I love it. This is my favorite thread ever!
Wow, reading this thread makes me appreciate even more the genius of my high school's director. I don't think we've ever put on a show that didn't end up looking at least descent. The worst thing I have ever seen at a high school was when a nearby school had their leads use microphones but no one else, so the chorus numbers were about half the volume of everything else. That really annoyed me.
Many moons ago, I was in a production of Camelot. During Arthur's speech at the end of Act 1, the entire set proceeded to fall down around his Medieval feet. Metaphorically, it was perfect.
"Miss Elphie: You need to contact the U.S. Copyright office immediately and copyright that post. Someone is bound to steal it for their own. And I am warning you right now it will most likely be I.
"Jubilation T.....just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter....Cornpone""
haha! No one can take it. I have it on video to prove it!
Miss Elphie, Get copies of that video on E-Bay without further delay. You have one copy sold already. (he calls Visa to have credit limit raised.)
"Rose, "FINE me a find" You're damn right they should have been fined......several thousand dollars."
Heh...oops. I'm such a bad typist...
"Miss Elphie, Get copies of that video on E-Bay without further delay. You have one copy sold already. (he calls Visa to have credit limit raised.)"
Haha! Hmmm...I never thought I could make money with this...
(goes to find video tape from years ago that is probably unmarked...)
Miss Elphie, LOL times infinity. You are killing me! "That is probably unmarked." And rightfully so, Miss Edna.
*takes a bow*
Well, I always thought if I wasn't in auto insurance I would be in comedy. Oh wait, auto insurance IS comedy...
Miss Elphie, Nobody could take the dents out of your production of Lil Abner produced by special arrangemnent with Bette Midler.
how true.
"Some say love...it is in Dogpatch..."
Updated On: 6/9/05 at 01:16 PM
If only Ed Wood were alive to film these posts!
Memo to Miss Elphie: Honey, you're in my will.
This wasn't a high school production, but the worst college production I've seen was of Sweeney Todd. I was in the front row, and I could barely hear the chorus leaders when the got to the front of the stage. Also, I usually like sitting through musicals. This production of "Sweeney Todd" was boring. My high school did a better job putting on "Seussical the Musical." I was in it too!
I will tell you a story of some bad school theatre.
Back when I was in Grade 10, almost a year ago. I was in a production of Bye Bye Birdie that was not bad at all, in fact, we got a lot of media attention for it being really good. Anyway back to the bad theatre. I decided to go and see a local junior highschool production of the same play. They cut out like, ALL the songs, I kid you not there were like 5 and Conrad could NOT play the guitar! he was off beat I cried
Broadway Star Joined: 1/29/05
This wasn't my high school, but a school near ours put on "Grease!" and lip-synched to the movie soundtrack.
This isn't really one of my stories but one of my directors told me about it:
He went to see a production of West Side that he knew a kid in and I guess they changed some things so Maria walks in right after berardo is suppsoed to get shot and that is where the act ends. But bernardo never entered so when she heard the music she entered anyway, and it is riff on stage (the character still alive because they haven't faught) and Riff panicks and shoots Maria! The entire show ended right there.
Stand-by Joined: 4/1/04
You all are seriously cracking me up!!! He shot Maria?!?!?
I love it!!
So far we haven't had any true horrible-ness yet. In our production of Pirates of Penzance we had to cast a girl who really couldn't sing in the role of Fredrick's nanny-person. She pulled it off, though, with her personality.
Can anyone else see the future Wicked productions unfortunately looking like this?
http://www.applausetheatre.com/Previous%20Productions/oz_prod_photos/pages/134-3471_IMG.htm
Updated On: 6/10/05 at 10:11 PM
OMG TOTALLY, cathy!
"This wasn't a high school production, but the worst college production I've seen was of Sweeney Todd. I was in the front row, and I could barely hear the chorus leaders when the got to the front of the stage. Also, I usually like sitting through musicals. This production of "Sweeney Todd" was boring. My high school did a better job putting on "Seussical the Musical." I was in it too!"
Well, let us compare the two musicals. Hm... Flaherty... Sondheim...Flaherty... Sondheim... riiiiiiiiight. And you're done. I won't even get into the difficulty of acting those roles. Let's see your highschool try on Sweeney instead of another Webber, Schwartz, or Rogers, or Flaherty show.
Oooo I'm a hot head tonight.
Stand-by Joined: 6/3/05
We did Finian's Rainbow. It sucked in so many different ways, it's impossible to describe. I won Class Thespian and I QUIT the show it sucked SO BADLY.
Candleshoe2,those photos, which I could not continue to view, defy description.
And how long before the Broadway CHICAGO looks like this:
http://www.applausetheatre.com/Previous%20Productions/chicago/index.htm
What is this place, Applause Theatre? Since I can enjoy really bad theatre, I feel the need to go........almost.
Swing Joined: 6/11/05
Even worse than the bad high school performances . . . bad summer camp performances.
Several summers ago I was hired as a technical supervisor for a camp's theater program. We did 2 shows, both with only 2 weeks of preproduction. The first was Little Shop of Horrors, and the 2nd was Guys and Dolls. Only a few problems here.
1. The camp director wanted the shows to be 30 minutes or less.
2. Every kid that auditioned HAD to be put in the show
and
3. He wanted it G-rated. So in LSoH, there was no talk of killing, abuse, sex, or any of that. And in GaD, no gambling, and no hot box girls.
Does anybody else see the problems with all that?? 70 kids on a stage that can't hold 20, singing songs that make no sense because all of the major plot points had to be removed. I felt bad because there were 2 or 3 kids who were really talented, but couldn't shine in the huge casts with cruddy material.
The director was so pleased with the end result that he asked us all to come back the following year. I turned it down because I couldn't do that and sleep at night.
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