A Little Night Music 2009 Revival

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 3:27am

So I have always had this cast recording, but tonight was the first time I actually REALLY listened to it. I am literally speechless and the sheer beauty of this cast recording. I remember this revival was received pretty well. I know this was a contender for best revival in a year where there were A LOT of revivals. La Cage won over this though... For those who saw both, what are your thoughts? Also, for those who saw both casts, how did the compare?

[ABB2357]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 3:33am

I didn't see LA CAGE, but this production didn't really come alive until Bernadette and Stritch joined the cast. The orchestrations were pared down and slowed to a dirge, the lighting was dark and dreary. It seemed like those two added a spark of life to the proceedings, not to mention Bernadette's (dare I say definitive?) "Send in the Clowns." Hunter Ryan Herdlicka and Ramona Mallory were screechy and flat in their roles but got better as the run went along. Alexander Hanson and Erin Davie were both terrific throughout.

[binau]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 4:40am

I saw both and although I enjoyed La Cage A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC has a better written book, score and had a more exciting cast.

Glamorous is the best way I can describe how the show felt to me with CZJ and Lansbury. A true star vehicle. CZJ did not give an intricate performance but she was serviceable and I enjoy her voice. It's a shame the Tony performance will rewrite the history of her performance. Lansbury was absolutely hilarious and heartbreaking, sometimes at the same time (The Wooden Ring speech).....I wish she got a Tony.

I thought some of the glamour was lost when Bernadette and Stritch joined, but Bernadette's intricate performances of a couple of the songs - particularly SEND IN THE CLOWNS, which is my favourite performance of a song by anyone ever in a musical - was wonderful. Her line readings were not quite as consistent and she had a weird accent - I think overall her performance in FOLLIES was better. But her SEND IN THE CLOWNS is certainly definitive for me. As Sondheim described in an interview when asked if he preferred CZJ or Bernadette, Bernadette really knows how to act anad sing at the same time. Glynis Johns can act but not sing.

Stritch was a train wreck who could not remember her lines - it was very uncomfortable to watch her struggle through Liaisons (this was near the end of the run - the description of her performance seemed to me to start off horribly, peak then end horribly). I didn't think she played any kind of character and I thought she went for cheap laughs where Lansbury was very funny (e.g. when Stritch dragged out the Wooden Ring speech). The show also lost something when Alexander Hanson left.

Truly a very exciting time for me, and for this forum. I love the atmosphere of this place when people are speculating and anticipating shows....and then finally the announcement of cast etc... meets or exceeds expectations. FOLLIES and A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC are probably the best examples I've ever seen here. I hope it happens again soon.

[AwesomeDanny]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 5:02am

Both Night Music and La Cage were much smaller productions than their lavish originals, and that worked better for La Cage. Night Music really requires a feeling of grandeur, and though it's technically a chamber piece (due to the cast size), having a chamber orchestra does not suit the score very well. La Cage, on the other hand, still worked very well in the smaller production, in my opinion.

It's interesting to hear that you love this recording so much. I really appreciated the inclusion of so much dialogue to make the album so cohesive, but most of the singing is below that on the 1973 recording, and the orchestrations in the revival absolutely pale in comparison to Tunick's gorgeous originals.

[dramamama611]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 7:10am

while i enjoyed Night Music, it really lacked "something". Joy? Everyone seemed so seedy, so self-centered. (Not the actors, but the characters.)

La Cage was a breath of fresh air in comparison.

[artscallion]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 7:41am

Loved this revival and saw both casts. Ramona Mallory was, as has been mentioned, screechy both times. I enjoyed all of the other supporting cast's performances.

As for the stars, I MUCH preferred CZJ & Angela. Bernadette gave a shallow performance, full of her usual schtick and from the 8th row looked FAR too old compared to Frederick to be a believable rival to Ann, no matter the other considerations.

Stritch was a travesty. She made the stuff up, continually called for lines, or worse would hold up her hand and say, "no. wait, I'll get it" while we all sat uncomfortably in the audience waiting for her to eventually just make something up anyway. Worse thing I ever witnessed.

[wickedfan]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 8:54am

Saw the production when it was at the Menier and disliked it, but Hannah Waddingham and Maureen Lipman were so phenomenal I walked away happy. When it was announced for Broadway I had hoped Nunn would have made the proper changes to really make this elegant Chekhovian funeral come alive. Alas, he did not. He actually made it worse. Pity, since he had assembled a fine cast. A cast he had no idea what to do with and had no right directing. Saw it with Jones and Lansbury and really hated both of them in it. Lansbury, who had triumphed a year earlier with Blithe Spirit was really just delivering the same performance, though in a wheelchair. Every time Jones entered the stage, she carried herself like such a glamorous movie star I always had new hopes that she would deliver in her next scene. She never did. When Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch (who didn't forget her lines once when I saw it) came in, the entire cast was rejuvenated. I think this had less to do with the two of them and more to do with the fact that Trevor Nunn had left and they were all starting to get free reign over their performances.

A Little Night Music is a much better show than La Cage, but that year La Cage was by far the superior revival (though both paled in comparison to Finian's Rainbow).

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 9:04am

I saw both this and La Cage, and absolutely thought La Cage deserved its win. It's an inferior show, yes, but it was a terrific production.

This production, which I saw with Bernadette and Stritch, was interesting, but the whole affair felt pretty cold, which I think is the wrong direction to go with for this show. At it's heart, it's all about sex, but it didn't feel like that in the slightest. Some of the supporting cast was good, though, and I really loved both Bernadette and Stritch. Still, the production as a whole felt like a misfire.

[NYC4Life]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 9:07am

"Every time Jones entered the stage, she carried herself like such a glamorous movie star"

Haha, See and this is why I believed she was perfectly cast. I loved Zeta-Jones and I think like someone stated previously her Tony performance in radio city music hall made her look all over the place. What happened at the Walter Kerr the night I saw it was a star performance that was intimate and touching at times.

I saw Peters and Stritch too and I think that because of the excitement of who they are people gave them more credit than they deserved. It honestly just didnt gel the night I saw it. Who doesn't love to see them live?! It just wasn't alive for me. It is hard to explain but Bernadette actually seemed more "look! Im bernadette peters!!" than Catharine Zeta-Jones seemed "look! I am catherine zeta-jones".

Updated On: 7/9/13 at 09:07 AM

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 9:23am

I think La Cage deserved to win. Even though I prefer the book and score of ALNM to La Cage, the production was not very good, and the supporting cast was often horrible.

CZJ, Angela and Alexander Hanson were the only good things about the original cast. Ramona Mallory gave one of the most grating performances I've ever seen every time I saw the show. Hunter Ryan Herdlicka was not far behind. Lazar and Davie were as bland as could possibly be- it was almost as if they were trying not to be funny on purpose. I think they were directed that way and Davie loosened up by the time Peters and Stritch joined the cast, but she was never great.

I loved Peters, but Liaisons was uncomfortable with Stritch.

La Cage was fun, and the small-scale seedy club approach worked. I saw all three casts (Grammer/Hodge, Tambor/Fierstein, Sieber/Fierstein) and aside from Tambor, they were all great. As good as Hodge was, my favorite combination (that worked like charm), was Sieber and Fierstein.

[ray-andallthatjazz86]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:10am

Whizzer, I agree 100% with what you said. I thought Zeta-Jones gave a commanding turn, I believed she was a star, I believed her relationship with her mother and daughter, it just worked for me. The production as a whole was such a letdown, though, there was no fun to it, no lightness, NIGHT MUSIC is not supposed to be Chekhov, and even if it were, Chekhov was actually funny! This was not funny or fun at all. The ensemble was so uneven, with Ramona Mallory giving an insanely annoying turn, Davie/Lazar unable to make the most out of great characters, and Leigh Ann Larkin acting like she was in a completely different show altogether (and using like 10 accents throughout the 3 hours).

Updated On: 7/9/13 at 10:10 AM

[AC126748]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:13am

Whizzer's assessment is correct. I believe A Little Night Music is a better show. That particular production, though, was deadly. La Cage is a slight show, but that production was superb. It was leagues better.

[newintown]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:20am

I, too, found that Night Music revival to be drab and lifeless, except for Leigh Ann Larkin, who brings the art of overacting to an entirely new dimension - that girl is one of the coarsest actors I think I've ever seen; full of talent and using every bit of it to glorify herself at the expense of the show (which she also did in Gypsy).

[matineeidol2591]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:29am

I saw both La Cage and Night Music with their full original casts.

It was the first time I had ever seen both shows. Neither production made a huge impact on me, but I do recall leaving Night Music and how taken I was with the wit and sophistication, yet accessibility of the piece. It is truly an awesome musical. The blandness of the production did little justice to the brilliance of the material. Every thing on stage, down to the casting, was 'bleh'. I thought CZJ and Lansbury were serviceable, but perhaps their performances were bogged down by all the blandness happening around them. The production wasn't bad, just kinda boring. My appreciation for the words and music were more than enough to keep me entertained though.

As stated on here, the overall La Cage concept simply worked better. Although the show is pure fluff, the vision was cohesive, and the production was light and entertaining on all levels.

[PianoMann]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:32am

I've been kicking myself for years because I missed this production, flaws and all. I absolutely love this cast recording, even though the orchestrations aren't as lush and the OBCR, and it is the recording that made me fall in love with the incredible score. It has always been interesting to me to see the widely varied reactions to Peters / Stritch. How could audience reaction be so completely all over the map? It will be a shame if we have to wait another 30+ years to see this one again; I feel it's one of Sondheim's absolute best.

[matineeidol2591]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:33am

Also, for those who are interested in Night Music and can use the search feature with success (I can never seem to figure it out), there is a very extensive thread I began about the original production hiding somewhere on the boards. The wealth of knowledge and first hand experience some of the posters have with the original production makes for a really fascinating thread.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:39am

Ramona Mallory was stunt casting. Her mother had played the role and she was put in to carry on the tradition.

[ljay889]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 10:55am

I saw this revival 12 times. Although I'm a bigger FOLLIES fan, there were different circumstances when ALNM was playing, and it became the my most seen show to date.

I loved both casts. But let's face it, Bernadette overacted through much the production. But with Bernadette and Stritch, the production lost much of the serious and well "British" tone that it had with the the original cast. When Stritch remembered LIAISONS, it was honestly amazing. I'd say she had the better act 1, while Lansbury owned act 2. Lansbury had many heartbreaking moments in act 2. Also, CZJ never ever gave a performance like she did on the Tonys. That was such an unfortunate performance.

Looking back, the orchestrations were not good live. The larger ones for the cast recording are MUCH better. The set for act 1 was confusing and not pretty. The lighting was great, once they fixed it during previews.

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:06am

PianoMann, You ask how everyone could have such wildly varied reactions to Peters and Stritch? It's because they gave wildly different performances, especially with Stritch. You held your breath at the beginning of Liaisons because you didn't know what the hell you were going to see. It could be brilliant, or it could be a train wreck.

I agree with ljay that the show became less stuffy/serious with the replacement cast. It was like someone loosened all the strings on a corset, just a bit. I think this served the material better, but went against the tone of the production, which even if wrong was the direction the actors had to work with.

[AC126748]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:10am

Bernadette's performance became more self-indulgent as her run came along. I saw her three times during her first month of performances (including her first performance), and she was surprisingly natural. And it was a consistent performance, then. I saw her again about two weeks before the show closed, and by then she was so over-the-top it was embarrassing.

With Stritch, it was always a guessing game as to what you were going to get, from her first performance on.

Updated On: 7/9/13 at 11:10 AM

[matineeidol2591]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:16am

And Wicked-Fan, yes!! Finian's should have been the revival to beat that year. A shame it didn't find an audience and lasted all of four months. There was talk for a short time that the production was going to move to a smaller theatre and hold out til the Tony awards; I was oh so disappointed when this didn't happen.

Having seen most of the best actress nominees that year, I still believe in an ideal and fair world, Kate Baldwin should have been the winner.

[ljay889]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:18am

That's true. I was at Bernadette's first performance, and it wasn't as wacky as it was later in the run.

It was just annoying how she eventually SPOOOOKE.LIIIIIIIKE .....THIIIIIIISSSSS!!!!


She did have some very good moments, but I preferred her as Sally Durant.

Updated On: 7/9/13 at 11:18 AM

[PianoMann]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:35am

PianoMann, You ask how everyone could have such wildly varied reactions to Peters and Stritch? It's because they gave wildly different performances, especially with Stritch.

That makes complete sense, especially coming from someone who saw the show many times and can comment on the fluctuating quality. I suppose only seeing the show once could be either a blessing or a curse, depending on what performance you happened to catch. That's a real shame for those who got an off-show.

[ray-andallthatjazz86]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:49am

What happened to Peters' acting? Her performance in SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE and her film work in the 1980s are superb, but her line readings in FOLLIES were so weak.

Updated On: 7/9/13 at 11:49 AM

[artscallion]

Posted: 7/9/13 at 11:56am

I agree Ray. I think she defined Dot and the Witch in Into the Woods. Her subtlety in Pennies From Heaven is also amazing. I'm a longtime fan of hers, even seeing her in concert several times in the 80s. But her recent performances in ALNM & Follies just boggle my mind. She seems to have fallen back on the schtick that defined the Bernadette Peters' popular TV guest spot persona that she used to use on the Carol Burnett Show...the bubbly, eye-rolling, fake-crying cutesy girl.

Updated On: 7/9/13 at 11:56 AM