“Say Goodnight Gracie”

Starring Frank Gorshin

Directed by John Tillinger…

“Say Goodnight Gracie”

Starring Frank Gorshin

Directed by John Tillinger

Byham Theater, Downtown

Through March 28

From the moment “Say Goodnight Gracie” begins, with fog, dramatic lighting and George Burns (Frank Gorshin), circa the time of his death, shuffling on stage, the Byham Theater becomes the vaudeville house it began as. In fact, it’s a stage that Burns himself once graced during those golden years of entertainment.

But what takes place on stage isn’t technically a vaudeville show. It’s a one-man act that’s a very-much-refined version of something you might have seen on those stages. However, this isn’t your typical one-man show — you’re not going to see a Margaret Cho-type performance of imitations and stand-up comedy. Rather, Gorshin, whom people should know as the Riddler from the ’60s CBS “Batman” TV show, transforms himself into the famed Burns for an hour and a half, recounting his life, career and love with Gracie Allen.

With sparse set design — the only things on the stage are two tables, one with a radio and both with telephones, and a bench — Gorshin can rely only on himself to carry the show and the audience. And he does this with inspired gusto, class, skill and ease.

Burns takes us on a trip through his life, beginning with his youth in New York, living in a tenement too small to support his large family and working at various odd jobs. The one that made the greatest impact was a candy-making job. While stirring ingredients in the basement of a candy shop, Burns and his two co-workers would sing to eliminate the boredom of the job. They noticed people watching and listening to them through the basement window. When they were done, those people threw change at them. An entertainer was born.

He left the candy shop for the exciting, hard-knock life of working in vaudeville. Going from one partner to another, one act to another, and so many name changes, it looked like he’d never make it.

Until he met Gracie. With her, he had an act that took him from the smallest stages in New York City to the grandest ones, then to radio, the movies and television. But most importantly, she took his heart. He fell in love with Gracie Allen, in one of the most storied romances in entertainment history, and never looked back.

It’s at the end of his life when we meet Burns, wandering through a limbo he compares to being in Buffalo, N.Y. As he tells his story, auditioning for God for a spot in Heaven so that he can see Gracie again, Burns reenacts songs he sung, dances he danced and routines he performed with Gracie. But Gracie never appears onstage. Instead, it’s the disembodied voice of Didi Conn providing the other half of Burns and Allen.

This isn’t some sort of cheap gimmick. Because Burns is stuck in limbo, he wouldn’t be able to see Gracie — remember, he wants to get into Heaven to meet her — so it makes sense to only hear her voice. God, judging the audition, surely wants to hear Gracie’s punch lines to Burns’ set-ups. And so do we. This piece of the production works wonderfully. Only hearing her voice — from time to time, we also see a still image projected on the wall behind Burns — makes the show all the more affecting.

Also interspersed throughout “Gracie” are clips from old Burns-Allen films and TV shows and Gorshin-Conn reenactments of old Burns-Allen radio shows. This provides a sort-of relief for Gorshin, breathers in his nearly 90-minute-long monologue, and it gives the audience more insight into the story Burns is telling.

But these clips also highlight just how spot-on Gorshin’s performance is. Burn’s traits — the mannerisms, the stutterings, the inflection, the shuffling, the way he says “Gracie” in a drawn out way then dwells on the name for a beat before continuing — are all incorporated into Gorshin’s performance. He absolutely disappears in the Burns persona. Only from time to time does Gorshin come out — when he smiles, the light and his angle onstage occasionally catch him in the right way as to make you say, “Look! The Riddler!” Thankfully, though, those moments are few and far between.

“Say Goodnight Gracie” is a magical show, taking the audience on a trip through a life and love unparalleled in modern-day entertainment. The magic that radiates from the stage as Frank Gorshin transforms into George Burns and the Byham back into the old Gayety vaudeville house is overwhelming. This is a show that is one of the best to come through Pittsburgh in a while, and it will absolutely knock your socks off.