a sad day December 20, 2007

My friend asked me the other day if I’d heard anything about Jonathan Crombie (Gilbert from Anne of Green Gables fame) playing Man in Chair in The Drowsy Chaperone, and I said “oh no, I get The Drowsy Chaperone newsletter, I’d surely know if he’d been in the show.” Then I had a sickening feeling as I remembered how I’d rather cavalierly deleted one or two of those email newsletters without really reading them. Sure enough, I checked the trusty IBDB the next day, and found to my great dismay and regret that yes, I did miss my chance to see the wonderful, Canadian Jonathan Crombie in person in such a wonderful show, and could even have, perhaps (swoon), gotten his autograph (and said something very embarrassing and stupid I’m sure) at the stage door!! It almost seems fitting that on the heels of such horrible news, I check out Playbill.com today to find that The Drowsy Chaperone is closing at the end of the year.  It’s a sad day my friends.  A very sad day.

opera blues November 20, 2007

I feel like I should like the opera, but I don’t. It’s too much for me, most of the time. Occasionally someone in my family will come to visit and ask if I’d like to see an opera, and I have to scrunch my nose and say no thank you!

Of course, just as soon as I leave, the Met is doing an opera I really would like to see. Hansel and Gretel is right up my alley since it’s a fairy tale and I sang a song from it in high school choir. The sets look pretty awesome too. There’s also going to be an art exhibit at the Met which I am hoping to see before I go of book illustrations of this oh-so-famous tale.  Click on the picture for a sneak peak care of The New Yorker.

the business of Broadway November 13, 2007

…is seriously putting a crimp in my style. The skuttlebut is that the Broadway directors really don’t want to give in to the stagehands who want a bigger piece of the Broadway box office pie, so in turn, the stagehands want to hit the producers where it hurts – the holiday take. Bottom line, this strike could go on for weeks. Weeks!

Don’t they know I have a limited time to get as much theatre in as possible before I leave the Promised Land!?  I was hoping to see The Seafarer, The Little Mermaid, and Pygmalion before I left, but now, I’m worried it’s not possible.  Pygmalion is actually still running, but I was hoping to get into the Monday showing Thanksgiving week which, on the unusual night, is usually accessible, but now, I’m worried tourists will throw themselves at it since there are only 8 Broadway shows to choose from for the indefinite future.  If only they’d held off until 2008 it would have been so much better for me, and isn’t that the most important thing?

check it out, dude October 22, 2007

A coworker brought this site to my attention which is really a shame since I could easily lose hours at a time on this baby. Still, they’d be really fun hours, so I think you should go there too. Click on the picture to be transported to musical theatre heaven.

a trailer for a musical with no music? October 4, 2007

The first Sweeney Todd trailer is available for viewing online (Click poster for the link).  I’m worried.  I understand that having a trailer with virtually no singing might seem a better way to draw non-musical theatre crowds to the movie, but it also makes me think that perhaps the actors don’t sound so good.  I don’t even know how they got so much footage without singing in it – am I crazy in thinking of Sweeney Todd as 90% sung?
 I am devoted to Tim Burton, but he has let me down before.  I hope he doesn’t fail me this time.  I would love to love this movie.

things I thought about stuff October 4, 2007

• THE RITZ @ Studio 54.  I am apparently alone in my opinion, but I say it is a terrible play.  Perhaps when it came out it was funny in a very fluffy, purely entertainment way, but today, I’m sorry, having the only truly emotional note in your play being the possibility of a friendship between a gay and a straight guy just doesn’t cut it.
• AUSTENLANDby Shannon Hale.  It was ok.  I’d much rather read her YA stuff.  Much rather.
• ONCE.  Here’s the thing.  It’s a very nice movie.  But then people liked it, and hyped it to high heaven which is the opposite of what this kind of movie needs.  If you see it, you’ll enjoy it.  If you don’t see it, that’s fine too.  No need to see on the big screen, it’s the music and relationship that the movie’s about.
• THE LOVE CURSE OF THE RUMBAUGHSby Jack Gantos.  Really different from his other books, and other peoples’ books for that matter, very creepy; a good read for October.
• A CERTAIN SLANT OF LIGHTby Laura Whitcomb.  Couldn’t stop reading it (stayed up ’til 3am).  This is what I wanted from The Lovely Bones, glad I finally got it.
• THE GREEN GLASS SEA by Ellen Klages.  I just started reading this book, so I can’t share an opinion of it.  But I am mystified as to why I’m reading it.  Let me explain.  I, like many bibliophiles, have many scraps of papers with book titles on them.  Things I’ve seen or heard about that I want to read.  The scraps of paper float through drawers, over piles, fall out of notebooks, etc.  Some of them I eventually request from the library having completely forgotten why I was interested in them in the first place, which is really part of the fun.  But I really didn’t think this was the case with The Green Glass Sea.  I knew in my head that it was a book by the lady that wrote Life As We Knew It (really good, I recommend it to you all – but it will scare you).  But guess what, y’all?  It’s not.  Because Susan Beth Pfeffer wrote Life as We Knew It, and she’s not Ellen Klages now, is she?  So anyway, I don’t know why I’m reading Green Glass Sea exactly, but I liked to first chapter, so I’m very happy to continue.

Patti LuPone as Mama Rose August 3, 2007

Click on the poster for a taste of why I was thrilled to pay too much money to see the incomprable Patti LuPone in Gypsy this summer. There are rumors of a West End transfer, and I certainly hope it happens so that I may hope for a cast recording. This is the best Gypsy cast I’ve ever seen, and I’d love to listen to them over and over and over…

Tony’s 2007 June 20, 2007

I thought the Tony’s were pretty boring considering the lion share of awards went to The Coast of Utopia and Spring Awakening. I have good things to say about both
of those shows, but they certainly didn’t deserve all the awards, plus that’s just boring to watch. The only award that really thrilled me was Mary Louise Wilson (I’m glad Christine Ebersole won too, but that was more of a sure thing in my mind).

I also thought it was interesting that of the musical numbers presented, Mary Poppins was the only one that wasn’t just a piece of the show, it was a full on commercial. That’s why Disney is a billion dollar company, they know how to advertise.

May 2, 2007

Alcestis photo © Kah Leong Poon

Euripides’ Alcestis

In a version by Ted Hughes

“What would we do without this invaluable indie troupe that keeps finding brilliant poetic drama that others have somehow ignored?” —nytheatre.com on Handcart’s Alcestis

Only ten days remain to see Handcart Ensemble’s enthrallingly staged Alcestis (spotlighted under nytheatre.com’s Brilliant Writers, Onstage in NYC’s Indie Theaters). Combining powerfully acted characters with a mesmerizingly choreographed chorus and an innovative, actor-generated sound score, this production engages its audiences on every level imaginable. Ted Hughes’s dazzling adaptation of the Euripides text is sublime in its aural beauty, hilarity, and imagination — a career-crowning, final affirmation of life completed by England’s great Poet Laureate in the year of his death.

Performance Schedule

April 19th – May 5th, 2007
Thur – Fri 8:00 PM; Sat 2:00 PM & 8:00 PM

Location

The Salvation Army’s THEATRE 315
315 West 47th Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues
New York, NY 10036

Tickets

Tickets cost $18 and are available in advance through SmartTix at 212-868-4444 or smarttix.com. Please purchase advance tickets. There is no fee for buying advance tickets.

Special Offer !

Purchase advance tickets for only $15 using SmartTix discount code TED.

so, I saw some shows April 17, 2007

I’m so behind on telling you about shows, it’s ridicledackle, but here’s a little recap.  I saw Howard Katz at the Laura Pels Theatre.  Wasn’t a huge fan of the play, but I am a huge fan of Alfred Molina!  This is an actor that just never lets me down.  I would be thrilled to see him in just about anything.

While in CA I checked out The Marvelous Wonderettes which I heard about from a friend. I thought it’s be a good vacation show as it’s a jukebox musical based around girl group songs from the 50′s and 60′s. I was right. It’s not going to change the face of musical theatre, but it was a very good time, the perfect companion piece to Forever Plaid (a review show of boys songs from the 50′s), and I would recommend it.  Special shout-out to Kim Huber, I thought she was really great.

I really wish I’d gotten my act together and told you about this show right when I saw it, so maybe you could have gone to it. The Voysey Inheritance newly adapted by David Mamet, was wonderfully engaging. I’ve heard that Mamet cut at least an hour off of the show which seems amazing, particularly because I didn’t feel like I was missing anything. Yes, there were conversations that could have gone longer, but overall, I felt like I got everything I needed for the story, and was left wanting just a little more, which isn’t a bad thing.

I’m not going to say anything about Inherit the Wind right now, because it’s getting it’s own posting. But I will tell you this is the first of three Broadway plays that I saw last week. Three! That’s what I call crazy, sexy, cool. Well you know, that and TLC.  An interesting note, they are selling little stuffed monkeys in the lobby of the Lyceum theatre.  I’ve yet to decide if this is a brilliant marketing scheme, or a sign of the decline of American theatre production.

Finally, finally, finally I saw Grey Gardens, and I almost don’t know what to say. It is as magnificent as people say. The second act is based on the Maysles famous documentary, and the first act is a fictional preamble to that.  Having watched the documentary very recently, I can tell you that both Christine Ebersole and Mary Louise Wilson are magical.  They do not merely imitate these women, they are them.  The music was poignant and touching.  The whole experience was just a delight.  If you’re in New York this spring or summer, this is a must see.  And lastly, I would like you to know that they are selling little stuffed cats in the Walter Kerr Theatre lobby.  What’s going on?  What children are going to see Inherit the Wind and/or Grey Gardens?

And that brings us to this weekend’s viewing of 110 in the Shade.  This was my first exposure to the story as I’ve never read or seen this musical, or the play, The Rainmaker, that it’s based on (Shhh, don’t tell your I’ll get my theatre degree revoked), and while the story was interesting, I didn’t think it was told too well – don’t know if this is the play’s fault or the musical adaptation.  All I know is the first and last song were about the lack of rain, and all the songs in the middle were about Lizzie not having a husband; it seemed a little out of wack.  Of course Audra McDonald was great, I wouldn’t have expected anything else.  I’m still not under her spell as everyone else I know is, but she is great.  I was happy to see John Cullum again.  I can’t believe he’s still working so much at his age, but good for him.  And you know who’s spell I am under?  Christopher Innvar’s; he is big time dreamy.  Oh please, oh please, let Christopher keep doing lots of NY plays so I can keep seeing him.  There were no stuffed animals being sold at Studio 54, but I was not left in any way disappointed – we were sitting next to Michael Cerveris.  Yowza!  Now that’s a memorable afternoon at the theatre.