Was there a rave at the St. James Theatre? Between the loud, thumping opening and the revved-up audience shaking glow sticks, you’d think the venue had booked a Swedish House Mafia gig by mistake.
But no, this was opening night of “Manilow on Broadway,” and the joint was jumping last night. At least for the first five minutes. Then everybody settled into a mellow groove and recuperated for 85 minutes, before going wild again during “Copacabana.”
You’ve got to hand it to Barry Manilow: The man’s 69 and unlike the vast majority of his peers, he still sells lots of records and can fall back on Vegas residencies — he really doesn’t have to be out peddling his wares on a cold winter evening. Yet there he was, in his first Broadway run in 24 years.
And if there were any doubts left about Manilow being a pro, let’s just say that he sounded good enough on opening night, after a bout of bronchitis forced him to cancel several shows last week.
A bigger problem is that his face is frozen in eternal middle age, and he appeared to sing through clenched jaws. Between that and the terrible, echoey sound, it was hard to get any sense of emotion, real or fake.
But then the performance itself was beside the point, as the crowd knew the set list by heart. “All I got is a whole bunch of hit songs,” the star announced genially, “and I’m going to do them.”
“It’s a Miracle”: check. “Could It Be Magic”: check. “Mandy”: check. And so on up to Lola, who “was a showgirl with yellow feathers in her hair and a dress cut down to there.”
Unlike many similar vintage acts, Manilow went easy on the multimedia thingamajigs, with mostly basic projections like a smiley face during “Can’t Smile Without You.”
We did get the mandatory stroll down memory lane — he grew up in Williamsburg — but it didn’t overstay its welcome. That bit also provided the setting for one of the evening’s highlights: a driving version of 1987’s “Brooklyn Blues,” a fascinating hybrid of Billy Joel and Steely Dan.
A couple of other numbers were winning in different ways, making you wish Manilow threw more back catalogue nuggets our way, and less of the schmaltzy stuff.
One highlight was 1984’s “When October Goes,” in which Manilow set words by Johnny Mercer (“Moon River”) to a lovely melody reminiscent of Michel Legrand at his swooniest.
Another was “Every Single Day,” a stirring ballad from “Harmony,” a musical Manilow co-wrote with lyricist Bruce Sussman in ’97.
Ironically, the song made its Broadway debut before the rest of the show, which has only been done out of town. Dare we ask for more?
“Manilow on Broadway” runs through March 2.