Review and interview by Gene Jones, IJA President.

 

Attempting to review a Broadway show like Sugar Babies is a task comparable to reviewing America . It has many characteristics that are in contradiction, yet they all make sense within the context of the show. Sugar Babies is an epic of a burlesque show that features some of the best and some of the worst that burlesque has to offer.

 

The show is authentic in its production and actually uses many well-worn burlesque routines. Some of the jokes and gags work, and some don't, but the show continues with unstoppable gusto no matter what happens.

 

Mickey Rooney seems to be having the time of his life, and Ann Miller proves that she can still belt out a song with the best of them. Although the sketches are old and often corny, the veteran vaudeville players Maxie Furman and Sammy Smith have a delivery and flavor that salvages even the shakiest material. Unfortunately, the repeated use of tiresome sexual innuendo does become a bit distracting.

 

Sugar Babies steamrolls along for 2 1/2 hours. For all its fallacies and corniness, it is a show with an underlying enthusiasm for variety entertainment that is rare in modem theatre. Sugar Babies is definitely a throwback to the days of vaudeville, an era that was declared dead, but which no one could ever bury. Those who loved vaudeville will relish the nostalgia and those who never knew it should consider taking a look at a bona fide slice of entertainment history.

 

Of course, the main attraction of Sugar Babies for jugglers is the presence of Michael Davis, who is billed by his full name, Michael Allen Davis and occupies the headline position in the second act.

 

From the minute he walks on stage, Davis 's unflappable delivery has the audience in his hip pocket.   Michael Davis is a polished entertainer who uses everything to his advantage, including a heckler who showed up the night of this review. Hecklers are very unusual at Broadway shows, but Mr. Davis appeared totally casual in wringing a few laughs out of the situation.

 

Davis's act consists of very few jokes and not very much juggling. The mainstay of his performance is his timing and delivery, which is so slow and well constructed, that the audience is constantly hanging on every word. During the course of his 15 minute routine, Mr. Davis juggles one ball, three balls, five balls, ping pong balls with his mouth, water (very briefly), hatchets, and his famous finale of the 'razor sharp' bowling ball, apple and egg.

 

For those of you who have not seen this act, the climax is when Mr. Davis smacks the raw egg into his mouth after eating a good deal of the apple. he fortunately avoids eating the bowling ball. One must conclude that Mr. Davis has a very high dry cleaning bill when watching the raw egg slowly descend onto his three piece suit.

 

Talking backstage with Michael Davis, one finds his personality and timing very similar to the way he conducts his act. He is a bit unnerving, very intelligent, and most notably a very humorous yet serious person. He is seemingly unimpressed with his newly acquired stardom and role as the world's most recognizable juggler, though he does admit it provides him access to many avenues that were previously unreachable.

 

A poster of Buster Keaton hangs meaningfully on his dressing room wall. As soon as we started talking, he handed me a piece of his personal stationery which bears his initials: MAD. Michael Davis may seem a bit mad on stage, but he is a man who truly knows what he is doing.

 

An actor before being a juggler, young Michael Davis was also a writer who read poetry on stage in high school. Many times people laughed during his readings. Even though that wasn't his plan, that laughter was the inspiration for a career in

comedy.

 

He learned to juggle ten years ago in the streets of San Francisco : "Juggling was just something that I used to do when I wanted to show off." Actually, Michael Davis began his performing career as a clown, not a juggler. After training at Ringling Brothers Clown College , he worked a year with the Red unit of the Barnum & Bailey Circus as a partner with IJA member Greg Dean.

 

The two became good friends while doing a knockabout acrobatic act. Later they left the circus and worked as a juggling team in the Bay area.

 

"The toughest debut ever was my first show in the streets. At that time, I was the straight juggler and Greg got all the laughs. I knew I didn't want to just be a straight juggler, but that experience was very helpful in developing my juggling skills."

 

The first signs of future success sprouted when Davis began to eat a tomato during his act at a Renaissance Faire. "I became known as 'the guy who ate the tomato.' It was a messy act, but it got tremendous laughs."

 

In 1977 Michael Davis painted a bowling ball white, bought a few unusual props and started his own act. The audiences loved it: "All of a sudden I was making money and having a great time. When I first started, I had no idea what I was doing. I just juggled and built my patter around the action."

Davis soon became a fixture at the Cannery in San Francisco . He admits to being aggressive and performing every time there was a free spot: "I practically lived down there. One day I did ten half-hour shows."

 

When quizzed on how he feels about his act, Michael Davis picked the ping pong ball routine as his favorite, followed closely by his three ball act, which had to be shortened to fit into his time slot in Sugar Babies. Davis feels that each show is different but always within a definite framework; "A well constructed act should manipulate the audience to react in a certain way. Fortunately, my act was developed around an audience."

 

Although juggling no longer dominates Mr. Davis's creative focus, he had some definite advice for developing jugglers. He adamantly stated, "Don't steal other people's material. Not that it won't make you successful, but the creative process is the important thing. You should learn from other people, but never copy them. Just keep working and be sensitive to the audience.