Profile for LucyEth

Saw the show yesterday afternoon.  Thought it was hugely entertaining, an old-fashioned musical with modern-day smarts.  David Henry Hwang and Jeanine Tesori have, remarkably, combined a hate crime and the aftershocks of the Trump election to create a funny, moving and important piece of political musical theater -- all the time paying homage to R&H and the great song and dance shows of the past.  It's an odd, relevant and unlikely master work that ends o

Saw this last night.  Close to three hours of sound and fury, signifying not much at all (and not wholly historically accurate).  We witness the birth of the worst kind of tabloid journalism possible, and while much of it resonates and reflects on what's happening in journalism and social media today, I can't say I ever had any "aha" moments.  It's an interesting play, beautifully performed and mounted, but I was never drawn into the st

SPOILERS AHEAD

JBroadway: Apologies for taking so long to get back to you, have been busy with Life!

For me, by cutting unnecessary characters and events -- no-one invents the phone machine, there's no Frank Jr., no lawyer Jerome -- this production clarifies what's important about the story, and that's the relationship between these three people.  There's a poignancy to the "Old Friends" section of "It's a Hit" that never hit me befor

I'm really surprised and disappointed by the negative comments here.  Obviously tastes differ, but I find this to be the only production since the original that justifies the story going backward.  It's always been the conceit, of course, but IMHO the Lapine version (and its subsequent iterations, some of which I have enjoyed very much) simply starts when it starts and goes back in time without ever explaining why.  By eliminating the high school gra

Full disclosure, I'm an original cast member, so this show is very dear to my heart, as you can imagine.  I was there last night and found it thrilling.  It's a complete top-to-bottom reinvention of the show, one that focuses solely on the six main characters, using some earlier book scenes and lyrics, most of which I've never heard before.  Locations are changed, songs are deconstructed, lyrics are reassigned -- and the whole thing works incredibly well.

OMG, saw this last night.  One of the most inept, amateurish evening I've ever experienced in the theater.  And I'm a native New Yorker who's been seeing theater for over 40 years.  (And no, I'm not too old to appreciate well-done fluff.)  Dove Cameron, was out, which might have contributed to the slapdash nature of things, but I can't imagine that her presence would have helped that much.  Truly, this was like a stale Hasty Pudding spoof. &nb

I know it's not fair to judge a show for what it's not, but I think this would have been so much more successful had they concentrated on how a small town deals with homophobia.  Had Beth Leavel and Chris Sieber played Emma's parents (she's too conveniently alone right now, IMHO -- where the hell is grandma?), the writers would have been able to really explore the whole conflicted family vs. town dynamic.  Even if they were accepting parents dealing with a

This was pretty much a total miss for me.  It just had no idea what it wanted to be.  One moment it was a sitcom (and a not very funny one at that), the next a Barbara Stanwyck mother/daughter weepy.  And then at the end we're asked to take it all super seriously.  The anachronistic dialogue drove me crazy.  Every time Glenn Close called Joan "Joanie," I kept thinking "...loves Chachi."  And when the high tone woman at the castle tells&nbs

Saw this tonight and have very mixed feelings.  On the one hand, it definitely takes a while to get going.  The songs don't really have anything to do with what's happening onstage beyond reflecting the moods of the characters.  And there is way too much exposition in Act 1 about people you don't really care about...and never do.  On the other hand, this is the most crazily talented ensemble I've had the privilege to watch since "Come From Aw

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Add me to the list of the unimpressed.  While not a complete disaster, this production adds NOTHING to our understanding of the text in any way, shape or form.  It's bewildering to leave an audience sitting in silence for a full minute as Field and Mantello lift impaired actress Madison Ferris onto the stage.  Given that she turns out to be a not particularly skilled actress makes her casting more stunt than inspiration.  It's a choice that'