Tarzan Reviews- Page 2

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:03pm

NICE!

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:06pm

http://www.talkinbroadway.com/world/Tarzan.html

Negative:

"Don't believe anyone who tells you there's no entertainment value in Tarzan. While Disney's stage adaptation of its 1999 animated film, which just opened at the Richard Rodgers, might at first seem a theatrical black hole, there are in fact numerous joys for the intrepid theatregoer.

And, believe it or not, they're found in David Henry Hwang's libretto. Where else could ammunition for mockery be proffered so readily, practically on a silver platter? Following are several sample lines from Tarzan's book, along with possible retorts. Theatre lovers are encouraged, nay expected, to devise their own as well:

"Not everybody can fall down that often and still get up!" "Disney Theatricals does a great job!"

"'Can't' is a box in which we hold our limitations." "You mean like the Richard Rodgers?"

"You're rapidly sliding down the evolutionary ladder!" "Tarzan proves there's not much farther for theatre to go!"

Yes, we can thank Hwang for the hours and hours of fun to be derived from Tarzan's book. But for the fact that hardly any of it is intentional, and that this bloated behemoth is one of the most deadening shows to arrive on Broadway since the last Hwang-Disney collaboration of Elton John and Tim Rice's Aida in 2000, we must blame Hwang and director Bob Crowley. They've worked tirelessly to make this adaptation of Tab Murphy, Bob Tzudiker, and Noni White's Disney screenplay and Edgar Rice Burroughs's original story as offensive to serious theatregoers as it is inoffensive to mass audiences."

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:07pm

Talkin Broadway is Negative:

"Yes, we can thank Hwang for the hours and hours of fun to be derived from Tarzan's book. But for the fact that hardly any of it is intentional, and that this bloated behemoth is one of the most deadening shows to arrive on Broadway since the last Hwang-Disney collaboration of Elton John and Tim Rice's Aida in 2000, we must blame Hwang and director Bob Crowley. They've worked tirelessly to make this adaptation of Tab Murphy, Bob Tzudiker, and Noni White's Disney screenplay and Edgar Rice Burroughs's original story as offensive to serious theatregoers as it is inoffensive to mass audiences.

Julie Taymor successfully courted both groups with her direction for Disney's stage adaptation of The Lion King, using tried-and-true techniques to deliver sumptuous visuals while serving the story. And during the isolated times that happens in Tarzan, the results are as close to impressive as anything is here: The harrowing opening sequence, depicting the storm, shipwreck, and fateful Africa landfall of Tarzan's parents, suggests Crowley is following Taymor's visionary example in creating a spectacular, kinetic theatrical event.

But as soon as it's time to focus on the titular ape man, Tarzan becomes a huge, vine-entangled mess.
________________________________________________________________

The tree-representing "walls" of Crowley's sets look like the tissue-paper-streamer remnants of a birthday party for a child with an unhealthy green fixation. Crowley's costumes are half-hearted Victorian knock-offs for the humans, and for the ape chorus resemble a leather bar on caveman theme night. The mostly successful lighting (Natasha Katz) now and again plays with shadow, silhouette, and perspective in ways that might be effective were they supported by the writing.
________________________________________________________________

Of course, as the apes and humans are all singing Phil Collins songs, magic was probably always a long shot. Collins, a soft-rock sensation of the 1980s whose career has somehow not waned as his contemporaries' have, has retained his songs for the film (including the syrupy, inexplicably Oscar-winning "You'll Be In My Heart") and penned new ones every bit as forgettable. His lyrics are better than those Bernie Taupin gave this season's other pop-schlock score, Lestat, but are too droning, repetitive, and nonspecific to be even decent theatre music.
_______________________________________________________________

But if you must pity someone, make it Gambatese. An adept singer and game young actress constantly misused by Broadway (she last starred in All Shook Up), she gets the show's only intentionally funny line (comparing ape-speak to the Romance languages), but is otherwise saddled with nonstop thankless tasks as the story's token Sierra Club representative. How can you help but feel for someone whose introductory number requires her to marvel at Africa's native flora and fauna (which resemble an LSD-fueled Little Shop of Horrors) while rattling off their scientific names in all their incomprehensible glory?

The rest of the lyrics and dialogue could just as well be in Latin, too, for all the difference it would make. But then you'd likely miss timeless lines like Gregory's "Should I be punished for my intelligence?" No, Terk. But Hwang, Crowley, Collins, and the rest should be punished for their lack of it in bringing this fur-trimmed fiasco to Broadway."


http://www.talkinbroadway.com/world/Tarzan.html

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:09pm

NOW WE'RE TALKING!!!!

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:10pm

Ditto 100%, Munk.

[liotte]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:11pm

Munk and Yankeefan007, I know you guys don't like the show, but to hope for its failure, to want bad reviews, and to exclaim "NICE!" and "NOW WE'RE TALKING!" when a bad review is posted is not only rude, but mean-spirited and a disgusting display of yourselves.
Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:11 PM

[YankeeGal#24]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:14pm

I really think it's totally classless to celebrate negative reviews. I mean, what do you care? Do you need validation for what you thought of the show that desperately?

Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:14 PM

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:14pm

The AP is Mostly Negative:

"Tarzan, baby, you've come a long way from the days of Johnny Weissmuller - and that's not necessarily a compliment.

Hollywood's most famous incarnation of Edgar Rice Burroughs' jungle hero might have a hard time recognizing the new version of himself, the one unveiled Wednesday at Broadway's Richard Rodgers Theatre. That's where Disney opened a stage adaptation of its 1999 animated film.

And while the elaborate production is visually stunning, the show, directed and designed by Bob Crowley, is emotionally and musically lightweight - almost as skimpy as Tarzan's leather loincloth.
________________________________________________________________

The music, while melodic, is not theatrical. It's anthemlike in presentation and, more often than not, stalls David Henry Hwang's straightforward if not terribly involving recitation of how Tarzan came to be and his subsequent identity crisis.
________________________________________________________________

Crowley's ape costumes accentuate fuzzy, almost feathery bodies and heads, but the faces remain human. They give the performers room to bound and leap across the jungle setting. That movement is the work of several people, most notably Pichon Baldinu, who did the aerial design and Meryl Tankard, in charge of the athletic choreography. It's exhausting.

Crowley, best known for his Tony-winning sets for the Lincoln Center Theater revival of Carousel and Disney's Aida, gives his all in the design department. And his work is quite eye-popping.
_______________________________________________________________

But then the sparks between Jane and Tarzan don't exactly ignite either. And humour is scarce, too, although a smidgen can be found in the performance of Chester Gregory II as Terk, the most jivin' and incongruously street-wise of the apes. He gets to lead the crew in Collins' jazzy Trashin' the Camp, the catchiest number in the film and on stage.

In one of the musical's most accomplished bits of stagecraft, a huge butterfly swings and soars over the audience. With a musical as unfortunately earthbound as Tarzan, you have to appreciate every high-flying moment you can get.


http://jam.canoe.ca/Theatre/2006/05/10/1573625-ap.html

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:16pm

I admit, it's totally classless.


However, when I posted my scathing review, I was attacked. Brutally attacked.

What can I say, besides "I told you so?"

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:17pm

liotte, we all know I didn't particularly care for the show. Do I want it to get bad reviews? It would be nice, as, I believe, that's what it deserves. Had it been done with a different creative team, I'm sure it could have been better.

Am I rooting for the show to fail? 100% no. I'd like for it to get bad reviews, but I don't want it to fail. The ramifications of 1 closed show are huge. Hundreds of people are put out of work. Actors have families to feed and worry about. God bless 'em. I hope it has a nice run. I just don't want it to get good reviews.

Wanting bad reviews and wanting it to fail are two different things.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:18pm

That's where we're different.

I'm hoping for it's failure. There's no way this trash should occupy a Broadway theatre. It shouldn't be tolerated.

[muscle23ftl]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:19pm

probably this show will be a hit, even if it gets negative reviews, anyone agrees? i haven't seen the show though, just a feeling it's been selling very well since it started previews.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:21pm

It's selling very well, at 100% capacity every week.

It's really disgusting, but at this point, most of the ticket sales are out of curiosity.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:24pm

Soapbox: I think this story makes a case for the spiritual power of adoption in ways, say, SEUSSICAL failed (though it tried.) I'm not defending the show's execution, but I don't understand the cynicism about its supposedly pandering ambitions, or the central metaphor: the loving bond that holds all non-traditional families together.

I find it unduly ugly to trash that as a theme. Maybe it's handled in a bald or ham-fisted way. But in a culture where Ozzie and Harriet (or the Cleavers ... or the Cosby show, or take your pick from the last 20 years) is history as a viable universal model, to me it's not fair to condemn material that attempts to find the common experience in ties between parents and children thrown together by fate or forces other than biological ones.

Our children today being raised in complex, non-traditional families -- two mommies, two daddies, one mom, one dad, zero moms and dads but many cousins/aunts -- need mythology and tall tales to serve them. At least this one has its heart decidedly in the right place. In today's "culture of life," can't we celebrate love what isn't explained by DNA? If that's "Disney," can we agree that it's a positive? It seems cold-hearted to preach against its exploration of these non-traditional themes at a time when some divisive elements in our culture are far too obsessed with "traditional" family values. Let Tarzan and his nurturing apes teach us something, no matter how simple or small.

Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:24 PM

[popular_elphie]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:26pm

This show will most likely be a hit anyways. It's Disney, and it's family. I agree that the show isn't the best thing on Broadway right now.

It's not good manners to hope for a show's failure, but if some of you guys don't like the show, who is anyone else to stop you?

[VinnieTheIceman]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:29pm

Ben's up and it ain't pretty.

[bjh2114]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:31pm

"It's not good manners to hope for a show's failure, but if some of you guys don't like the show, who is anyone else to stop you?"

I don't think that hoping for a BAD show to get bad reviews is an incorrect sentiment. Would you rather the terrible show get good reviews?? That doesn't make any sense. I think wishing for bad reviews and wishing for the show's failure are two VERY different things!
-BJH

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:33pm

The Times is Negative:

"The tree-surfing title character is not the only creature sailing through the air in "Tarzan," the giant, writhing green blob with music that opened last night at the Richard Rodgers Theater. Apes, flowers, moths, a snake, a leopard, a hut-size spider, two shipwrecked Victorians, an English botanist in her underwear: no sooner do such figures make their entrances in this restless adaptation of the 1999 Disney animated film than they find themselves pulled into some kind of airborne aerobics.

Almost everybody and everything swings in "Tarzan." Which is odd, since the show itself, to borrow from Duke Ellington's famous credo, definitely ain't got that swing.

"Tarzan" is the latest, and most insistently kinetic, offering from Disney Theatrical Productions, the Goliath that conquered little old Broadway by turning cartoon movies from its mother company into stage shows, including "Beauty and the Beast" and "The Lion King." Directed (and largely designed) by Bob Crowley, with songs by Phil Collins and a book by David Henry Hwang, "Tarzan" feels as fidgety and attention-deficient as the toddlers who kept straying from their seats during the performance I saw.

Though much money (a reported $12 million to $15 million) and international research (with special emphasis on what a character in the show calls pendulation) has been lavished on "Tarzan," it somehow never acquired the art of focus. Momentous events — from fatal fights with evil animals to Freudian struggles between parents and children of two species — occur regularly in the course of this retelling of Edgar Rice Burroughs's evergreen adventure novel. But any tension or excitement is routinely sabotaged by overkill and diffuseness.

No moment seems to carry more dramatic weight than any other. All instances of swinging (and they are countless) have been created equal. And Mr. Collins's soda-pop songs (expanded from those he wrote for the film) surface and evaporate more or less at random, like bubbles on a pond. The whole experience starts to feel like a super-deluxe day care center, equipped with lots of bungee cords and karaoke synthesizers, where kids can swing when they get tired of singing and vice versa.
________________________________________________________________

In contrast to the treacle of Mr. Collins's music and lyrics is the abrasively wiseguy tone of the script by Mr. Hwang ("M. Butterfly," the book for the Disney musical "Aida"). "Do you know how many apes are lost to underripe bananas?" asks Terk, trying to steal Tarzan's snack. "It's a silent epidemic." And the Latin-quoting Jane, upon realizing she is trapped in that spider's web, says, "O excrementum!"

Better, perhaps, to shift your attention from plot and dialogue to song and dance, except that it's often impossible to tell who's singing. (Even solos are coated with layers of disembodied offstage voices.) And Meryl Tankard's choreography is just a grounded version of Mr. Baldinu's aerial acrobatics.

So that leaves you with the visuals, and since Mr. Crowley is known to be a brilliant stage designer (his work includes the Lincoln Center "Carousel" and the Broadway-bound "Mary Poppins"), there should be plenty to divert the eye. Well, the apes — who suggest a cross between heavy-metal band refugees and Daryl Hannah in "The Clan of the Cave Bear" — are certainly novel looking. And those floating, singing flowers have a kind of "Fantasia" appeal.

But only Natasha Katz's lighting, especially the impressionist dots that suggest flocks of butterflies, summons a magical spirit. Otherwise all those layers and layers of green — walls of shredded cloth and scrims and floor coverings — start to induce claustrophobia after a while. No wonder the cast members spend so much time in the air. Even with a personal spotlight, no one has much of a chance of standing out in this oppressive jungle. "


http://theater2.nytimes.com/2006/05/11/theater/reviews/11tarz.html

Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:33 PM

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:33pm

Vinnie: You attacked me when I posted a negative TARZAN review. What do you have to say about that now?

[JerseyScoundrel]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:34pm

BEN BRANTLEY: IT DOES NOT HAVE THAT SWING

This is definitley not a slam dunk for Disney. However, because of the commercial appeal, it will probably last. Broadway is getting so commercial that it makes me sick.

Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:34 PM

[Fabrizio2]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:37pm

I didn't really like Josh Strickland...that much....really...I didnt like him at all actually.

I thought the set looked like green bungee jumping cords.

I didn't like the movie in the first place anyways.

I liked the marketing.

I think that this was not well planned out...It needs a lot more work, I'm sorry.

That's my review.
Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:37 PM

[sondwisenheimer]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:39pm

I can see the quote on the marquee now:

"Momentous!"

- Ben Brantley, NY Times
Updated On: 5/10/06 at 10:39 PM

[VinnieTheIceman]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:39pm

Munk, I think you're an immature young fellow who only finds satisfaction in knocking things down to your pathetic level. I feel sorry you need to do this to feel better about yourself. Yes, the reviews are stinkers, but let's think about the need you have to continuously pull the show down. Have you accomplished that little in your life thus far?

[JerseyScoundrel]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:40pm

Fabrizio2,

I also agree. The show, since it has commercial appeal, will probably only last till December. Im sure the kids will be coming down to check it out with their families on Christmas break.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/10/06 at 10:41pm

IS THAT NOT LAUGHABLE!

Yes, for those of you that haven't seen the show, those are supposed to be primates.