A Christmas Story goes LIVE... — Page 5

TheQuibbler said: "IdinaBellFoster said: "I can't imagine being bothered by a racially diverse cast. Disgusting."

Agreed. I think it's strange that people use "politically correct" as a critique, as if removing racially insensitive jokes and casting an array of people who actually represent what America looks like is politically motivated and not, simply, the right thing to do."

Really? So, if the Bumpus family (stupid hillbillies, so low-down on the evolutionary chain that Charles Darwin would have described them as, 'your guess is as good as mine' were visible onstage, how would you have cast them? What would have been "the right thing to do"?

Updated On: 12/18/17 at 11:19 AM

John Adams said: "TheQuibbler said: "IdinaBellFoster said: "I can't imagine being bothered by a racially diverse cast. Disgusting."

Agreed. I think it's strange that people use "politically correct" as a critique, as if removing racially insensitive jokes and casting an array of people who actually represent what America looks like is politically motivated and not, simply, the right thing to do."

Really? So, if the Bumpus family (stupid hillbillies, so low-down on the evolutionary chain that Charles Darwin would have described them as, 'your guess is as good as mine' were visible onstage, how would you have cast them? What would have been "the right thing to do"?"

Personally, I would have costumed them in red baseball caps.

John Adams said: "Really? So, if the Bumpus family (stupid hillbillies, so low-down on the evolutionary chain that Charles Darwin would have described them as, 'your guess is as good as mine' were visible onstage, how would you have cast them? What would have been "the right thing to do"?"

I'm not really sure those two things are related. Not making fun of an entire region's accent and casting actors and children of varying ethnicities doesn't have much to do with characters that are written to be crass and unintelligent. They could have cast anyone they wanted to.

Love Jane Krakowski and the kids homage to "Love Is Good for Anything That Ails You" from Herbert Ross' 1981 film PENNIES FROM HEAVEN which featured a 33 year old Bernadette Peters choreographed by the legendary Danny Daniels. The costumes are by Bob Mackie.

Take a look. The film used existing recordings so the entire cast lip-syncs to these - no one sang in their own voices. Bernadette is lip-syncing to Phyllis Robins' vocals:

LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TSdVilaBkg

Miles2Go2 said: "Of course, Playbill only focuses on the positives:

http://www.playbill.com/article/9-things-a-christmas-story-live-got-totally-right"

It's weird how in an article about what they got right, they discuss what they got right.

And in an article about the low ratings, they discuss its low ratings: http://www.playbill.com/article/a-christmas-story-live-ratings-up-against-football-fox-faces-numbers-dip-compared-to-grease

It's almost like they have an ability to focus.

Jordan Catalano said: "The 3 hour run time can only hurt a “family” program like that. They need to find a way to do these with “limited commercial” interruptions and knock it down an hour, otherwise the rating are only going to continue to decline."

Jordan is right. I love musicals just as much as everyone else on the board. But when there is a 3 hour long musical, with constant commercials, even I get bored! I agree that the timing wasn't the best. I always didn't mind the early December date (per NBC). They always rebroadcast the show with NBC. Probably don't have time to redo a broadcast.

I had fallen asleep watching it, but thankfully woke up in time to catch the tap number with Jane. That was the best number of the entire evening (IMO). I'm sorry I didn't see it when it was on Broadway.

I know I saw the movie, but I really don't remember much about it.

Well the ratings were a big fat FAIL. Is the end of these musicals near??

I don't think an end is near, quite yet. I mean, Jesus Christ Superstar is coming in April. And there are the swirling of a few other titles for down the road (Bye Bye Birdie, Rent, A Few Good Men). I've always been curious why ABC hasn't tried to bring back the Wonderful World of Disney and their tv musicals (Cinderella, Geppetto, Once Upon A Mattress, The Music Man, Annie). Even if you didn't like those, they were leaps and bounds over a lot of the recent offerings.