D.O.A.

By * T.E.K.

In any given season, a surprising number of shows are dead on arrival. Often, the cause of death is a kind of premature old age. We live in a society in which fads and fashions change with bewildering rapidity, and the theater is no exception. In the dramatic novelty line, he who gets there firstest with the mostest leaves very little for the sequel trade.

Three shows in the past three weeks are instructive examples. Stag Movie is a flea-brained bedroom farce played in the nude. It is not without its funny moments, but the yawns are more frequent simply because Oh! Calcutta! preempted the field, and was and is the best of the barest. A rock musical, Soon, a kind of hairless Hair, lasted exactly three performances. What was wrong with it? Soon was Late.

Ari, a pitiable musical play adapted by Leon Uris from his bestselling novel Exodus, has been dated both by history and the glut of Jewish musicals trying to emulate the success of Fiddler on the Roof. However morally admirable, it is difficult, 22 years after the event, to work up a passionate present concern over the ordeal of founding Israel. This season, Broadway has seemed like a secular synagogue. Prior to Ari were The Rothschilds (pleasant) and Two by Two (puerile), plus the Yiddish shows Light, Lively and Yiddish and The President's Daughter. To all concerned, shalom and enough already.

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