It’s a classic piece of advice for writers: show, don’t tell. For the people at Ogunquit Playhouse putting on the current production of “An American in Paris,” the recommendation might have been: dance, don’t tell.
Clyde Alves and Julie Eicher play the lead roles in this production. They’re professionals who make their living in musical theatre so dancing isn’t unusual for them—but rarely, if ever, do they dance as much as in this show. The story of an American veteran in Paris after World War II unfolds, to an exceptional degree, not through dialogue but through movement.
At one point Julie does a ballet that lasts twelve minutes with no break. Challenging? Sure. But it’s one reason, she says, why this is a dream role. “I love being busy in a show. I don’t like doing a show where I go on stage for a few minutes and then go back in the wings and scroll on my phone.”