American Psycho - closing week audiences- Page 5

[Jane2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 12:56pm

 

groucho said - "" Yes... thirty years ahead of its time. "

In what way?"

"I'd start by saying that I don't know many shows that cite Depreche Mode and New Order as inspirations for a score, though I think in time those influences will prove useful again."

It's "Depeche Mode." Anyway, using songs from 30 years ago, is being 30 years ahead of its time? smh

"Lighting, choreography (especially), staging - pretty graphic for Disney's Broadway."

That's nothing new, let alone 30 years ahead. Did you see Ghost? That's one off the top of my head that already did that.

"Subject matter - I don't know that audiences were particularly ready to be entertained by a sociopath, regardless of how he was created. I think in 30 years folks might be ready to see Timon and Pumbaa chopped into little pieces, but not right now."

Sweeney Todd, anyone? Behind the times, not 30 years ahead.

"I do have to laugh at those of you who are hating this show in every conceivable way, as if 1) those of us who liked the show are WRONG for liking it,  or 2) that you'll somehow convince us of the error of our ways. As long as I live, I'll never know how The Addams Family got a tour - but I wouldn't waste a second of my life demanding that people hate it. It seems so incredibly pointless."

I doubt that you're laughing. Anyway, you have it backwards, those of us here who didn't love the show are supposed to feel that we are wrong. 

Also - do NOT count me in as one who hated the show in every conceivable way. I already stated that I loved the choreography, the score, the sets AND the cast. I thought the story was too thin and didn't translate well to the stage. So, count me out of your list, thank you.
 

[songanddanceman2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:03pm

Ok first of all the majority of talk on Twitter, message boards etc is all positive, the majority seemed to love the show, yes of course some don't like it and that's fine, that's theatre and I mean no disrespect to anyone who didn't.

 

NewinTown I'm from the UK and the show received largly positive reviews with one or two mixed. 

 

The show didn't flop because the people who watched it didn't like it, it flopped because not enough people went, it was only going to be a hard sell.

 

Sorry but anybody who thinks this won't be remembered is kidding themselves 

[Jane2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:06pm

"The show didn't flop because the people who watched it didn't like it, it flopped because not enough people went, it was only going to be a hard sell."

Did you ever hear of word of mouth? And you're right -  it flopped because not enough people went. That's the dictionary definition of flop.

[beltingbaritone]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:12pm

newintown said: But a commercial musical based on a quarter-century-old novel (by a writer considered by many to be something of a hack), featuring an 80s-style pastiche techno score (padded out with decades-old pop tunes) written by a 46-year-old has-been pop singer, with a book by a 43-year-old comic book writer whose only other commercial theatre credit is the astoundingly amateurish Spider Man... whatever you could call this combo, "ahead of its time" certainly doesn't seem to be applicable."

 

How is Bret Easton Ellis considered a hack? I'm legitimately asking, not being snarky, as I was unfamiliar with his work until I saw AP, and went out to buy the original novel, perusing his other novels in the process.

 

[newintown]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:13pm

"Ok first of all the majority of talk on Twitter, message boards etc is all positive..."

The majority of everything about popular entertainment on those platforms is positive; people who don't like shows tend to post their thoughts once; the fans repeat themselves over and over and over. That's the nature of fandom.

"I'm from the UK and the show received largly [sic] positive reviews..."

I'm from the US, and - hey! - every review is available here in America, too. Like I said before, it got mixed reviews. And it ran for six weeks. If you call that a hit, then you're using a version of 1984's NewSpeak.

Look, I don't care about this show - I didn't see it, I didn't want to see it. I've heard the songs that are available, I read the novel, and I saw the movie. I'm just not interested. But I am interested (in a negative way) in fans saying that white is black or the moon is made of cheese merely because they need to feel that they're right for liking a show, and everyone else is wrong for not liking it. Just say you like the dang thing and let it go. Does it have to be a contest?

[haterobics]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:23pm

PThespian said: "I'm just observing that, had it been a flop, people probably wouldn't have invested millions of dollars to bring to Broadway a show that they knew was only going to last 81 performances."

Now you're jumping from audiences not investigating the details of the London run to the investors of the show also not doing any research?! I mean, if they couldn't do the legwork to figure out whether a 6-week run in a 325-seat theater would translate to a Broadway budget in a 1,031 seat theater, isn't that sort of on them? Surely they knew it was risky. It is based on a book that was controversial and only gained a cult following after its launch, which spawned a movie that didn't do well that developed a cult following after its launch...

[songanddanceman2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:25pm

NewInTown what are you on about? You turned this thread negative and nobody else (as per usual). The show was a limited run In London and was a sell out. If you want the I will post the London reviews. 

[haterobics]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:27pm

newintown said: "I've heard the songs that are available, I read the novel, and I saw the movie. I'm just not interested."

That's a high level of research to achieve disinterest.

[newintown]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:30pm

"That's a high level of research to achieve disinterest."

Well, I didn't do it all just lately, to prepare for this thread...

[newintown]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 1:33pm

"If you want the I will post the London reviews."

Do so, but only if it truly pleases you; just try to include the negative with the positive, OK? To give as much of a full, truthful picture as possible, y'know.

[devonian.t]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 2:03pm

Whilst I applaud anyone who really passionately loves a show, I agree 100% with Jane2 in her assessment of the show and also with the annoyance at suggestions that the show is somehow "ahead of its time"- like us dullards just don't get it and maybe in 30 years we'll have actually caught up with the smart set.  Balls!  

It's great to love it if you like, but for some of it the smoke and mirrors did not distract from the significant weaknesses in the material.

And it's really disingenuous to say that the show was a sell-out hit at the Almeida on the strength of it being a brilliant show.  It sold out its run in that tiny venue IN ADVANCE because it starred fr*gg*ng DR WHO.  Matt Smith was red hot coming out of the ridiculously popular TV show.  Like Daniel Radcliffe, he could have sold out anything in London so the "sell out" is really no reflection on the popularity of the material itself.  I remember clearly: Matt Smith was announced and the show sold out overnight.

Personally, I am baffled at the decision not to open this show off-Broadway- was it vanity, greed or self-delusion that made the producers take that leap from selling 15,600 seats over 6 weeks to a capacity of 8248 seats per week in an open run?

Love the show by all means, but this project was deeply flawed.

[aaaaaa15]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 2:15pm

Yes, I was going to say, it did well in London because of Matt Smith. Who knows what would have happened if an unknown had starred?

[Jane2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 2:46pm

I want to post a reason for my not being very impressed by the show.

I lived it. I was part of that  NY downtown club scene. I went to those places, those restaurants and hung out with some of those people- the ones who are let right into clubs before everyone else. I was with people who got reservations at any restaurant.

Then there were the club kids - the young  people who put together the most outrageous and silly looking outfits in order to get attention and become famous. One of them did - Michael Alig -he murdered another club kid over a drug debt. Alig served 17 years in prison.

The clubs I went to were all about materialism, strobe lights, graphic projections on walls. Being fabulous. This was back in the 80's. 

American Psycho is not ahead of its time.

[haterobics]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 2:50pm

PThespian said: "The bottom line is they brought over a production that was much lauded in London and failed miserably here. I'm curious why people think that happened."

I just don't think comparing a 325-seat theater in London to a Broadway theater where they had to sell 700+ extra tickets to every performance for it to be sold out is comparing similar things. If it had opened in a small, intimate house Off-Broadway, it might still be running.

PThespian said: "Anytime a Broadway show closes is a sad time for the whole industry."

Not if you're a producer with a show looking for a theater to open up... Plus, the majority of shows fail, and many of them don't find audiences. By the time a show closes, most people don't even know it was a show. When I wear my Bridges of Madison County musical T-shirt, people say "Oh, they're making a musical of that?"

Updated On: 6/6/16 at 02:50 PM

[After Eight]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:01pm

"that the show is somehow "ahead of its time"- like us dullards just don't get it and maybe in 30 years we'll have actually caught up with the smart set.  Balls! "

 

Wasn't the same exact phrase used for the likes of Follies, Sunday in the Park With George, Passion, etc? Was it "Balls!" to them as well? And if not, why not?  What's good for the goose..... 

[songanddanceman2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:12pm

The show (in my opinion) was 100 percent ahead of its time in terms of taking a risk on the material, the staging, design, light and sound. Just because you lived it does not mean they have somehow got it wrong. It's a work of dark fiction, Im pretty sure most yuppies didn't go out killing people. This was not Sweeney Todd that was formatted in a very traditional Sondhiem way, looking and feeling like a musical with a dark story, this was something that looked and sounded fresh, it was targeting a new audience and was not afraid to be cold, to not rest on a sympathetic character that has an uplifting 11 o'clock number. It didn't fall in to that trap.

 

People commenting on the London run need to remember a few things. Matt Smith was not attached first and the show was still getting major buzz. Matt came in and it blew up but it wasn't like the show would not have proceeded without him. 

 

The London production opened to largly positive reviews, no out right negative from any major uk critics, and that was not down to Matt Smith.

 

Also if you don't think it was ahead of its time, artistically brilliant, has an amazing score etc that's fine, but saying it drives you crazy because other people think that is silly. 

 

Ive worked professionaly in theatre for years, I've written and directed plenty of plays here in the UK, won my awards, got the reviews and continue to do well, so I'm sure I'm allowed to have my opinion without getting told its wrong. 

 

This is production probably should have gone Off Broadway first to build some hype, you live and learn, but I can guarantee this show will have a life because many of us producers and directors would be drawn to something inventive and fresh. 

[devonian.t]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:13pm

Good try, old friend, but I don't recall ever having made that claim- although the experimentations with form in those shows certainly might be considered that way; thank you for the suggestion.

Quite a few people described 'Chicago' as being ahead of its time, and the comparative success of the revival certainly suggests that might be true.

As Jane 2 so eloquently explained, 'American Psycho' is not experimental- (and I also remember the 80's)- so this show is far more retro than avant-garde.

[Jane2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:22pm

songanddance said " Just because you lived it does not mean they have somehow got it wrong. "

I DID NOT say they got it wrong.

And at this point, instead of continuing this with you, and possibly being part of  another "Songanddance vs. Namo" fiascos, I quit.

[Broadway Forever2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:41pm

The problem with this show is that to outside people it looked really strange. Go to any youtube video of it. half the comets are about how dumb it is to make a musical of it or how dumb it looks. Now that might be an ignorant opinion but the marketing team needed to do something to combat that. 

[After Eight]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:43pm

"Good try, old friend, but I don't recall ever having made that claim- although the experimentations with form in those shows certainly might be considered that way;"

 

And it would amount to the same hill of beans that you were objecting to. And by the way, I was not referring to your ever having made that claim, but the shows' cadre of fawning elitists' at the time.

 

As for American Psycho, I don't foresee any greater recognition in the future than it has now. You see, it is missing the elements that would garner the adulation of the critics and agenda brigade at any time. It wasn't written by a critics' pet;  nor did it mouth the talking points of the powers-that-be. If they didn't go to bat for this show now, they're not going to do so in the future.

[UrNotAMachine]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 3:47pm

This might get a lot of hate, but I actually consider American Psycho to be very much in-line with many of Sondheim's concept musicals. I'm not talking about the quality of those shows, but rather a similarity in the forms they use to tell their stories. Bateman walks around covered in blood for a good portion of the second act , a visual representation of his inner state, but it goes totally unacknowledged by the rest of the characters. This calls back to the "ghosts" in Follies or The Balladeer in Assassins, entities that are not literally present in the scene but are nonetheless represented on stage.

The big difference from this show and Sondheim's shows is, obviously, the music. Nothing in the score would be considered Sondheim-esque in any way, shape or form. Especially given it's overt use of slant-rhyme and its rejection of other traditionally held standards of lyric writing. However, Sondheim's main rule for song-writing is "content dictates form." Isn't vapid 80s synth pop the only suitable form for American Psycho's content? In that way, Psycho becomes a sort of meta musical with its frequent use of a less-than-stellar score being used in order to further illustrate its own point about our empty society. I'm not yet calling this a good or bad decision. I'm just stating what I personally observed. 

Look, the show obviously didn't do well. And the jury's still out on whether or not its ideas worked. I personally loved American Psycho but I fully understand why someone else would not. It's not because other people didn't "get" the show, it's simply that they didn't appreciate what it was trying to do. And that's fine, no one is required to. There's always the question of, "How far is too far?"  Some might argue that the line between a show with a bad score and a show with a score that purposefully does away with long held conventions in order to serve the story is an indistinguishable one. A bad score is a bad score. Others might say that it makes all the difference in the world. 

 

In this way, I do see American Psycho as an experiment. It does attempt things that haven't been attempted. I think the real debate is whether or not it worked (from an artistic standpoint, not a financial one)

[LightsOut90]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 10:39pm

it closed, some people really loved it, some people hated it, its over get over it and stop bitching at each other you old queens. 

[Jane2]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 10:45pm

"it closed, some people really loved it, some people hated it, its over get over it and stop bitching at each other you old queens."

That's what we do here, son.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 6/6/16 at 11:02pm

beltingbaritone said: "newintown said: But a commercial musical based on a quarter-century-old novel (by a writer considered by many to be something of a hack), featuring an 80s-style pastiche techno score (padded out with decades-old pop tunes) written by a 46-year-old has-been pop singer, with a book by a 43-year-old comic book writer whose only other commercial theatre credit is the astoundingly amateurish Spider Man... whatever you could call this combo, "ahead of its time" certainly doesn't seem to be applicable."

 

How is Bret Easton Ellis considered a hack? I'm legitimately asking, not being snarky, as I was unfamiliar with his work until I saw AP, and went out to buy the original novel, perusing his other novels in the process.

 

 

"
I think Bret Easton Ellis is seen as someone who captured a certain zeitgeist moment, but his work hasn't aged well and his writing hasn't improved ( Chuck Palahniuk and Ellis "frenemy" Jay McInerney seem to be lumped in with him on these points).  His constant twitter tirades, and theflop of his erotic drama The Canyons probably hasn't helped things.  Still, I wouldn't call him a hack--maybe an author of his time.

I really liked this show--at least from the recordings I've heard and seen, but I agree with every one of Jane's points.

 

[newintown]

Posted: 6/7/16 at 8:57am

I think that's very well put, Eric. Ellis, McInerney, and don't forget their sidekicks Tama Janowitz and Mark Lindquist, did capture a certain pre-Goth/Emo immature/adolescent nihilism that was very popular in the mid-late 80's (and continues among some to this day). It was definitely facile and shallow, and maybe the times were a bit, too - but that still doesn't make for the best writing. And I think there was a lot more to the era than casual sex, greed, materialism, narcissism, and drugs. But those things were hot for a while.