Amélie — Page 2

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#26

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 3:16am

I left thinking it was cute, but not right for the season. With such heavy-hitting new musicals, I knew it wouldn't stand a chance. I also like Phillipa Soo, but she seemed miscast, like she was mimicking the idea of a "manic pixie dream girl." She was acting. I, too, wish she had continued with Great Comet, especially because I personally found Denee Benton to be so bland, her performance actually made me appreciate Phillipa Soo more.

But the music was fine, the staging was cute, and the performances were enjoyable enough. If they had maybe done another tryout and brought it in this season, it might have fared better. But, then again, who knows?

#27

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 8:55am

It wouldn’t have fared better this or any other season, it’s greatest crime was Soo was bland and so was the show

Well I didn't want to get into it, but he's a Satanist. Every full moon he sacrifices 4 puppies to the Dark Lord and smears their blood on his paino. This should help you understand the score for Wicked a little bit more. Tazber's: Reply to Is Stephen Schwartz a Practicing Christian

#28

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 9:19am

It was just too small and simple for Broadway. I loved it and it's probably one of the shows I listen to the most. I love the haunting piano in the opening, and I love most all of the score. "Thin Air" is such a gorgeous song. I hope we see it pop up in regional houses. It's such a simple show to do, surprised it hasn't been done more often.

#29

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 9:44am

Amelie was by far one of, if not THE, worst things I have ever seen on Broadway. An absolute mess of a show with one or two passable tunes. The book and score were excruciatingly bland and bad.

"There’s nothing quite like the power and the passion of Broadway music. "

#30

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 11:28am

I will give props to the lovely set design for AMELIE on Broadway by David Zinn. The conceit of creating a streetscape of Paris out of stacked armoires and bureaus was absolutely inspired and very much in the spirit of the show. Even as the score was boring me to tears, I was happy as a clam to watch the set changes work their magic.

#31

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 11:41am

Elegance101 said: I, too, wish she had continued with Great Comet, especially because I personally found Denee Benton to be so bland, her performance actually made me appreciate Phillipa Soo more.

I too thought Benton was bland until I saw her from the stage tavern seating area and she wasn't at all she was wonderful.

#32

Amelie

Posted: 5/28/18 at 3:14pm

rosscoe(au) said: "it’s greatest crime was Soo was bland and so was the show"

If the show was bland, wouldn't that mean Soo was doing her job perfectly if you found her bland? She was nailing the material!

#33

Amelie

Posted: 5/29/18 at 10:28pm

I have a lot of thoughts.

Shh_413, that was a wonderful little analysis of the meaning behind the movie's color schemes. I hadn't considered many of those elements before.

Anyway, I love the stage show's score for what it is...I just don't think it suited Amelie. Like it makes for great listening but not great drama. Alex Kulak2, I'd love to hear more specifics about how the final product was so different from what you heard initially at Berkeley Rep.

As some of you know, I have been screwing around with this idea of a stripped-down Amelie onstage- and Mr. Nowack saw the Dixon Place video- but it's been put on the back burner (as I began other projects). But everyone's strong thoughts here have made me want to revisit my concept again!

https://newplayexchange.org/users/99643/amanda-delalla

#34

Amelie

Posted: 5/29/18 at 10:46pm

Big Fish and Ghost both have licensed versions that are "stripped down" and smaller casts. I could see this working in a smaller setting. It really only needs a piano and maybe an accordion. I love the music, but do wish the orchestrations had SOME Parisian flair to them. It seemed as if they wanted it to be more "universal" than Paris.

#35

Amelie

Posted: 5/30/18 at 10:31am

Ado Annie D'Ysquith said: "Alex Kulak2, I'd love to hear more specifics about how the final product was so different from what you heard initially at Berkeley Rep."

I know you're not asking me, but in case you missed it, I gave my two-cents on this in my post above.

#36

Amelie

Posted: 5/30/18 at 2:46pm

Honestly i wish we could have seen a slightly younger Katrina Lenk as Amelie and a score by Yazbeck

#37

Amelie

Posted: 5/30/18 at 4:02pm

I saw Amélie a couple of weeks before it's closing date on Broadway and was able to get front row center rush tickets. The thing that stuck me was while wasn't unpleasant, it wasn't really about anything. It didn't feel like the people who created the musical version had something to say, they had just decided they wanted to make an Amélie musical, had the plot from the movie as a framework, but it had no personality of it's own.

Later that same day I saw Indecent, a play stuffed with facts and ideas it felt like playwright Paula Vogel needed to get across, and while granted it's trying to be a very different type of theatrical experience, that contrast in purpose really made it clear for me how much passion was missing from Amélie.

(BTW, the juxtaposition of that double header might be the closest anyone gets to seeing Katrina Lenk star as Amélie.)

#38

Amelie

Posted: 5/30/18 at 4:20pm

I also saw the Berkeley production and thought it was lovely, if inconsequential. When they announced the casting of Phillipa Soo, I was disappointed because Samantha Barks was the highlight of the production for me. I assumed that Soo would be a little wooden, lacking the natural buoyancy of Barks' performance - I didn't even see the production but then read reviews that confirmed my suspicions. Then I remember listening to the Broadway cast recording and was shocked by how much spark those songs were stripped of in the New York move. A shame that this was such a dud.

#39

Amelie

Posted: 5/30/18 at 5:27pm

I'm so glad to hear I'm not the only one who thought the Berkeley production was much better.

#40

Amelie

Posted: 5/30/18 at 8:26pm

I regret not seeing this show on either of my two trips to NYC this year. I managed to get 15 shows in but the bad reviews kept me out of this one. Another regret, my sister did see it and she isn’t even a broadway fan. So she can lord it over me forever that I saw a broadway show that I didn’t :)

#41

Amelie

Posted: 8/5/25 at 7:35pm

Chris Jones gives 3.5 stars to a reinvented version playing now in Chicago.

"The gifted director and choregrapher Derek Van Barham, who has been doing for musicals these last few summers what David Cromer once did for straight plays in the basement of the Chopin Theatre in Wicker Park, has created an eye-poppingly immersive production that draws on the cabaret-style implications of the material (Amélie is, after all, a waitress in a Parisian cafe) and features a cast that switches, “Once”-style, back and forth between playing instruments (playing them well, too) and performing the show’s wacky lost urban souls."

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