Just imagine pitching the following idea to a Broadway producer: We’re going to take an early Alfred Hitchcock espionage film from 1935 and turn it into a stage comedy. The cast will consist of just four people and three of them will have to play over 100 roles. Along the way we’re going to reference every Hitchcock movie made.

Well, against all logic, it works beautifully. We saw The 39 Steps on Broadway.

This was playing in London when I was there a year ago and I didn’t get a chance to see it then but, miraculously, the same cast that was in the London show is intact here in New York. Generally, they don’t bother to import a show unless they’re sure it’s going to succeed, so I had an inclination that it was going to be worthwhile. The tsunami of good reviews helped.

It’s a funny show but also a bit of an acting tour de force. Change a hat, change a character. I see a lot of small, downtown black box theater and I can assure you that not every actor can pull this sort of thing off. Some of them have a hard enough time getting set inside ONE character!

This is probably my last show of the year. When I review the list of plays I’ve seen in 2008, it looks like it was a pretty satisfying year for theater. 28 shows. Not bad. The counter resets to 0. When I get tired of the long, late train ride home to New Jersey I’ll stop going but until then I’m going to take advantage of living out here.

Mrs. Wife came into the city last night and we saw the Roundabout Theater Company revival of Pal Joey that’s in previews. I was lucky enough to see the first two Roundabout productions of the season—A Man for All Seasons and Streamers—and they were both extraordinary, so I had high hopes for Pal Joey. This is a killer ad, isn’t it?

Pal Joey is a musical based on the John O’Hara novel with songs by Rogers and Hart. This famous still of Frank Sinatra…

…is from the film adaptation of Pal Joey. With a pedigree like that, how can you go wrong?

Well, you start by having a lead with a weak singing voice. It’s a musical about a womanizing night club singer. You need someone who has a smooth voice and a sick amount of charisma. This guy ain’t no Sinatra, that’s for damn sure. Two stage veterans were in the cast; Stockard Channing, who gave a serviceable performance, and Martha Plimpton, who was fantastic. Did you know that Martha Plimpton has a beautiful singing voice? I didn’t.

The story takes place in 1930s Chicago and the dance numbers looked like routines that were rejected from Bob Fosse’s Chicago, which was a way better show. The songs were maudlin and the theater was too hot. The show is in previews and you never know, they could turn it around by opening night. I feel bad for Mrs. Wife. She gets into the city for this sort of thing so infrequently. I wish it had been a killer show for her sake. I wanted everything to be perfect for her but it wasn’t.

I saw a great play last night with CB. He liked it too, which counts for plenty because his standards are a lot tougher than mine. It was a drama with lots of yucks about baseball during the steroid era called Back Back Back.

The two principal actors were stand-ins for José Canseco and Mark McGwire. CB isn’t a baseball fan and initially I was concerned that he wouldn’t find the story very compelling, but there was nothing worry about. The acting is so good that you are pulled in whether you’re a baseball fan or not. The play ends with the Canseco/McGwire doppelgängers getting ready for their Congressional hearings and you really do feel the weight of what they did to baseball and each other. You never hear the word “steroid” spoken. Great plays like this make up for dogs I occasionally sit through.

The play was presented by the Manhattan Theater Club and I’m very happy that this is such a strong show. (Although, it’s still in previews. For all I know, the critics could trash it when it opens, but I can’t imagine that happening.) They’ve opened two other plays this season that were both panned by the critics, so they need a hit. Producing plays must be nerve wracking. All those weeks (months?) of rehearsal and preparation and all it takes it a handful of bad reviews on opening night and that’s it. You’re through. Pow. Right in the kisser.

The play was in midtown and before it started I sat outside for a while across the street from Radio City Music Hall on the ledge of a fountain. It was so freakishly balmy out that I could sit comfortably without a jacket on.

I watched the tourists and traffic flow up 6th Avenue. Radio City is an art deco masterpiece and it’s already all lit up for Christmas. A crowd was pouring in for the evening performance of the annual Christmas Spectacular.

The out-of-towners were having their picture taken with Radio City as a backdrop and I obliged three different families who handed me a camera and asked me to take a photo for them. Everyone was so happy and excited to be in New York that I got all stupid and gooey inside. What a punk.

Last night I saw the revival of David Rabe’s Streamers at the venerable Roundabout Theater.

Unlike last week’s fiasco, this show was compelling and perfectly cast. I don’t recall ever seeing a bum show at the Roundabout Theater Company. Those guys have the magic touch.

The story takes place in an Army barracks in 1965 Virginia. The Streamers of the title is what you see when you jump out of an airplane and your parachute fails to properly deploy. I’m sure that’s a metaphor for something integral to the plot but that stuff always gets by me. Four soldiers await orders to Vietnam but the play has very little to do with war. It’s a clash of culture, education and race. There is unrequited love, blood and death. Really forceful stuff. I liked it.

Streamers originally opened in 1976 at Lincoln Center and was directed by Mike Nichols. In 1983, it was made into a movie directed by Robert Altman and starring Matthew Modine. David Rabe wrote the screenplay as well. I haven’t seen the film. Do you know if it’s any good?