Butler's Cinema Scene

P.T. Barnum (Hugh Jackman) and his band of oddities

“THE GREATEST SHOWMAN” My rating: B-

105 minutes | MPAA rating: PG

The most memorable utterance attributed to P.T. Barnum — “There’s a sucker born every minute”  — appears nowhere in the original film musical “The Great Showman.”

This is understandable. The quote is thick with contempt/condescension for the everyday idiot.  Michael Gracey’s film, on the other hand, is all about openness and a childlike sense of wonder.

Ostensibly a biography of the 19th-century con man and entertainment entrepreneur, “The Greatest Showman” is a passion project from Aussie actor Hugh Jackman, who has long wanted to tackle the role. (Aside from subject matter, the film is in no way related to the fine 1980 Broadway musical “Barnum.”)

The real Barnum was a wart of a fellow and a self-proclaimed “humbugger,'” certainly not the dashing charmer we get in this production. But then “The Greatest Showman” has been conceived and executed not as history or actual biography but as a colorful commentary on dreaming big and embracing diversity.

The characters are paper thin and the historic details iffy (there appear to be electric lights in a house in the 1850s, the women’s costumes are all over the place).

But it is undeniably entertaining, especially in several of the musical numbers and in a garish presentational approach that reminds of Baz Luhrmann’s work on “Moulin Rouge,” with maybe a touch of Bob Fosse-inspired choreography thrown in for good measure.

Zendaya

We follow the rise of Jackman’s Barnum from struggling shipping company clerk to national prominence. He woos and wins a wealthy young woman (Michelle Williams), in the process alienating her family, who find his work very low class.

He buys a run-down museum in NYC and goes on a world-wide hunt to stock it with human and animal oddities. Before long Barnum can claim among his attractions the world’s smallest man, Tom Thumb, a bearded lady (Keala Settle), Siamese twins, the Dog Boy, the Tattooed Man and  a fellow with three legs.

Far from presenting Barnum as an exploiter of these unfortunates, the film depicts him as a father figure who creates an outcast clan whose members band together for mutual support in defiance of a cruel world.

Zac Efron, Hugh Jackman

In a similar vein the film embraces the forbidden love between an African American aerialist (pop singer and Disney star Zendaya) and Barnum’s second-in-command, the high-society refugee Phillip Carlyle (Zac Efron).

Michelle Williams

But it all nearly crashes and burns when Barnum tries to polish his image by presenting a national tour of “the Swedish nightingale,” Jenny Lind (Rebecca Ferguson). When rumors filter back home that he and his star are canoodling, the Missus take umbrage.

The songs penned by John Debney, Benj Hasek, Justin Paul and Joseph Trapansese are adequate if somewhat generic.  There are a couple of standout numbers, though.

In one smartly choreographed number Barnum courts the wealthy Carlyle in a posh barroom — it turns into a three-part dance routine featuring the two stars and the saloonkeeper behind the bar who does a nifty routine employing bottle, shot glasses and beer mugs.

And Efron and Zendaya have a physically impossible but hugely effective duet involving a trapeze and all sorts of graceful aerial activities.

In fact, it is in these circus-inspired moments of pageantry and brilliant color that “The Greatest Showman” finds its firmest footing. What is a musical, after all, but a carefully conceived and executed  con job?

Barnum would surely have approved.

| Robert W. Butler