Profile for bear88

CoffeeBreak said: "The star of Maybe Happy ending is Maybe Happy Ending. Criss being there doesn't matter. Andrew being there doesn't matter. The show is running with anyone in it is the thing. If there is a real star-in-the-making in that show it's Dez. But people want to see Maybe Happy Ending the cast is pretty irrelevant at this point.

Maybe Happy Ending is that underrated thing, a well-crafted, mainstream Broadway musical. It can thrive

I caught the Hamilton pro shot on Thursday night. I haven’t really sat down and watched it since the musical came out on Disney five years ago, and haven’t seen it in person since 2019, when I saw it on tour.

While I have expressed some melancholy about the ironic twist of American Then (when the show first came out) versus America Now, and whether the show is an Obama era relic, there’s still a jolt in watching it on the big screen. It’s

BJR said: "I still maintain this not transferring could be a terrible sign for the health of Bway. This is a production that absolutely would have transferred anytime pre-pandemic, or anytime pre-now really.

It broke through to pop culture, seemed to cause a sensation, and while not a tiny show like that Cake musical or Mincemeat, it's not massive spectacle so large it would've precluded it prior to common economics."

It’s one reason why I wa

I have learned to mistrust the Telecharge seating charts because I assume (with rare exceptions) that the producers are holding plenty of seats back. Maybe Ragtime isn’t because of the Lincoln Center subscriber base and the show’s status as a modern classic that should sell well in its early months.

But Chess? Lea Michele’s drawing power is unproven outside of the unique alchemy of Funny Girl. Tveit has a fan base but I&r

I remain a bit obsessed with this production. I saw a local production (which was very good) years ago and I did wonder how well this musical would age. The answer is: remarkably well. The cast is pretty much perfect. In my earlier comment, I didn’t give enough credit to Jamie Parker who doesn’t have the musical standout songs (or the voice) compared to the rest of the cast but whose acting is first-rate and really makes me feel for his character, even when he is making bad -

binau said: "I would not be surprised if we just saw the last revival of Gypsy with Audra."

After three consecutive commercial failures in this century, that’s certainly possible. The next Gypsy revival would probably be at a nonprofit. But there’s always the possibility that some major star - not just a Broadway star, because that’s not enough - would want to take a crack at it in 15 or 20 years.

By then, the musical will

The upcoming season doesn’t seem too exciting on the new musical front, but it’s still early. I do wonder if the combination of the loss of the tax credit, the Trump economic uncertainty, and the failure of even ‘successful’ musicals to recoup is combining to make producers skittish. (I know there were extenuating circumstances, and commercial revivals generally have a tough time making money, but the inability of Sunset Blvd. to recoup struck me as a dis

The endless trolling behavior by the same small group of people who hijack threads feels worse now. While I have historically not been a fan of aggressive moderation, it’s obvious that some people are taking advantage of their absence (aside from allegations of wrongdoing, which are quickly acted upon even when the issues are the subject of published reports).

All of this is driving good contributors away and discouraging everyone except for the trolls and people who take th