Lea Michele/Rachel Berry

[fakeempress]

 

That is a subjective opinion on my part that I found her a more interesting performer before the Hollywood bug bit her and she got caught up with being Lea Michele, star of Glee instead of actor/singer Lea Michele.

But we don't know if she wouldn't have come up with the same type of album if she had stayed on BW away from Hollywood (provided she could've had the financing), that's an apriori assumption that is unprovable. 

[dizzyizzy01]

I am hardly the only person who felt that Lea's album was not up to what she is capable of as a singer. Read the reviews (http://www.metacritic.com/music/louder/lea-michele). Most were, at best, mixed and all had the same complaints about poor material choice and a real lack of Lea's personality in many of the songs (what makes otherwise inane pop numbers spark). And I don't get where being critical of her artistic choices in song and acting jobs comes across as "condescending" when I've made it clear that I think highly of Lea's talent.

Again, the point isn't that the album was good or not.  I'm a Lea fan, and I thought it was an overall mediocre album with some spots of potential.  It's just offensive to call it artistically lazy.  She may not fit the mold for a pop star or have the right instincts.  She may not have the required skill set of crafting lyrically and sonically great pop music.  That's a fair opinion.  But to write it off as if she's making lazy choices, artistically or otherwise, is belittling the effort that goes into these projects.  That is all I'm saying.

 

If successful is defined as being in the black, it wasn't terrible by any means.

 

That's fair.  Terrible is too strong a word.  It wasn't a big hit, but for an independent project it was ambitious and mildly successful.  It's just not some sort of revolutionary groundbreaking project either.  It was a middling success, probably in the same vein as Lea's first foray into being a recording artist.  They're both trying things they have an interest in that have various degrees of success.  I just find it dumb to say one project is better than the other.  BTW, I like them both, and I hate comparisons that pit actors against each other in an attempt to boost the other so I should just stop with that.

Edited February 12, 2015 by dizzyizzy01

[Higgs]

What I meant by ["too old for her"] is the album wasn't fun. It was dull, joyless, most of it you can't even dance to even though technically it's a "pop" album. Kind of like elevator music with words. It really sounds like something that would be more appropriate for someone like Celine Dion to release.

OK, now we're getting somewhere. This may be the crux of the issue.

"Too-perfect voice" was a phrase Rolling Stone used to damn her album. Lea cannot possibly become a pop megastar under the constraint of the current tastes of the demographic whose purchases determine official popularity, and neither could Streisand or Dion if they were just starting out today.

Lea's forte is as a singing actor. By that I do not mean merely an actor who can sing, nor do I mean anything having to do with Broadway musicals. I mean that she acts through song to unveil a character's inner world in an intimate setting, and there is no more a mass audience for that kind of vocalism in pop than there is in jazz or in classical art songs (e.g., Schubert lieder, whose audience is a tiny fraction of the one for opera). The best suggestion I have to illustrate her (yes, once in a generation) talent is by a very detailed comparison of Lea's and Celine's versions of "It's All Coming Back To Me Now". Through phrasing and vocal coloring, Lea achieves a depth of emotion that Celine can't match. In the very last breathed phrase, Lea is chilling, and while Celine could do it if she wanted, not being an actor, she would never think of it.

None of this is to suggest Lea couldn't put out a hugely successful album, just that it would require she short-change her greatest gift (as she mostly did in the album, except for the iTunes extra "The Bells") and sing a little ugly for those who just want to dance or who equate vocal strain with emotion. Or she could put out "Touch Me" as a single. I have no shame.

Edited February 13, 2015 by Higgs

[camussie]

Each their own because while Lea's version of "it's all coming back to me" was good it didn't pack near the emotional punch of celine's.

As for lea being a once in a generation talent I don't agree with that either. She is talented but there are many others who are as well. Laura Benanti is only 6 years older than Lea so she if of the same generation and I consider her every bit as talented as Lea. Anna Kendrick is another one I consider every bit as talented as Lea.

Edited February 13, 2015 by camussie

[Higgs]

So I went to YT to listen to Laura Benanti. I heard a classically-trained singer who, like Chenoweth, O'Hara, etc., isn't remotely good enough to make it in opera. (Yes, I know about "The Merry Widow" at the Met.) She also doesn't have a clue about how to sing pop. I wouldn't cross the street to see her perform, but I'd fly across the country to see Lea in the right context, as will many if she ever does FG.

Virtually the only vocal music I listen to is classical (opera, oratorios, art songs). It's difficult to explain to people unfamiliar with that stuff, but Lea, whose vocal technique doesn't begin to compare, sings in her genre with the precision and sensibilty of a Callas, Baker, and, currently, Di Donato. There have been thousands of singers with greater vocal instruments (e.g., Streisand, in B'Way/pop), but that's not the same as being a greater singing actor.

[camussie]

I feel very comfortable with my opinion about both Laura Benanti and Anna Kendrick being as talented of singing actresses as Lea considering Laura has 3 Tony nominations with one win while Anna has a Tony nomination. Both, like Lea, have done pop as well. Laura is on Nashville right now where she has done some country pop.

Also, for someone who proclaims to be such an expert on acting singing talent in surprises me you had to look up Laura. She is a very well known Broadway actress.

[tom87]

Laura is being wasted on Nashville. I wish she would find the right tv vehicle. Preferably a comedy becasue she is funny.

 

Anyway I love Lea but I am not going to pretend she is her generation's greatest voice.   I always thought that was such a disservice to her for Ryan to say that. 

 

Bloviating about Lea is not doing her any favors.  

Edited February 13, 2015 by tom87

[camussie]

She is being wasted on Nashville but I watch for her and Connie. I will always be disappointed RM didn't write in a guest role for Laura. She has a fantastic voice and excellent comedic timing. Not to mention she is a must follow on Twitter. So very witty. Anything would have been great especially of we got a duet with either Lea or Matt out of it

Edited February 13, 2015 by camussie

[Sara2009]

She is being wasted on Nashville but I watch for her and Connie. I will always be disappointed RM didn't write in a guest role for Laura. She has a fantastic voice and excellent comedic

timing. Not to mention she is a must follow on

Twitter. So very witty. Anything would have

been great especially of we got a duet with

either Lea or Matt out of it

Matt and Laura actually did a concert together over the summer. Apparently they had a fun dynamic together and also sounded really good.

[SadieT]

I love Laura Benanti. She's extremely talented and very funny too. And she of course has a gorgeous voice. I'm currently suffering through Nashville just to see her as she's been cast as a recurring character this season. She's actually a good example of how hard it is for even the most talented of performers to make it in Hollywood. She's been on a bunch of TV shows playing small guest roles here or there but any show she's been cast in as a lead has been cancelled (Playboy Club, Go On). She jokingly sang about this at the Tonys a couple years ago with Megan Hilty and Andrew Rannells.  

 

There was a lot of discussion in here recently about why doesn't Lea do this or do that, take this project and not that one, make this sort of music and not that, as if it’s that simple or as if she's not trying. But sometimes being talented isn't enough. The right vehicle or opportunities aren't always available and sometimes you have to make smart business choices instead of artistically challenging ones. Which is why being a working actress, signing onto a second TV series, putting out an album, and getting a couple of books published is actually really impressive, especially for someone like Lea, who comes from a Broadway background and maybe doesn't have the conventional Hollywood look or the conventional pop voice (hers is much more pure than most pop stars). Yet she's still succeeding despite all that. 

 

Laura Benanti has been working on Broadway since she was 18 (see, it’s not only Rachel Berry who gets cast in Broadway shows as a teenager), she won a Tony for her role in Gypsy and has a couple of additional nominations, she has the ability to steal a show, even in a small part (see her as Baroness Schrader in NBC's The Sound of Music Live, or her part in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown a few years ago), and she released an album of a live concert she did that has some lovely performances (her mashup cover of Starry Eyed/Video Games is gorgeous and was actually sung by Matt Morrison and his wife at their wedding), she's also really witty and her Twitter is hilarious....all that and she's still not a Hollywood star or a recognizable name outside of the Broadway community. And it's not for lack of trying, she talks about trying to break into the world quite often but never quite getting there because there aren't many parts for someone like her.

 

Basically I really love Laura Benanti and no one should put her down to pump up Lea, who's capable of standing on her own. 

 

So people can call Lea artistically lazy or question her every career choice, but she's carving out a pretty nice career for herself, a career many other talented performers with plenty of artistic integrity would probably love to have a shot at.

 

When it comes to her own music, I didn't love every song on her album but I did like a bunch of them, particularly the ones that weren't so over-produced. But I do think Lea fully believed in those songs and was excited to record and share them, so I don't think her album was her being artistically lazy or whatever, I just think she's still trying to find the right sound and it's not exactly easy to become a pop star.

[caracas1914]

I think it boils down to some think trying to achieve pop success is shallow or lazy or fame mongering. Fair enough if you despise the pop music genre, but thats more personal preference IMO than reflecting Lea's lack of ambition or artistic integrity. Pop music is a genre with a lot of adherents.

Side note: I do listen to opera and know the history, and if anything got criticized about Maria Callas WAS her singing voice and technique. Some purists couldn't stand her singing, so even on the broadest of levels I find the comparisons with Lea not quite fitting.

[Cranberry]

I think for me, it's not pop music that's lazy (I actually quite enjoy the genre), but I don't tend to like albums where the artist didn't either participate in writing most of the songs or have the songs written specifically for him or her. When an album is made up of songs that were written by various people and shopped around, they tend to sound generic and boring to me because they weren't tailored to a specific artist, if that makes sense. Or sometimes they sound more like the artist who wrote them than the one who's singing them, which always makes them seem "off" to me, too (I'm thinking of the Kelly Clarkson songs "I Do Not Hook Up" and "Long Shot" here, which were written by Katy Perry and sound it). In any case, the album lacks cohesiveness.

 

I haven't actually listened to Lea's album and don't know anything about it (except that she has co-writing credit on just two of the songs), but is something like that going on, maybe? I know she "collaborated" with these different artists, but did they write the songs for her, or just tweak already-written songs? Lea has a distinctive voice and a different style from the usual pop singers, so I could see how an album of songs written and produced by different people, and not specifically for Lea, could appear lacking.

[dizzyizzy01]

I think for me, it's not pop music that's lazy (I actually quite enjoy the genre), but I don't tend to like albums where the artist didn't either participate in writing most of the songs or have the songs written specifically for him or her. When an album is made up of songs that were written by various people and shopped around, they tend to sound generic and boring to me because they weren't tailored to a specific artist, if that makes sense. Or sometimes they sound more like the artist who wrote them than the one who's singing them, which always makes them seem "off" to me, too (I'm thinking of the Kelly Clarkson songs "I Do Not Hook Up" and "Long Shot" here, which were written by Katy Perry and sound it). In any case, the album lacks cohesiveness.

I haven't actually listened to Lea's album and don't know anything about it (except that she has co-writing credit on just two of the songs), but is something like that going on, maybe? I know she "collaborated" with these different artists, but did they write the songs for her, or just tweak already-written songs? Lea has a distinctive voice and a different style from the usual pop singers, so I could see how an album of songs written and produced by different people, and not specifically for Lea, could appear lacking.

 

It's probably a combination of both.  There's definitely some already-written stuff that was simply tweaked a bit, but there's some original stuff in there too.  That's kind of the reality of making an album on a major record label.  There's a stable of songwriters and their songs get shopped to artists.  It's funny because some of the songs I liked best were the ones she had a bigger hand in, like "Cue the Rain".  Nonetheless, I think curating and collaborating to create an album in any genre (Pop, Rock, Hip-hop, etc.) is incredibly challenging.  Did Lea 100% succeed in her first effort?  Probably depends on who you ask, but it certainly showed some interesting potential to me.  

 

I think it boils down to some think trying to achieve pop success is shallow or lazy or fame mongering. Fair enough if you despise the pop music genre, but thats more personal preference IMO than reflecting Lea's lack of ambition or artistic integrity. Pop music is a genre with a lot of adherents.

 

I agree with you.  I think that's what it boils down to, and to me that's such a myopic view.  To question someone's artistic integrity over liking and pursuing pop music is pretty out there for me.  I think it's an elitist view of music.  I mean, I grew up with classical training, but I love nearly all genres of music.  

 

Also, maybe it's because of where I am, the criticism Lea gets, which I think is greatly undeserved, about what roles she's taken or the appreciation she shows towards Glee seems so incredibly removed from reality to me.  The example of Laura Benanti is a great one of how challenging it really is to be a working actor in this city and truly breakthrough.  There are a lot of talented people that never make it, and a lot of what hits honestly comes down to quite a bit of luck.

[ancslove]

100K sales isn't bad, considering the album got no radio play.  Actually, I'm a bit surprised that the song about/for Cory didn't take off, just from his fans buying and requesting it.  But neither that single nor Cannonball took off, and that hurt Lea.  And maybe the label should have led with something else.  It's hard to tell what songs will gain traction and popularity - if it were easy, everyone would have huge hits.  But regardless, making a pop album is a creative stretch for Lea, even if the result isn't 100% big success or what fans individually would like to get.  

 

I don't think Lea is objectively the best voice of her generation.  That kind of statement is fine as one person's opinion, but falls apart if you try to make it worldwide fact.  I can name at least 5 singers around her age who can do what Lea does, equally or IMO better than her.  And that's not a knock against Lea - I think she has a fantastic voice and she's a very good actress.  But it doesn't help her to say she has no peer.

[Hana Chan]

Singers can do great things with songs that aren't written by them or for them specifically. Adam Lambert absolutely owned the Pink song that she ended up not using (and even when she performs it, considers it to be Adam's song). I just didn't feel any real emotional resonance from any of the songs on Lea's album with the sole exception of the one written about Cory.

 

I don't hate the pop genre, but if you're going to do an album in that genre, do a good one. The best pop songs have that emotional charge that can make singers that I don't think have great voices engaging. Lea's album was, for me, emotionally inert which is why I don't consider it a successful endeavor. And given that I've heard her sing with emotional resonance before, it turned me off of the album.

 

Lea has so much potential and it will be a shame if she doesn't get projects that allow her to really fulfill it. I'm hoping that part of her rationale for taking the role in Ryan Murphy's new show is that it will allow her the time to pursue other projects without trying to manage as lead in a tv show. I think that she needs to focus a bit and really have the time to work on and promote her other projects.

[fakeempress]

 

I don't hate the pop genre, but if you're going to do an album in that genre, do a good one.

And we are back to square one. It's so easy to say, do a good one. How do you do a good pop album if I may ask, is there a recipe that Lea didn't follow or something? I don't think people like Lea set out to do a bad/mediocre album or book, so I will refer to Chris's quote about people in his generation being afraid of trying for fear of failure, and that trying and going for it is success in its own. This is also why I see Chris's movie (since it was brought up here before) as a personal success even though by itself it had problems, some of which coming from the writing (which is on Chris alone), and didn't exactly set the world on fire. 

 

By all accounts, Lea was quite committed and was a hands-on collaborator on the album. And indeed for an album without airplay, no touring or much promotion, the business it did isn't bad at all. 

Edited February 13, 2015 by fakeempress

[caracas1914]

Personally I think after Spring Awakening Lea had BW offers more than forth coming, she had built up an impressive stage resume. I actually thought it took guts to forego that and go to LA and try to break in the TV business instead of just settling for the next BW role.

[Higgs]

Also, for someone who proclaims to be such an expert on acting singing talent in surprises me you had to look up Laura. She is a very well known Broadway actress.

I pay little attention to Broadway, although I did go see MM's "South Pacific" the last time I was in NYC. The most recent enjoyable talent I know about from there is Jessie Mueller, who I thought out-performed O'Hara on a PBS "Carousel". Oh, and I was there for Cheyenne Jackson's magnificant Tony in a concert performance of WSS with the San Francisco Symphony.

(Good grief, have I been watching musicals!? And there's a solid rumor we'll be getting Matt's "You'll Never Walk Alone" on Glee. Go, Liverpool!) The classical music experience causes me to listen to all singers in perhaps a different way than others might. I suspect the same might be true for jazz aficionados. In general, I prefer folk and rock to pop and Broadway.

Side note: I do listen to opera and know the history, and if anything got criticized about Maria Callas WAS her singing voice and technique. Some purists couldn't stand her singing, so even on the broadest of levels I find the comparisons with Lea not quite fitting.

Callas is extremely divisive among opera fan(atic)s. I hated her voice for a long time until I learned what to listen for. She was an interpretive genius, but her voice was in decline by as early as the late '50s. But she illustrates, like almost no other, the difference between great technique and great singing acting. Here she is, long past her vocal prime, as a teenage girl begging her daddy to let her marry her boyfriend or she'll kill herself. (And people complain about the faces Lea makes!)

(Now check out how the stronger-voiced divas sing it.)

Neither RM, nor anyone else I know, ever said Lea had "the best voice" in a generation or even for an hour on some given day. "Best voice" has no meaning, not even within the same genre. What RM did say was that Lea had a voice that comes along once in a generation, and named Streisand and Garland as examples. (Neither of them had anything approaching the "best voice", either.) What he meant is that she had a very special, almost unique, quality that transcended sound and technique, and even that was limited to narrow musical genres. That's all, and it's plenty, but no more than that.

Edited February 13, 2015 by Higgs

[Hana Chan]

And we are back to square one. It's so easy to say, do a good one. How do you do a good pop album if I may ask, is there a recipe that Lea didn't follow or something? I don't think people like Lea set out to do a bad/mediocre album or book, so I will refer to Chris's quote about people in his generation being afraid of trying for fear of failure, and that trying and going for it is success in its own. This is also why I see Chris's movie (since it was brought up here before) as a personal success even though by itself it had problems, some of which coming from the writing (which is on Chris alone), and didn't exactly set the world on fire. 

 

By all accounts, Lea was quite committed and was a hands-on collaborator on the album. And indeed for an album without airplay, no touring or much promotion, the business it did isn't bad at all. 

 

Everyone wants an album to be commercially (and ideally critically successful) and there's no telling what an audience will gravitate towards. But I'll actually argue that how they went about trying to make Lea's album a commercial hit is what hurt her album rather than helped it. It felt as if they were trying to copy what was already on the radio (lots of female empowerment songs by Katy, Miley, Pink, etc) instead of selecting songs that stood out in a unique way. Lea and her handlers were following a trend rather than setting one. This is why I felt that Lea's album was a swing and a miss. I would be more complimentary if she did an album that wasn't a huge commercial success but that showcased Lea and her unique voice and POV more instead of trying to do something that they thought would sell because it sounded like everything else.

 

I'm looking at artists that really hit it big in recent years and did so by doing what no one else was doing. Look at artists like Adele and Hozier, both of whom didn't sound like anyone else at the moment and struck a chord with the audience. Lea's album got lost in a sea of other very similar albums and she wasn't getting material that really displayed her best attribute (her voice) to its best advantage. Lea's people (and Lea herself) played this one too safe and ended up undercutting her potential. I'm hoping that her next album is a bit more Lea and a lot less generic pop princess because she can do so much more. Not that I expect her to write all the songs because I don't know if that's comfortably in her wheelhouse, but to at least pick songs that really speak to her as an artist and not what she thinks will simply sell. And hopefully by not being the lead in her new show, she'll have the time to do the heavy promotion and even a tour that is really needed today in order to move units.

[fakeempress]

^^ You keep comparing Lea to artists like Adele, Pink, Hozier, who write their own music. There is a different artistic vision involved there. And Lea as a trend-setter is such a high bar for her to clear, it's demanding too much I think. 

Edited February 13, 2015 by fakeempress

[Hana Chan]

As I said, I don't expect Lea to write her own songs if it's not something that she's comfortable doing, but it's the songs that she (and her team) picked that hurt her.

 

For example (which I cited earlier), Adam Lambert had a huge hit with a song that Pink wrote and ended up not using on her album. But it was something that he felt a sincere affinity for (or at least, it felt that he did with how he performed it) and it ended up working very well for him (and was the biggest hit on his debut album). There are plenty of really great recording artists who don't write their own songs (or at least most of their own songs). But picking the right material if you're not a song writer is important. Otherwise how is Lea going to set herself apart from the few dozen other female pop singers currently on the charts now? There's only so much Lea can do if she's got mediocre songs filled with clichés that have already been done by other singers.

 

The music business is a harsh one and it's a challenge for even the best artists to be successful. I can't count how many great albums that I love don't do well commercially, but the most obnoxious crap sells like crazy. If Lea couldn't have a big commercial hit (and given the industry, that's a tough challenge for any new artist), I would have been happy to see her do well critically. But nearly every review that I read said much the same thing - that the songs and the production didn't match the quality of Lea's voice. She deserved better material and I'm hoping that if she does do a second album that she'll have that chance.

[ancslove]

Whataya Want From Me was also released and performed as Adam's not-quite-mea-culpa song after the AMA "scandal".  For Your Entertainment was supposed to be his lead single, but WWFM came out that week, in direct response.  That gave it a relevance and resonance that, likely, wasn't there when he first chose it, but definitely helped sell it. 

 

The thing is, picking the right song is surprisingly difficult.  That's why the go-to ding on American Idol, even with good performances, is "Song Choice!".    Finding the song that speaks to the artist, catches the attention of the audience, stands out to the industry, and shows off the singer's voice is a crapshoot.  No one thinks that the song they are writing is mediocre or cliched.  It probably will take Lea a bit to find out how to choose the best songs - that's if she's even given a wide range to choose from, which is uncertain.  After all, she's spent years taking whatever songs she's been assigned, and selling them as best as she can.  But having fallible instincts in song choice doesn't mean that Lea is playing it safe or being lazy.

Edited February 13, 2015 by ancslove

[camussie]

Personally I think after Spring Awakening Lea had BW offers more than forth coming, she had built up an impressive stage resume.

 

 

I think it was a smart choice to go to LA but as far as other Broadway offers she lost out on Maria to West Side Story shortly before she came to LA.  Now that isn't to say she didn't have other Broadway projects on the horizon.  I only know that WSS was one role she was in the running for but lost out on.  

Edited February 13, 2015 by camussie

[fakeempress]

 

 

As I said, I don't expect Lea to write her own songs if it's not something that she's comfortable doing, but it's the songs that she (and her team) picked that hurt her.

For example (which I cited earlier), Adam Lambert had a huge hit with a song that Pink wrote and ended up not using on her album. But it was something that he felt a sincere affinity for (or at least, it felt that he did with how he performed it) and it ended up working very well for him (and was the biggest hit on his debut album). There are plenty of really great recording artists who don't write their own songs (or at least most of their own songs). But picking the right material if you're not a song writer is important. Otherwise how is Lea going to set herself apart from the few dozen other female pop singers currently on the charts now? There's only so much Lea can do if she's got mediocre songs filled with clichés that have already been done by other singers.

The music business is a harsh one and it's a challenge for even the best artists to be successful. I can't count how many great albums that I love don't do well commercially, but the most obnoxious crap sells like crazy. If Lea couldn't have a big commercial hit (and given the industry, that's a tough challenge for any new artist), I would have been happy to see her do well critically. But nearly every review that I read said much the same thing - that the songs and the production didn't match the quality of Lea's voice. She deserved better material and I'm hoping that if she does do a second album that she'll have that chance.

 

By all accounts Lea loved the Sia song, for instance. How is that so different from how Adam loved the Pink song? I just feel that there is such high bar set here for Lea in what hasn't been a typical artistic venue for her. If she was only a recording artist and that was her only artistic venue, I can probably get the demand for excellence more, but as it is, she, like Matthew, are BW stars who got an opportunity to make a record. Matt's first record wasn't anything special either as far as I'm concerned, Chris's movie wasn't a masterpiece, Mark's album wasn't very good either, and I can go on. Why is only Lea held to such impossibly high standards to be a unique recording artist in her very first effort, I don't get. I wasn't blown away by Louder either but I never thought she had to be a trend-setter, a unique pop voice or any superlatives - though I'd be thrilled for her if she were. 

Edited February 13, 2015 by fakeempress

[SadieT]

As I said, I don't expect Lea to write her own songs if it's not something that she's comfortable doing, but it's the songs that she (and her team) picked that hurt her.

 

For example (which I cited earlier), Adam Lambert had a huge hit with a song that Pink wrote and ended up not using on her album. But it was something that he felt a sincere affinity for (or at least, it felt that he did with how he performed it) and it ended up working very well for him (and was the biggest hit on his debut album). There are plenty of really great recording artists who don't write their own songs (or at least most of their own songs). But picking the right material if you're not a song writer is important. Otherwise how is Lea going to set herself apart from the few dozen other female pop singers currently on the charts now? There's only so much Lea can do if she's got mediocre songs filled with clichés that have already been done by other singers.

 

 

But Lea did seem to feel strongly about at least some of the songs she picked, as much as anyone could tell anyway. I know she easily expresses excitement, but I believe her excitement for Cannonball in particular was sincere. She was thrilled to be recoding a song written by Sia and she seemed to love the empowerment angle of it and said repeatedly that the song resonated with her because of what she was going through at the time. Yet I thought that song was one of the weaker songs from the album, which just goes to show that simply having a strong affinity for a song is not always enough to make a record good. Like I said before, I think Lea still needs to find her sound and work on songs that are better suited for her voice, but not trying or not caring weren't the problem with the album. 

[tom87]

Lea co wrote more songs than made the album as well.   She also said that  a few months in they stop and regrouped and  they took the album a little different way.  So it was a process.   She didn't just throw a dart at a board with song titles attached and paste the album from that that.   Like it or not it. 

Edited February 14, 2015 by tom87

[dizzyizzy01]

As I said, I don't expect Lea to write her own songs if it's not something that she's comfortable doing, but it's the songs that she (and her team) picked that hurt her.

 

For example (which I cited earlier), Adam Lambert had a huge hit with a song that Pink wrote and ended up not using on her album. But it was something that he felt a sincere affinity for (or at least, it felt that he did with how he performed it) and it ended up working very well for him (and was the biggest hit on his debut album). There are plenty of really great recording artists who don't write their own songs (or at least most of their own songs). But picking the right material if you're not a song writer is important. Otherwise how is Lea going to set herself apart from the few dozen other female pop singers currently on the charts now? There's only so much Lea can do if she's got mediocre songs filled with clichés that have already been done by other singers.

You're making the assumption that she didn't have an affinity for these songs, and that's a very BIG leap to make.  Such strong assertions and all about actors/artists thought processes and attacking integrity or character just seem to be such an arrogant position to take.

[tom87]

Wow I bet Lea never thought about picking the right songs.      Damn it if only she knew.  :)

[dizzyizzy01]

Man....some people make it sound so easy to have a successful record.  I'll just go tell everyone I know that failed to hit it big is simply because they didn't follow whatever playbook people seem to be reading from.

 

Seriously for every Adele, Hozier, and even Adam Lambert (who had the AI vehicle), there have been countless of very talented people that did not make it big.

 

OT, I love 21 and Adele's voice, but man some of Adele's lyrics are pretty generic, and some don't really even make any sense.  It truly is very hard to determine what makes that breakthrough and what doesn't.

[caracas1914]

What  a whirlwind few weeks for Lea.  She is filming "Scream Queen", then is shown doing for a photo op for her second book to be released his summer/fall, after which is she is shown with Kate Upton and William H Macy, the co star and the  director of her new film "Layover" , after which she tweets/instagrams recording sessons of  her 2nd album.

 

Quite a workload!

[Hana Chan]

Lea's been dropped from the IMDb listing for The Layover. Her role is now being played by Alexandra Daddario. It looks like there was just too much a conflict between the Scream Queens filming schedule and doing a movie.

[caracas1914]

I wonder if Lea's commitment to "Scream Queens " is more than a year. Hard to believe Arianna Grande or Nick Jonas would be committing to multiple seasons unless on a limited episode appearance basis.

[tab19]

Lea's been dropped from the IMDb listing for The Layover. Her role is now being played by Alexandra Daddario. It looks like there was just too much a conflict between the Scream Queens filming schedule and doing a movie.

I am curious about what changed - surely when she signed on for The Layover, she had a sense of the Scream Queens filming schedule?  If I were Lea, I'd be bitter at missing out on a lead role in a movie that William Macy is directing because of Scream Queens. 

[fakeempress]

Wasn't there some reference that Ryan Murphy very recently changed the filming schedule? I think that was presumed to be a reason for Lea's dropping out of the movie. 

[shantown]

Lea's been dropped from the IMDb listing for The Layover. Her role is now being played by Alexandra Daddario. It looks like there was just too much a conflict between the Scream Queens filming schedule and doing a movie.

It's a Ryan Murphy show. I'm sure the writing, filming, etc are all already behind schedule. 

[camussie]

There has been no official reason given for Lea dropping out of "The Layover" but, while it could be a conflict with the "Scream Queens" schedule, I am not 100% sure it is.  Scream Queens filming has been on hiatus the last couple of weeks and Emma Roberts has been working on a movie during that time.  Maybe it is a conflict with Lea's recording schedule?  Whatever the reason her not being in it is a disappointment  because I thought it was good step for Lea's career to be branching out from RM led projects.  

Edited May 10, 2015 by camussie

[Hana Chan]

If Lea dropped The Layover for any other reason other than a conflict with Scream Queens, then I'm wondering if this is going to hurt her film prospects. If she quit the film or was dropped, it's possible that this will affect her chances of being hired for future major roles. Recording an album is a flexible schedule and she managed to do it while working full time on a television program, so I find it hard to put the blame there.

 

It's not that I think that The Layover sounded like such a super amazing project, but it could have helped move her mainstream film career forward. Dropping out feels like a major step backwards.

Edited May 11, 2015 by Hana Chan

[fakeempress]

It's not that infrequent for actors to drop out of projects for various reasons. I don't see why this here for Lea should be a blackballing offense at all, unless there is a huge scandal of some sort but it doesn't seem so at all. People have gotten sued by studios when they backed out, but it's usually big money features and names.

[tom87]

Yes people drop out all the time.  Just from Scream Queens alone two actors who were announced had to drop out.  Joe Magnanelli was said to drop out just due to having to do press later in the summer.   

Edited May 11, 2015 by tom87

[dizzyizzy01]

Seriously, I doubt dropping out of a low-budget indie comedy is going to hurt Lea at all, and in all honesty nobody's really checking for this movie anyway.  Anyway, it's very likely a scheduling thing.  There was a last minute thing to re-shoot some stuff to include Ariana for Fox upfronts that coincided with the weekend they were starting to do stuff for the Layover, and now Lea's at upfronts and doing press for SQ.

 

It's a bummer cause working with Macey sounded interesting even if the movie itself sounded kind of terrible.

[caracas1914]

Last week Lea won her last TCA award for Glee, as best female lead in TV comedy.

[tom87]

Happy 29th Birthday to Lea Michele.

 

Edited August 29, 2015 by tom87

[caracas1914]

While Scream Queens has gotten mixed reviews , (some downright bad) Lea Michelle overall has gotten good positive notices for her portrayal of the Sorority Pledge Hester.

[ExplainItAgain]

While Scream Queens has gotten mixed reviews , (some downright bad) Lea Michelle overall has gotten good positive notices for her portrayal of the Sorority Pledge Hester.

 

I didn't enjoy the show, but she was definitely the best part. I think Lea has such great comedic timing.

[caracas1914]

The difference between her comedic timing and Emma Roberts is Grand Canyon chasm difference. Yes, I'm being bitchy and snarky but not telling lies.

[shoregirl]

I definitely thought Lea was a standout on the show. I think both the girls who play Chanel and Grace are pretty terrible but Lea and some of the supporting cast were very good and funny.

[fakeempress]

I also thought Emma R. was atrocious, which is one of several problems. She is just not funny (when she has to be), nor charismatic or compelling as a lead. I don't watch AHS so my exposure to her is very minimal, but based on the SQ premiere I don't see her anywhere near Lea's league. It's no coincidence that most reviews, as well as online response from non-fans and fans alike, mention Lea as a standout. Though one review from either E! or ET said Emma's performance was a comedy masterclass or something - don't know what they were smoking.

 

For Lea's sake I wish the quality improves or at least she gets her due in screentime. Bonus if she gets to be the last woman standing. 

Edited September 24, 2015 by fakeempress

[caracas1914]

E! and EW blow smoke constantly up Ryan Murphy's ass, they both gave Scream Queens raves.

Again, Lea's comedic timing comes through, she is more than Rachel Berry.

[Casual Viewing]

Not even Lea being in the cast can persuade me to submit myself to the torture of another Ryan Murphy production. As the saying goes: fool me once...

I am glad though that she is getting the chance to show her comedic abilities and is being acknowledged for her performance.

[caracas1914]

Was Lea's dress sprayed on on the Jimmy Kimmel?

http://tomandlorenzo.com/2015/09/lea-michele-on-jimmy-kimmel-live-in-alice-olivia-and-bec-bridge/

It's coming from a place of love.