Profile for The Distinctive Baritone

Close is just jealous that Nicole Scherzinger is getting so much praise for “her” role. Let it go, girl. “Nothing’s wrong with being eighty - unless you’re acting fifty!”

The character of Rafaela is a fictional composite, and from what I gather, the main storyline about being “in love with two people at the same time” is pretty much made up, so that’s pretty glaring, I’d say. It had some good songs though.

In fairness, Gould and Kreitzer wrote the show, and not all writers are willing and able to have their work “shaped” in the way that Chavkin guided Hadestown and Great Comet to Broadway. Directing a new musical or play does sometimes involve being a dramaturg or kind of ghost writer or “silent partner,” but not necessarily. Every collaboration is going to be different.

Grosses from last week are out and listed HERE

New shows playing at obviously below-the-nut (in some case, very, very below) include:

Lempica ($288K...yikes)

Heart of Rock and Roll ($371K...another yikes))

Illinoise ($728K...not bad but not good either)

Suffs ($630K)

I really don’t get how Astrov is considered a leading role but Sonia and Yelena are not. Aside from his long monologue about trees his part is the same size as the other principals’.

With Eden’s several missed performances since opening, will enough nominators have seen her for her to make the cut? I hope she gets a nomination, especially since who knows what her career is going to look like after this thing closes. I genuinely feel bad for her. 

Looks like Sarah Paulson now has some real competition for the Tony.

I have played both Cliff and Ernst, and there is nothing in the text that suggests Ernst is attracted to Cliff. However, I distinctly remember in the Mendes production Denis O’Hare adding a sexual subtext to lines like “We make a large whoopee,” etc. It made zero sense, but O’Hare is such a great actor that it somehow worked. When was that? 1998? Strange what we remember about plays we see.

Anyway, this is not the first professional production of Cabaret

Looking at the grosses from the past couple of weeks, there is sadly no way Lempicka is not going to post a closing notice immediately after the Tony nominations are announced a week from today. The grosses have been in the $300K's, which is absolutely abysmal, especially for a musical: Broadway Grosses.

Poor Gayle Rankin is, I’m sure, doing exactly what the director told her to do. There is no reason to speculate that she will be replaced prior to her scheduled departure date. Some of the reviews have even commented on how they think she could have been a better Sally if she was allowed to play the role without so much directorial mismanagement.

I think it’s somewhat unfair to negatively compare Eden’s performance to Mariand’s in regards to pitch etc. since Eden clearly has vocal fatigue from a role that makes singing Elphaba eight times a week look like a walk in the park. Also, in the bootleg I heard of Mariand’s “Woman Is,” she actually does go painfully flat on one of the big screaming high notes - not that I can blame her, since the song is just insanely (and unnecessarily) high.

I had to look up who Greg Nubile is. A producer on Enemy of the People and last year’s Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window is dunking on stars in plays? What?

And Michael Schulman for the win. He’s funny AND correct.

I didn’t say it was a pan, I said it was negative. He praised the actors but said in the kindest way possible that the material is not very good. But I supppse it is probably more mixed, overall.

Variety is negative:

Variety review

Interesting that both musical versions cast boyish tenors (and Tonys in the two most recent WSS revivals) in the title role.