Theatre Talk: In Our Own Little Corner

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Daphne Rubin-Vega, Gizel Jimenez, and Erin McKeown discuss Miss You Like Hell

[Silver Raven]

Today's Sacramento Musical Theatre production was Finding Neverland.   The acting was ... just so so, the major problem being that the actors were so concentrated on trying to do English accents (and shouldn't Barrie have a Scottish accent?) that they wind up pontificating instead of sounding realistic.

But the singing voices were outstanding.

JM Barrie is played by Will Ray, who had s really nice singing voice.

Sylvia Llewelyn Davies is played by lLel Van Kuren.  I loved her soprano.  It was gorgeous.

Charles Frohamn and Captain Hook were played by John Davidson. I just looked him up, and he's 76, but he did a great job.  Especially as Captain Hook, where he came across as deliciously evil.  And he can still belt with the best of them.

Karen Murphy was Mrs. du Maurier, and her few singing opportunites were very nice.

Four boys travel with the touring company as the Llewelyn Davies boys, and all of them were outstanding.  They, and the dog, were the highlights of the show.

But what blew me away was the production design and the lighting.  When

Spoiler

Sylvia dies,

Peter Pan leads her through the bedroom window. Fans were set up in a circle (I never saw them set up), and Peter throws up a handful of glitter, which sparkles and spirals in the wind, and the dressing gown blows around like a dead spirit.

The setup of Captain Hook's pirate ship during "Hook" was amazing.  And the lighting and rapid scene changes during "Circus of Your Mind" just blew me away.

Edited April 16, 2018 by Silver Raven

[Silver Raven]

Josh Castille, who played Ernst in the Deaf West production of Spring Awakening on Broadway, will be playing Quasimodo in the Glenn Casale's Hunchback of Notre Dame at the Fifth Avenue Theater.

Casale directed Hunchback a couple of seasons ago at the Music Circus in Sacramento, which I was lucky enough to see.  The production in the small round theater at Music Circus, was outstanding.  It should be even better in a full stage.

I hope Casale gets back in time to take up the reins of Music Circus's artistic director this summer.

http://www.playbill.com/article/deaf-west-spring-awakening-alum-joshua-castille-to-star-in-5th-avenue-theatres-the-hunchback-of-notre-dame

 

I've seen a couple of Josh Castille's performances on YouTube, and he amazes me.

Edited April 16, 2018 by Silver Raven

[Spartan Girl]

I'm going to New York City next week and I'm seeing Aladdin on Broadway!  So excited!

[ElectricBoogaloo]

13 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

I'm going to New York City next week and I'm seeing Aladdin on Broadway!  So excited!

Have fun! It’s a very visually appealing show. It’s colorful and shiny and entertaining to watch.

Unfortunately when I saw the national tour in San Francisco, the magic carpet wasn’t working so Aladdin and Jasmine just sat on a bench to sing A Whole New World which was pretty anti-climactic. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Joshua Henry discusses Carousel:

[Spartan Girl]

4 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Have fun! It’s a very visually appealing show. It’s colorful and shiny and entertaining to watch.

Unfortunately when I saw the national tour in San Francisco, the magic carpet wasn’t working so Aladdin and Jasmine just sat on a bench to sing A Whole New World which was pretty anti-climactic. 

Seriously? Man, that would suck. 

I'm huge Disney/Aladdin fan, and I listen to the Broadway soundtrack all the time, so I have no doubt I'll love it.

The season for my theater (Whatton Center in MI) is also announced, and they're having Hamilton at the end of the year! My mom and I are officially becoming subscribers to get a better chance at good seats; however, to get first dibs, they're making it so that you have to buy the whole Broadway series for that season. So we're also going to see: School of Rock, Love Never Dies, Fiddler On the Roof, Anastasia, and Miss Saigon.

I have to tell you im not looking forward to LVD. I read the synopsis and all I can say is WHAT THE HELL, ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER?!

Edited April 17, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[ElectricBoogaloo]

1 minute ago, Spartan Girl said:

Seriously? Man, that would suck. 

I'm huge Disney/Aladdin fan, and I listen to the Broadway soundtrack all the time, so I have no doubt I'll love it.

The season for my theater (Whatton Center in MI) is also announced, and they're having Hamilton at the end of the year! My mom and I are officially becoming subscribers to get a better chance at good seats; however, to get first dibs, they're making it so that you have to buy the whole Broadway series for that season. So we're also going to see: School of Rock, Love Never Dies, Fiddler On the Roof, Anastasia, and Miss Saigon.

I have to tell you im not looking forward to LVD. I read the synopsis and all I can say is WHAT THE HELL, ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER?!

I love Aladdin (it's one of my favorite Disney movies) so I was really looking forward to seeing the musical version! Aside from the magic carpet (and I can't lie - that was really disappointing), it was a really fun show to watch. The theater in SF where I see most national tours is not great about having extra stuff in the lobby (shows that I've seen in Sacramento and San Jose had way cooler stuff while SHN/Orpheum in SF tends to have nothing at all but the merch booth), but for Aladdin they had a backdrop set up where you could take pictures with the lamp. For as much as they charge for tickets, you'd think they would spring a couple hundred dollars to put up something for each show where people can take pictures, especially since SHN shows are typically in SF for at least a month.

I was able to get Hamilton tickets three different times at two different locations without buying a season subscription (twice in San Francisco and once in San Diego), but for next season I finally bought a full season subscription. Luckily I am enthusiastic about seeing most of the shows they are having next year. The first time Hamilton was in SF, they were selling season subscriptions and they hadn't even announced what one of the shows was going to be (which is one of the reasons I didn't buy a season subscription that year). But yeah, it's a lot to buy tickets to 6-7 shows just so you can have the opportunity to buy Hamilton tickets. Next season they're showing Miss Saigon, A Bronx Tale, Come From Away, Hello, Dolly!, Falsettos, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Anastasia. When I was in San Diego, I saw that their season included Love Never Dies and the first thing I thought when I saw the sign was THANK GOODNESS I don't have to see that show!

For the 2017 season, Hamilton was included as one of the shows in the season subscription so it was totally worth it because single orchestra seats were $513 when they went on sale to the public (that's the face value, not the scalper price) which meant that buying a season subscription cost about as much as a single Hamilton ticket. For the 2019 show, you have to buy a full season subscription and then you have access to buy Hamilton tickets in addition to the $$$$$$ you just spent on the seven shows in the regular season. They have raised the prices for Hamilton so to see the show next year, it's $678 for orchestra, $210 for mezzanine, and $110 for balcony.

I looked at the tour schedule recently to see if the Angelica cast is returning to SF or if it will be the Philip cast and I realized by looking at the dates that they will be launching another tour! The show will be in SF next year (February 26 - May 12) and the existing tours are already booked elsewhere (February 19 - March 10 in Cincinnati and February 12 - March 10 in Tampa). I'm looking forward to seeing who will be cast in the new tour!

On a Phantom related note, have you ever read Phantom by Susan Kay? Back in my youth when I loooooooved PotO, I read that book and totally loved it. In my mind, the epilogue to the book is how the story ends, not the whack stuff from Love Never Dies.

[Rinaldo]

I saw Aladdin on Broadway about a year ago (accidentally well timed; it was the last weekend the three original stars were all in it), having enjoyed the movie without especially high hopes for a stage adaptation, and was very pleasantly surprised in every respect.* The changes made are all intelligent ones, the new (old) songs work well, and there aren't too many of them -- it doesn't feel bloated like some screen-to-stage rethinking, it's a nice compact piece of storytelling. And the stage magic made me feel like a kid again, grinning in wonder and pleasure.

(*OK, one complaint: While it's wonderful to be in the New Amsterdam Theatre, historic and beautiful as it is and so lovingly restored, one element of restoration was overlooked: the seats are the same ones as in 1910, and people are bigger and taller now. :) )

[Spartan Girl]

With the exception of Love Never Dies, I'm excited for the other shows like School of Rock, Anastasia, and Fiddler on the Roof, in addition to Hamilton.  Miss Saigon I was on the fence about -- I know some people don't like it, but I already have the soundtrack and love the songs, plus it will be cool to see the helicopter in the theater, 

The one thing I always hate in Miss Saigon (spoiler tagging just in case)

is Kim's suicide.  It didn't have to happen.  Those two morons didn't want to "take a child from his mother" but because Ellen had issues with Kim going to the US they thought the best thing to do was to just leave them in Bangkok and just send them money.  Kim BEGGED them to take Tam with them to the US, she wasn't going to follow them there.  She shouldn't have had to kill herself just to get them to do the right fucking thing!

Edited April 17, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[Scott]

5 hours ago, Rinaldo said:

(*OK, one complaint: While it's wonderful to be in the New Amsterdam Theatre, historic and beautiful as it is and so lovingly restored, one element of restoration was overlooked: the seats are the same ones as in 1910, and people are bigger and taller now. :) )

Holy cow, you ain't kidding.  I've seen a couple shows there, and am taller and (quite) bigger than the average for today, let alone 1910, so I've never been comfortable in that theater. 

Disney did the same thing when they renovated the El Capitan movie theater in Hollywood.  I'm pretty sure they're not the original seats, but it may be the original seating plan, because those are on the tight side as well (although thankfully not as tight as the New Amsterdam).  

[Silver Raven]

Saturday is the annual season ticket holders' subscribers' showcase for the Sacramento Music Circus (even though the first performance isn't till June).  The performers announced as attending are:

Francesca Arostegui

Joey Barreiro

Jacquelyn Piro Donovan

Cory Lingner

Sarah E. Litzsinger

Noah Racey

The announcement doesn't say what most of the performers will be performing in, but Jackie Piro Donovan will be starring in Gypsy, Francesca Arostegui will be Sophie in Mamma Mia!, and I'm guessing that Joey Barreiro will be in Newsies.

[aradia22]

Oh, btw, my friend is currently playing Eliza in the Chicago production of Hamilton. https://hamiltonmusical.com/chicago/cast

[Quof]

Josh Groban and Sara Bareilles are hosting the Tonys!!!!!

[Spartan Girl]

On 4/17/2018 at 7:12 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

On a Phantom related note, have you ever read Phantom by Susan Kay? Back in my youth when I loooooooved PotO, I read that book and totally loved it. In my mind, the epilogue to the book is how the story ends, not the whack stuff from Love Never Dies.

No, but now I'm curious to read it.

The worst thing about Love Never Dies, I think, is that letting Christine go was the one good thing the Phantom did in the original show, and this sequel completely retcons that.

[aradia22]

I saw a concert version of Candide at Carnegie Hall tonight. Similar to the smaller productions at City Center (projections instead of sets, some costumes, light choreography). Another horrible audience experience but let's not get into it. The casting was pretty solid but I feel like they didn't have a lot of time with the material so the people who really shone were the ones with hammier comedic parts. Also it was strangely quiet in the house and a lot of lyrics were lost in a mush which is not what you want for operetta. Loved Erin Morley as Olympia so much that I saw it in HD and then at the opera house but she was a little disappointing as Cunegonde. I still like the Kristin Chenoweth version better. The show does not work, even as a concert. The best songs are in act 1 and in adapting from the very short novella, the tone is all over the place. The operetta style works for the light comedy. But it lacks the real bite of Voltaire so some of the satire just comes off as light Sondheim... almost a British restraint. It could use some better lyrics too. And then Make Our Garden Grow is beautiful but it and similar moments of sincerity don't feel earned. I can see Candide would work if it could pull off something more like A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder but "fixing" it would involve cutting so much beloved material, I don't know that it will ever happen. While (once I got away from the terrible people) it was an enjoyable show, I think this production confirmed that I really don't need to see another unless the casting is absolutely brilliant. 

Almost forgot! As I was leaving I saw that there was a LOT of recording equipment in the hallway. I don't know if they're just filming it for themselves as I don't remember Carnegie Hall concerts on TV but it was a lot of equipment for them to do nothing with it. It wasn't just for those clips they sometimes release.

Edited April 19, 2018 by aradia22

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Brian Tyree Henry discusses his return to Broadway in Lobby Hero, his tv show Atlanta, and his upcoming movie Hotel Artemis:

[ElectricBoogaloo]

17 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

No, but now I'm curious to read it.

The worst thing about Love Never Dies, I think, is that letting Christine go was the one good thing the Phantom did in the original show, and this sequel completely retcons that.

ITA - after all the creepy stalking and kidnapping (not to mention the rampant murdering), he FINALLY does one good and truly unselfish thing when he lets her go which is his redemption. I think the last time I checked, the Phantom book was out of print but there are probably used copies on amazon marketplace. I thought it gave everyone a satisfying ending (even if some of those endings were bittersweet).

I tend to see newer musicals, but apparently this is the autumn of nostalgia national tours because Phantom, Les Mis, and Miss Saigon are all coming to town!

On 4/17/2018 at 9:24 AM, Spartan Girl said:

Miss Saigon I was on the fence about -- I know some people don't like it, but I already have the soundtrack and love the songs, plus it will be cool to see the helicopter in the theater, 

I have mixed feelings about Miss Saigon, but I love the songs which overrides my other issues. For me, the most important thing in a musical is that it must have good music. No matter how good the story is, if the music sucks then what's the point of making it into a musical? Without good music, you might as well remove all the songs and just make it into a play. Miss Saigon has a lot of beautiful melodies which is why I love it. I saw the national tour twice in the mid to late 90s. I can't remember if it was the first tour or the second tour (they ran concurrently for about two years) but it was really good.

I'm excited to see it again this fall, but it will be interesting to see the changes they have made in the revival like replacing Please with Too Much for One Heart. I've seen Lea Salonga perform the original version that was cut from the show and the new version which is a hybrid of the two (it's mostly Please with a tiny bit of Too Much for One Heart).

The original version of Too Much for One Heart which was cut from the show:

Please from the original West End/Broadway productions:

 

The hybrid version of Please/Too Much for One Heart used in the revival:

 

It's Her or Me (original West End)/Now That I've Seen Her (original Broadway) has been replaced with Maybe (revival), but to be honest I never loved NTISH so I don't care about this change as much. I don't love Maybe either so it's kind of a wash for me.

Just for funsies, two Fantines singing Room 317/Now That I've Seen Her (Lea Salonga and Ruthie Henshall):

Maybe (revival):

[Spartan Girl]

Lea Salonga is the fucking queen.

The Room 317 video was awesome.  I love how it isn't until the "you don't know how he needed a new start" that Lea finally breaks down.  She looks like her heart has literally been ripped out of her chest. Poor Kim.  She's definitely the top 10 of musical characters that get screwed over.

Edited April 19, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[ElectricBoogaloo]

48 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

Lea Salonga is the fucking queen.

She really is. Almost thirty years later and she is STILL the queen!

My one fear about seeing Miss Saigon in the fall is that no one compares to her so I'm afraid I'll be disappointed by whoever plays Kim.

And I agree about Kim. Her life sucks from beginning to end. She got, what? Two days of happiness with Chris? Poor girl.

[Spartan Girl]

You couldn't have tried longer than one year to find her, could ya, Chris?! ????

Edited April 19, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[JustaPerson]

I suppose Kim had to die because it's a Madame Butterfly adaption. But then again, Jonathan Larson had Mimi actually survive the show instead of dying like she did in La Boheme so...

[Silver Raven]

2 hours ago, JustaPerson said:

I suppose Kim had to die because it's a Madame Butterfly adaption. But then again, Jonathan Larson had Mimi actually survive the show instead of dying like she did in La Boheme so...

That's such a cop out.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

11 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

You couldn't have tried longer than one year to find her, could ya, Chris?! ????

I know, right? What always irked me about the original West End version of Room 317 was that Ellen said "we've been married two years." When you add that to what John told Kim in Please (he went crazy when he lost you/spoke to no one for a year/then he finally said, "I'm home now/my life has to go on here"/please let me finish talking, please/this was three whole years ago), that means Chris spent a year not talking to anyone and then immediately married Ellen. Like seriously, Chris? Did you just walk up to the first woman you saw at the grocery store and propose and then drive straight to city hall to get married? When the show moved to Broadway, they changed Ellen's line to 'we've been married a year" which makes it slightly better (but still not great). Since they didn't do a Broadway recording when the show opened in 1991, I have been listening to that West End version with the "two years" line forever and it annoys me every time I hear it.

[Spartan Girl]

And don't even get me started on "you don't know how he needed a new start". PTSD is awful and everything, but really Chris?! You needed a new start?! Right, because you were the one stuck in Vietnam/Bangkok, and raising Tam alone, having to kill someone to protect him...oh wait, that was Kim! Asshole.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

1 hour ago, Spartan Girl said:

And don't even get me started on "you don't know how he needed a new start". PTSD is awful and everything, but really Chris?! You needed a new start?! Right, because you were the one stuck in Vietnam/Bangkok, and raising Tam alone, having to kill someone to protect him...oh wait, that was Kim! Asshole.

And that was after her country was torn apart, she saw her parents die, and she became desperate enough to work as prostitute to survive! Not to mention having her dick of a cousin have his men beat her once he found her. I don't doubt that Chris was affected by his time in Vietnam, but yeah, I'm pretty sure Kim has been worse off than Chris.

Part of me felt sorry for Ellen because Chris married her without telling her about Kim, which made me wonder what else he'd kept from her and if she knew him at all. Even after he told her that John had found Kim and Tam, Ellen pointed out after meeting Kim that Chris conveniently left out the part where he had been in love with her so I'm guessing his explanation was along the lines of "when I was in Nam, I knocked up some prostitute - whoops!" But I got riled up when Ellen refused to take Tam to America citing as one of her reasons that she and Chris wanted to have kids of their own. When there are children involved, I always resort to my legal training from the University of Law & Order. The question is always what is in the best interest of the child? Is it best for Tam to stay in Bangkok living in a shack with a bunch of other refugees while his mom works as a bar girl trying to make ends meet? 

I never listened to the complete symphonic recording or the definitive live recording so I didn't realize they had changed some of the lines in certain songs. I just found out that in one of the newer versions, Chris tells Ellen that he and Kim were together for two weeks. I seriously thought they were together for only two days (the day they met and then the one day that John says he can take for leave when Chris calls him).

[bosawks]

Chris wasn't in love with either Kim or Ellen, he was in love with Chris.

[Spartan Girl]

12 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Part of me felt sorry for Ellen because Chris married her without telling her about Kim, which made me wonder what else he'd kept from her and if she knew him at all. Even after he told her that John had found Kim and Tam, Ellen pointed out after meeting Kim that Chris conveniently left out the part where he had been in love with her so I'm guessing his explanation was along the lines of "when I was in Nam, I knocked up some prostitute - whoops!" But I got riled up when Ellen refused to take Tam to America citing as one of her reasons that she and Chris wanted to have kids of their own. When there are children involved, I always resort to my legal training from the University of Law & Order. The question is always what is in the best interest of the child? Is it best for Tam to stay in Bangkok living in a shack with a bunch of other refugees while his mom works as a bar girl trying to make ends meet? 

I did feel sorry for Ellen because of all the reasons you stated.  She got sucked in this crappy situation because Chris just couldn't be alone for more than a year.  But like you said, all that sympathy evaporated when she didn't want to let Tam and Kim come to America.  Kim had no intention of going with them anyway.  Taking a child from his mother offended their delicate sensibilities, but sending them pity money just to keep them in Bangkok and out of their lives didn't?!  

Maybe Chris wasn't the quite d-bag that his Madame Butterfly counterpart was, but still, screw him.

Edited April 21, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Just now, Spartan Girl said:

Taking a child from his mother offended their delicate sensibilities, but sending them pity money just to keep them in Bangkok and out of their lives didn't?!  

I know, right? They thought they could just send her some money every month and that would suffice so they could tell themselves that they were doing the right thing while remaining on their moral high horse about how they couldn’t allow Kim to “give away” her child (as if Tam living with his father was a ridiculous idea).

Let’s be real - neither of them wanted to deal with explaining to all of their friends and family that Chris knocked up a hooker while he was in Vietnam. For both of them, looking at Tam would be a daily reminder of Kim and who wants to deal with the guilt (not to mention the judgmental neighbors)? It’s so much easier to just send her a check every month and have bio kids who look like you! 

[aradia22]

There is something inappropriate about this many attractive people in one video. They all look like personal trainers and models. Where did they cast this show? I'm straight and I'm counting the women in that too. God damn.

[Silver Raven]

Bette Midler is going to return to Hello, Dolly for the final six weeks before it closes.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

16 hours ago, aradia22 said:

There is something inappropriate about this many attractive people in one video. They all look like personal trainers and models. Where did they cast this show? I'm straight and I'm counting the women in that too. God damn.

I saw the Angelica tour twice but about one year apart so there were several cast changes so I can confirm that yeah, everyone was hot AND fit. The female dancer with the amazing ass at 0:08-0:13 is Jennifer Geller, who plays The Bullet.

Can't wait to see the Philip tour's response! In case you missed the first #soyouthinkyouhamdance video from the Chicago cast:

Edited April 22, 2018 by ElectricBoogaloo

[Silver Raven]

Joey Barreiro slayed at yesterday's Music Circus showcase.  He sang "Santa Fe" from Newsies, which he will be starring in this summer, and "Johanna" from Sweeney Todd.  The older lady sitting in front of me turned to her companion to comment on how good his voice was.

Glenn Casale announced that, yes, they will be raining on the stage for Singin' in the Rain.  It will be interesting to see how they protect the front row, since the front row seats are so close to the stage in the theater in the round, that you can barely move your legs.

[PRgal]

On Miss Saigon:  Has anyone seen productions with Ellen being played by an actress of Asian descent?  It's as if Chris was looking for a REPLACEMENT.  I'd be f-ing MAD at that and contact my lawyer for divorce papers ASAP.  Hell, I may run off with John, just to p!$$ him off.  #justsayin

 

Also, does anyone have plans to see My Fair Lady at Lincoln Center?  It's on my wish list for this summer.  If I can get myself to NYC and get tickets.

[Rinaldo]

32 minutes ago, PRgal said:

On Miss Saigon:  Has anyone seen productions with Ellen being played by an actress of Asian descent? 

I didn't see it, but it happened in the course of the original Broadway run. The Playbill page for Margaret (Ann) Gates contains a photo of her in the role opposite Will Chase. (And the IBDB entry makes a special point of tagging her replacement casting as "first Asian actress to play Ellen.")

As with any other change in casting, I would prefer to say that it gives the relationship new nuances to act -- unusually interesting ones in this case, but I would not automatically find the result detrimental to his character. I guess in her place I would want to give the situation at least a thorough investigation before calling the divorce lawyers. Maybe it's coincidence, maybe he has a type (as many do, harmlessly), or it may indeed be as you say.

I have a ticket for My Fair Lady three weeks from now, coinciding with the third Encores! weekend.

[aradia22]

Quote

Also, does anyone have plans to see My Fair Lady at Lincoln Center?  It's on my wish list for this summer.  If I can get myself to NYC and get tickets.

I think I'm going at the end of May. I haven't checked on that in a while since I bought the ticket so long ago.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

6 hours ago, aradia22 said:

I think I'm going at the end of May. I haven't checked on that in a while since I bought the ticket so long ago.

I feel like some shows are selling their tickets soooooo far in advance these days. I bought my tickets for Waitress in November 2017 to see the show in November 2018. I bought Hamilton tickets in March 2018 and don't get to see the show until April 2019. Those were single tickets too, not annual/season subscriptions.

The farthest out I have bought tickets were through a season subscription which I bought in March 2018 for the upcoming 2018-2019 season. The last show of the season is Anastasia which isn't playing until September 2019.

I guess the good thing is that since these shows are so far in the future, I get to be excited about seeing them three times (when I buy the tickets, when the tickets arrive several months later, and when I finally get to see the show a year later).

[Rinaldo]

3 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

I feel like some shows are selling their tickets soooooo far in advance these days.

This sounds like a complaint, and I'm puzzled why. It's a response to customer demand, and only happens with popular shows, right? And it's nothing new -- I remember when My Fair Lady was a monster hit in its original Broadway run, and everyone wanted to see it (probably the closest historical analogue I can recall to the phenomenon around Hamilton), there were jokes about people committing to it a year or two in advance., or finding that even that was sold out and wishing they could buy three or four years ahead.

[Milburn Stone]

On 4/23/2018 at 6:08 AM, Rinaldo said:

This sounds like a complaint, and I'm puzzled why. It's a response to customer demand, and only happens with popular shows, right? And it's nothing new -- I remember when My Fair Lady was a monster hit in its original Broadway run, and everyone wanted to see it (probably the closest historical analogue I can recall to the phenomenon around Hamilton), there were jokes about people committing to it a year or two in advance., or finding that even that was sold out and wishing they could buy three or four years ahead.

Similarly, there were jokes in movies circa 1950 about the wait for tickets for South Pacific.

Going from (extremely hazy) memory here, but my brain tells me there's a line in the verse of the Arlen-Blane song "The Friendly Islands"--a sendup of "Bali Hai," written for the Betty Grable/Dan Dailey Fox musical My Blue Heaven--that talks of the impossibility of scoring tix for the show until 1986 or something. Or else I'm making that up.

[aradia22]

Quote

This sounds like a complaint, and I'm puzzled why. It's a response to customer demand, and only happens with popular shows, right?

My issue is not with Broadway shows. It's subscription houses. I don't love getting locked in to a specific day (e.g. always going on Monday nights) and buying so far in advance when you have no idea what the weather will be like or what else will be going on. And in a number of cases, no, there isn't high demand. I like the Met opera's system where you get the subscription but you can choose different dates and then later they're really good about letting you exchange tickets with advance notice so you don't have to worry if the weather is bad or your plans change.  

[ebk57]

On 4/22/2018 at 5:19 PM, PRgal said:

Also, does anyone have plans to see My Fair Lady at Lincoln Center?  It's on my wish list for this summer.  If I can get myself to NYC and get tickets.

I have tickets for August 10th.  We're also seeing Boys In The Band on the 6th.  Not sure what I'm doing between Monday and Friday that week, but I have a little time to plan.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

All of the casts dance to the Hamilton polka!

[aradia22]

Back from a matinee of Children of a Lesser God. I will have more thoughts later but I wanted to post now so I could give a recommendation (or enough so you can decide if you want to see it). I have a migraine and am easily distracted so I might forget if I leave it until later. Word of mouth has been mixed but I thought Joshua Jackson was fine as James. Things you might find unlikable are true to the character as written. I did feel like someone told him to "project" because he was shouting a bit too much and a better actor would have found a way to deliver some of those lines like they were things the character was genuinely saying and not lines he had memorized. But he was fine. And I commend him for the difficulty of signing as well as carrying most of the dialogue in the show. I'm not saying give her a Tony but Lauren is a very capable actress with the added bonus of that special kind of charm that makes someone seem remarkable. She's incredibly winsome and her signing is beautiful and very expressive. One of the downsides of having the supertitles + Jackson translating is my attention was always divided when I wanted to just be able to focus on her. I realize that's a privilege of usually seeing plays intended for hearing audiences but I kind of would have liked the play more if it had been written so Sarah's voice is sometimes heard through maybe an offstage female interpreter. I realize that would affect the themes and structure of the play but signing is visual so I felt like I was missing a lot taking my eyes off her for even a moment. I didn't hate the set or costumes. They didn't jump out at me but combined with the music and lighting I thought it set a nice mood and the show doesn't really require an overdressed set. The other actors were solid. I particularly liked the younger deaf/hard of hearing actors but Kecia Lewis is always great and the actor playing Franklin wasn't bad. It's just that those two parts are comparatively underwritten. Which reminds me, something I really appreciated was that this play contains a debate but it wasn't just a debate. I feel like a lot of contemporary plays are written in such a way where the playwright is making an argument and forgets that there are supposed to be human beings in the roles and they're not just mouthpieces for one POV or another. COALG is as much about marital issues as it is about issues within the deaf community and assimilation. Yes, Sarah is still mainly seen through James' eyes for much of the show but I appreciated the moments where she was able to speak for herself or her personality broke through and I appreciated how much the show let you see James as a flawed person. I didn't think the two leads had amazing chemistry but they had sufficient chemistry. The ending is a little similar to Next to Normal but I feel like it's more positive. It's something like the ending of Roman Holiday. It's hopeful in that it's open-ended and yet it doesn't give you a happy ending and I feel reasonably certain that there isn't going to be one that involves these two people getting back together. 

I don't think I would have paid full price but with all the discounts floating around, I think it's a solid production if you like the play or you've never seen it. I don't think it's a must see but I'm glad that I saw it and I hope to see more from the deaf/hard of hearing actors in the production. I really liked Treshelle in Spring Awakening and she was good in this but she played the character very young and I think it dumbed down her acting a bit. 

[Spartan Girl]

I saw Aladdin tonight.

IT WAS AWESOME! And the magic carpet worked without a hitch; that whole sequence was gorgeous.

Telly Leung and Arielle Jacobs were a great Aladdin and Jasmine. Juwan Crawley played Genie -- he was actually the understudy from the regular one but they better make him the next regular because he was fantastic. One of his funniest parts was his sarcastic response to Aladdin asking if he was really from the lamp: "No, I'm from from Wakanda!" AND HE DID THE WAKANDA SALUTE!!! XD

As a Disney geek I can't tell you how it felt to see the original voice of Jafar play him in person.

The only hiccup was that midway through the second act the actor playing Babkak had a "sudden illness" and had to be replaced. There was an ambulence seen outside the theater and everything. But from what we could garner it wasn't life threatening. I hope he's gonna be okay...

Other than that it was a great show.

Edited April 26, 2018 by Spartan Girl

[aradia22]

Re: Children of a Lesser God

I was curious so I did a bit of quick googling. The wiki says that Medoff wrote the play for the original actress, Phyllis Frelich but there's no citation for that. Nevertheless, it's interesting to compare French's biographical data with the play. Spoilers ahead.

Spoiler

Frelich was born to deaf parents and had nine siblings who were all deaf... In the play, Sarah's father leaves the family. She has one sister who is never on stage (and when she reconciles with her mother it's never explained where that sister went) and seemed to only exist to have male friends and help facilitate sexual relations between them and Sarah.

Frelich attended a school for the deaf and then college, completing a degree in library science and then going on to be a successful actress. Sarah stays at the school longer than she's supposed to and continues taking classes and working as a maid. There are hints of her wanting to teach and maybe go to school but there's never a firm answer and that lives mostly in the open-ended leaving James to find herself ending of the play. 

Frelich stayed married to her hearing husband for 46 years. I'm not sure of the timeline but it didn't seem like Sarah and James made it more than a few months. It definitely wasn't a year because they didn't celebrate an anniversary. 

Even though there are a lot of positive messages in the play, I think even for the time period, it was limited in how it imagined its deaf characters and for 1979, how it imagined its lead female character. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

David Morse discusses The Iceman Cometh:

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Harry Hadden-Paton discusses My Fair Lady:

[Silver Raven]

The Daytime Emmy Award for Creative Arts went to the Dear Evan Hansen cast performance on The Today Show

http://www.playbill.com/article/ben-platt-and-dear-evan-hansen-co-stars-win-daytime-creative-arts-emmy-award

[ElectricBoogaloo]

This month’s Hamlidrop is First Burn. This is the first draft of the lyrics for Burn and has five Elizas (Lexi Lawson from Broadway, Arianna Afsar from Chicago, Rachelle Ann Go from London, Julia Harriman from the Angelica tour, and Shoba Narayan from the Philip tour):

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Official video for First Burn: