50th Anniversary Revival of A CHORUS LINE still on track for 2025?- Page 4

[rg7759]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 5:45am

What would be impressive and an event is if they used the venue used in the movie (across from wicked)

[ACL2006]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 8:00am

MezzoDiva47 said: "
mezzodiva47 has spoken

bow down accordingly

"

your posts are annoying just because of your tagline at the end. STFU!

[Bwaygurl2]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 8:38am

ACL2006 said: "MezzoDiva47 said: "
mezzodiva47 has spoken

bow down accordingly

"

your posts are annoying just because of your tagline at the end. STFU!"

They seem tongue in cheek and not something to get worked up over?

A part of me thinks Chorus Line shouldn't be messed with, but how thrilling would it be if someone mounted a fresh production that really worked? Of course the risk is that it would be awful but that's the thrill of theater. 

[Dreamboy3]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 9:35am

I don’t think the Bennet estate would allow major changes. 
 

The staging is what makes ACL the astonishing work that it is. I don’t want to see a director with one tenth the talent of Bennet think that he or she or they can do better than Bennet. So I would be more open to book changes and score and lyric changes. 

But casting is huge. And the “leads” in the  2006 revival were just…so so.

[The8re phan]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 9:58am

What is Robbie Fairchild doing these days?

[ACL2006]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 10:00am

Charlotte was fine as Cassie. Her singing was her weakness. Considering who else was up for Cassie, I'd take Charlotte over Natasha Diaz. The backstage stories from that revival were terrible based on the poor stage management and immaturity of about half of the cast. Which is why I hope none of them return for this revival (even though most are too old now anyway).

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 10:15am

I saw that revival so many times. My favorite thing is when we would do standing room, Mario Lopez would be in back of us, working out on the stairs going up to the mezz. He’d be grunting and whatnot doing his sit-ups and pushups for most of the show and while it was distracting, it was also hilarious. 

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 10:28am

The8re phan said: "What is Robbie Fairchild doing these days?"

At age 37, there’s nothing in A CHORUS LINE that would be appetizing for him, not even the role of Zach. 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 10:28am

Dreamboy3 said: "I don’t think the Bennet estate would allow major changes."

The Bennett estate is John Breglio, his lawyer, who produced the 06 revival and likely would produce or oversee any upcoming revival too.

The originalist tendencies of some members here are coming out in this thread, which is unsurprising but always disappointing.

A Chorus Line will cease to be exciting or relevant if it is treated as a museum piece that may only be done one specific way in its staging and design, AND if a show about young people is to be restaged and produced by people in their late 70s-80s.

If Bennett were alive and overseeing his own revival, I’d like to think it would more resemble Arthur Laurents’ work on his revivals of GYPSY. Theatre is living, breathing, and evolving.

[ACL2006]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 10:29am

I saw it 19 times. The swings and understudies made bank due to going on so frequently.

Lopez was the worst thing about that revival. Bennett is going to chew out Baayork & Bob Avion for that.

The original cast would call out so frequently. Mostly Porter, Goldyn, McGill, Yazbeck, Jason Tam...

[Dreamboy3]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 11:38am

ErmengardeStopSniveling said: "Dreamboy3 said: "I don’t think the Bennet estate would allow major changes."

The Bennett estate is John Breglio, his lawyer, who produced the 06 revival and likely would produce or oversee any upcoming revival too.

The originalist tendencies of some members here are coming out in this thread, which is unsurprising but always disappointing.

A Chorus Line will cease to be exciting or relevant if it is treated as a museum piece that may only be done one specific way in its staging and design, AND if a show about young people is to be restaged and produced by people in their late 70s-80s.

If Bennett were alive and overseeing his own revival, I’d like to think it would more resemble Arthur Laurents’ work on his revivals of GYPSY. Theatre is living, breathing, and evolving."

I have worked with Breglio and know he is the Bennett estate. But gee thanks for pointing out that irrelevant fact. 🙄 And during his lifetime Bennet said a number of times that he was opposed to revivals.  

The issue is that unlike, for example Sondheim or Rogers and Hammerstein shows where the score is what makes the show and directors can bring their vision to present the show in a new light, that is not ACL. While I love the score of ACL it really functions as support for the staging. Can you imagine  production of Sweeney, etc with a reworked score?

[Sutton Ross]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 12:07pm

I think they'll do something to honor the 50th anniversary whether that be a star studded one night concert or a very short run on Broadway packed with high profile Broadway stars. I hope?

[JasonC3]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 12:23pm

While I'm certainly open to fresh interpretations, I think it is quite possible that A Chorus Line is one of few major hits that could survive for quite some time as a "museum piece.  "The stories and very minimal staging/props are relatively timeless.  And One as a closing number is as—if not more—exciting than a lot of the tech-driven big moments in current productions.

Updated On: 1/5/25 at 12:23 PM

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 12:49pm

There are two big issues, IMO:

• The original cast is so baked into the DNA of the show, and it may be that it will NEVER be performed as effectively by another troupe of dancers. Maybe some of the choreo has to be modified by 25% to fit a new cast like a glove (in the same way that sometimes musical scores get new arrangements/orchestrations, changed keys, and different vocal interpretations). (Maybe elements of the book would benefit by getting sharpened too, I don't know.)
• There shouldn't have to be such a slavish level of reproduction for this or any show to succeed. Choreo by Robbins and Fosse and others has more than survived being reinterpreted by different choreographers & restagers, and used in context that didn't involve the original direction and design.

Updated On: 1/5/25 at 12:49 PM

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 1/5/25 at 12:59pm

Also of note, Michael Bennett wasn’t opposed to modifying and making changes to his work. For the First National Tour of DREAMGIRLS, he completely reworked the Act 2 Las Vegas opening number and added it into the still running Broadway production shortly after. I’m sure if he were alive today, he would have made changes to A CHORUS LINE to keep it fresh and more relevant to today’s Broadway standards while still keeping the DNA of the original intact. 

[Owen22]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 3:07am

I think there have been two major non-replica productions of A Chorus Line. One was at the Stratford Festival and one was a regional tour in the UK that played London last fall. Both got terrific reviews but I found the UK production fairly mediocre and not up to the standards of the original.

[ACL2006]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 3:31pm

I've seen a few non-replica productions. Most were horribly done. Two of the worst were at The Media Theater in PA awhile ago and a recent community theater production of it. The one at the Media had Music and the Mirror as a duet with Zach while Cassie got an added solo during Montage. The recent community theater production had the cut dancers bring out chairs for the 17 dancers on the line to sit on. WTF? And then they somehow copied the finale choreo form the movie!

And then there were the productions of ACL done at the Hollywood Bowl and at Papermill(2012?) that were replicas but we're terrible. Baayork would likely direct the 50th anniversary production but she's no longer a viable option to make this show work anymore. She has muses she's been working with recently to help launch other productions of ACL as she simply can't stage this anymore without help.

[darquegk]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 4:31pm

A Chorus Line is unusual in that it's a live musical performance of a documentary, essentially. And we've reached the point in linear time where the people who made the documentary, who appeared in it, the time period of the documentary and even the kind of career and performance styles depicted in that documentary are dying out.

I'll even go a step further and say the cultural DNA has shifted: people in the arts sound like they're from America now, they don't sound like they're from specific states or boroughs or even neighborhoods. You can't listen to someone and know which shtetl their grandparents came in from, and Jewish assimilation plus the end of the Borscht belt means that Carson and Carlstein will sound and perform exactly the same nine times out of ten. Part of the appeal of that original cast recording is that these were not only nobodies, but individual distinct American stories from a time before everything got homogenized. We aren't that country anymore.

[Sauja]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 4:48pm

Have I completely made up (entirely possible) the rumor that someone wanted to stage this with Robbie Fairchild as the first male Cassie, but the estate shut it down?

[The8re phan]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 5:02pm

 i'd much prefer him as either Zach, Mike or Paul, but Robbie Fairchild can certainly dance the hell out of the "Cassie' role..........

 

https://youtu.be/Jp3_QP0NjWw?si=VRapBbJfYGFRKS1Y

Updated On: 1/6/25 at 05:02 PM

[ACL2006]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 7:23pm

Sauja said: "Have I completely made up (entirely possible) the rumor that someone wanted to stage this with Robbie Fairchild as the first male Cassie, but the estate shut it down?"

Just rumors. There was never another planned revival after the 2006 one closed up until now. Unless it was for a regional production.

[BalconyClub]

Posted: 1/6/25 at 8:06pm

A great show  - and I’ve never, ever seen a bad production.

Starlight Musicals - Indianapolis

Loyola University Chicago - student production

Porchlight Theatre - Chicago

The most recent Drury Lane production in the Chicago burbs was magical, even with its intermission.

[Dreamboy3]

Posted: 1/7/25 at 10:49am

The8re phan said: "i'd much prefer him as either Zach, Mike or Paul, butRobbie Fairchildcan certainly dance the hell out of the "Cassie' role..........



https://youtu.be/Jp3_QP0NjWw?si=VRapBbJfYGFRKS1Y"

But not in heels!

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 1/7/25 at 11:09am

Well, Donna McKechnie has mentioned numerous times that Michael Bennett did the best Cassie dance - even better than her and all the other ladies who danced it. Makes sense why the countless men who dance it look pretty damn good. 

Sad Fairchild had that tiny stage space as he couldn’t go full out and you can see his frustration having to adjust so many broad moments into little contained movements. 

[ACL2006]

Posted: 1/7/25 at 11:43am

Eric Sciotto did M&TM during lockdown. He was fabulous.