fascinating, it's full-fledged worldwide sensation; an international phenomenon spanning four decades and 22 countries.
Watching a tape recorder reel go 'round and 'round doesn't exactly bring the audience to the edge of their seats, however.
This is a movie that summons bursting emotions (sad and joyous), yet we don't really get to know enough of the key cast candidates.
The biggest misstep, at least from this aisle seat, is that when the selected few finally get to put on the gold outfits and top hats and take the stage after eight months or so of fighting, scratching to get there, "A Chorus Line" just doesn't pop, or explode as powerfully from the screen as it should.
God, they didn't get it. They didn't get it.
