Your thoughts on the 2010 Promises, Promises revival- Page 2

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 9/26/15 at 6:43pm

I believe that it wasn't a question of whether Kristin Chenoweth could handle a serious role and more that she was a tad too mature for it. 

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 9/26/15 at 9:43pm

darquegk said: "For all its misfires, it tweaked/"fixed" an interesting issue with the original show. Neil Simon, the librettist, is not a big fan of traditional musical structure, and prefers to write a straight play with songs that comment, rather than a fully integrated musical. This is almost always changed in revivals and adaptations: "Promises, Promises," "Little Me" and "Sweet Charity" all added reprises and finales in the revival, where they original had only non-recurring numbers and dialogue finales.

 

"

Well in the case of Sweet Charity keep in mind he was brought on after the score had been written, and the scenes laid out.  PP was his conception (Merrick asking him what property he would like to do as a musical and who he would choose to write it with him.)

Theatreguy--that's fascinating.  I know the Bennett estate can be quite controlling, but in this case I wonder why they didn't just say yes (certainly the other moments in the show Bennett got kudos for were nearly all about how well he managed to choreograph the scene changes--something that obviously has not been notated in any form of dance choreography.)

 

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 9/26/15 at 9:48pm

promisespromises2 said: "I'm always surprised hearing this because I'm obsessed with the cast recording.

 

Why wasn't Chenoweth right for the role?  I've seen her in serious roles on film and thought she was incredible and I actually wish she did a bit more of them.  

 

"

I think she instantly comes off as too knowing.  Adding A House is Not a Home fits this---to stereotype, by her age in the 1960s as a secretary sleeping with her boss that makes sorta sense, but as the role is written (listen to the lyrics of "Knowing when to leave" she doesn't fit any of those characteristics.  

 

[OlBlueEyes]

Posted: 9/27/15 at 2:52am

At intermission there was little audience buzz and some left. But they missed what I thought was a hysterical second act courtesy of Sean Hayes, Katie Finneran and Dick Latessa. My audience agreed with me. I still find it hysterical (not quite as much) when I watch it again.

With the first two thirds of the second act played so broadly for laughs, I think that any actress would have had a hard time turning the audience from laughter into sudden pathos.

[muscle23ftl]

Posted: 9/27/15 at 3:15am

I absolutely loved it. The songs were great, the jokes, the old "Broadway" feeling of it. Megan Sikora leading Turkey Lurkey Time was the best part of the show. Sean Hayes was excellent, Katie Finneran had a great number that was hilariously funny and won her a Tony. Kristin Chenoweth was all wrong for this part, but she didn't ruin the show at all. Her understudy was much better than her. Tony Goldwyn was charming in it too. It was my favorite show that season and it didn't even get a Tony nomination for best revival. Typical! But it was a financial success if I remember correctly, it made over a million bucks most weeks.

[Jarethan]

Posted: 6/5/24 at 9:13pm

Lifeless and terribly dated.  I loved The Apartment and the original production, which I saw 3 or 4 times.  Somehow, this seemed sleazy to me…and dated.  I hated Katie Finneran’s performance, clearly impacted by my memories of Marian Mercer’s great performance.

The seats and costumes brought me back to a place I’d never want to revisit.

[MrsSallyAdams]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 7:06am

Well sung. But the show itself hasn't aged as well as the Wilder film. There's just no reason to invest in the central relationship. The leading lady lacks agency. She's simply battered between her predatory boss and her entitled "nice guy" co-worker for 2 and a half hours.

[WldKingdomHM]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 7:11am

If you can’t preform an amazing Turkey Lurkey Time don’t even bother. 
 

 

[raddersons]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 7:17am

EricMontreal22 said: "I dunno why they don't just always use the Bennett choreography for Turkey Lurkey Time."

i don’t think the producers want to pay for cast chiropractors

[joevitus]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 7:46am

Just irritates me that the revival cast recording is readily available, but the original cast recording doesn't have an iTunes release (and the CD is no longer in print). 

[Dreamboy3]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 8:36am

Updated On: 6/6/24 at 08:36 AM

[Auggie27]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 11:55am

As a longtime fan of the OBC - I saw it tryout in DC when I was a senior in high school (fall of '68) - I was majorly disappointed. The show is about a nebbish-in-a-crowd and a naif, two young cogs in a dehumanizing corporate wheel, the strength of the storytelling the ways these relative kids are exploited. Hayes wasn't entirely wrong, but his comic self-awareness was at odds with the everyman-ness of Chuck. Hayes was something Chuck can't be: cute. And aware of his cuteness. (Jerry Orbach, a character actor, nailed what Lemmon brought to the Apartment: that ordinariness) And Chenoweth was at least ten years older than Fran. Rather than self-present as a poor-ish office worker, she was dolled up in Mad Men drag. The younger Chenoweth might've landed the role with poignancy. But in 2010, at 42 (admittedly passing for 35ish), she was a New York sophisticate, one who burst into "I Say a Little Prayer" a song never in the show, and not really in the lexicon of a girl-woman in over her head  It killed the sense of the corporate machinery smother innocents .

That highlights the real problem: the revival was determined to give a singing star more to sing and interpolated songs that added no character information, only chances to express the same emotional states as existing songs.  Most egregious, in the already long first act, Chuck exits the party and Fran unnecessarily torches "A House Is Not a Home," a rueful meditation on domestic disharmony that wouldn't remotely occupy the thoughts of a young urban worker - and steals the excavated angst from act 2's "Whoever You Are, I Love You," a less analytical and more personal confession of a young woman involved with a married man. Thus Fran ended up with three songs about her unsolvable-except-by-suicide plight: "Knowing When to Leave" "House is Not a Home," "Whoever You Are," all of which basically covered the same plot turf. She ended up the most emotionally paralyzed heroine in a musical comedy. 

Craft was always present in the original - it's Chuck's story - and juking a well told Simon-structured show to serve the Bachrach songbook just added running time. From what I've heard, the interpolated songs cannot be licensed with the show. 

[Jarethan]

Posted: 6/6/24 at 12:33pm

MrsSallyAdams said: "Well sung. But the show itself hasn't aged as well as the Wilder film. There's just no reason to invest in the central relationship. The leading lady lacks agency. She's simply battered between her predatory boss and her entitled "nice guy" co-worker for 2 and a halfhours."

I have to admit that I have seen the movie in the past year and, to my surprise, I was very disappointed in it.  I think it did not age well either.  It seemed sordid in a way that I don't remember originally feeling, and I was bored at times..  Maybe the Me-too movement has impacted my view on things more significantly that I realized.