By Marilyn Lester***Who says you can’t go home again? Karen Mason just did—triumphant over three August dates at Don’t Tell Mama in this year’s edition of SPF…The Summer Continues. Like many a cabaret and Broadway star of today, Mama’s was where 
their careers launched. Check out the venue’s poster gallery to see just how many early legends played there. Back at the Brick Room, Mason packed in friends and fans for a truly remarkable closing night. Magic was in the air, and while some might cite a perfect storm of musicians, music and star, there’s also the suspicion that Mason’s sparkly white sneakers—like Dorothy’s red slippers and Frosty’s top hat—were decidedly enchanted.
The show took off like a rocket, with an upbeat Mason singing the 1958 rock ‘n roll hit, “Summertime, Summertime” (Tom Jameson), with its fugal introduction, “It’s Summertime, Summertime, Sum, Sum, Summertime.” The cherry on the sundae came in the form of two backup singers: bassist Tom Hubbard and music director-pianist-arranger Christopher Denny. Blasting right into a mash-up of two mid-1960s Tony Hatch tunes, “Downtown” and “I Know a Place,” followed by some patter, another tune on the nostalgia tour of carefree summers gone by, was a balladic interpretation of 1962’s “Up on the Roof” (Gerry Goffin and Carole King)—
all suggestive of how and where kids of the day could and did spend their time off from school.
That narrative break revealed Mason at her relaxed and comedic best. We might know that the SPF label on sunscreen stands for Sun Protection Factor, but in Mason’s universe it means Songs-Patter-Fun—a completely accurate description of the show as she engaged her audience with wit, funny bits and spontaneous back-and-forth with friends and colleagues. When “You’ve Got a Friend” (Carole King) appeared during the set, it was a tune this close-knit cabaret community could attune to. And speaking of friends, two original tunes by friends enlivened the evening via the uptempo, fun “South of the Coconut Line” by Mason’s husband-composer Paul Rolnick and lyricist Paul Guzzone; and her director (and music co-arranger) Barry Kleinbort’s “The Kindest Man.”
An outlier to the theme, “Taking a Chance on Love” (Vernon Duke, John Latouche, Ted Fetter) from the 1940 musical, Cabin in the Sky, was dynamically arranged, from a bass intro to a rising arc of pianism and vocal interpretation. Another creative arrangement came with essentially piano-only accompaniment to “Faraway Places” (Joan Whitney, Alex Kramer), slowed down as a story song, bookended with several bars of 
haunting arco bass. There was a trip to Rome in “When in Rome” (Cy Coleman, Carolyn Leigh), jauntily arranged by Mason’s original music director, Brian Lasser (who died at age 40 in 1992) and “Three Coins in the Fountain” (Jule Styne, Sammy Cahn) from the 1954 romance film of the same name.
But as light-hearted as Mason’s summer fun musical tour was, there was a splash of drama to showcase the singer’s theatrical and storytelling skills: a superbly-conceived medley of “Help/Being Alive” (John Lennon, Paul McCartney/Stephen Sondheim), which combined two unlikely tunes into an exposition of brilliance. Mason’s performance of it was thrilling—a certified showstopper. Ending on a bright note was a sprightly “Lazy Hazy Crazy Days of Summer” (Hans Carste, with English lyrics by Charles Tobias), followed by a dollop of bright hope in the encore, “Look for the Silver Lining” (Jerome Kern, Buddy DeSylva)—good advice from the 1919 tune, underscoring Mason’s masterful demonstration of the power of music to heal, with or without magic sneakers.
Photos by Maryann Lopinto
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