Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#1
Posted: 10/9/12 at 9:44pm
Per the New York Daily News, about halfway down (following the story about Jill Zarin.) Genius casting.
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/confidential/zarin-tirade-a-mad-housewife-article-1.1177888
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#2
Posted: 10/9/12 at 9:48pmI hope this isn't her idea of star casting... I mean, I love Andrea, but you can't put her above the title.
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Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#2
Posted: 10/9/12 at 9:52pmWell, that's very good.
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/13/04
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#3
Posted: 10/9/12 at 10:04pmThis is exciting!
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#4
Posted: 10/9/12 at 10:22pmisn't Rachelle Rak also attached to this??
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#6
Posted: 10/10/12 at 1:41amRak is in the ensemble, and I believe she's covering Fastrada and/or The Leading Player.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#7
Posted: 10/10/12 at 7:40amI can't be excited enough for this production. Oh my goodness.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#8
Posted: 10/10/12 at 4:25pm
the entire cast has been announced. I smell a transfer.
A.R.T.'s Pippin Cast Announced
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#9
Posted: 10/10/12 at 4:30pm
Am I the only one who finds the casting of Rachel Bay Jones as Catherine incredibly bizzare? She's almost 40 and Matthew James Thomas, who's playing Pippin, is 23. It seems more appropriate that she'd be playing his mother in something rather than his love interest.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#10
Posted: 10/10/12 at 4:33pmMr and Mrs Mann will bring their certain something to the proceedings.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#11
Posted: 10/10/12 at 5:21pmI agree that RBJ make for a strange Catherine. I guess Diane just liked working with her on Hair. She wasn't really right for the role when she was younger, imo.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#12
Posted: 10/10/12 at 5:50pmbut why circus acts. 7 fingers a wonderful circus company but they should stick to that. Remember tarzan???
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#13
Posted: 10/10/12 at 5:57pmJeanGudio, 7 Fingers had nothing to do with TARZAN. Their most recent endeavor was the theatrical piece TRACES.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#14
Posted: 10/10/12 at 6:08pm
y But tarzan tried to combine circus and theatre and so did love never dies and we all know how they went.
Updated On: 10/10/12 at 06:08 PM
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#15
Posted: 10/10/12 at 6:18pmI can't tell, from the Playbill article if they are recreating (some?) of Fosse's choreography, or if Chet is just doing choreography in the Fosse style (like Reinking did the large parts of Chicago she didn't recreate). I know the odd sounding UK production from lst year (set in a video game?) did try to shoe horn Fosse's choreography, and it soundedlike an odd mix.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#16
Posted: 10/10/12 at 6:36pmSo excited about Patina Miller!
Broadway Legend Joined: 8/25/06
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#17
Posted: 10/10/12 at 6:38pm
> Here's how A.R.T. bills the production: "A bold new staging of the dark and existential musical you thought you knew. Pippin, on a death-defying journey to find his 'corner of the sky,' must choose between a life that's ordinary or a flash of singular glory."
i *did* think i knew Pippin, but i've never thought of it as being existential, and i certainly don't remember it being dark.
am i sundowning early today, or has the Paulus PR machine taken its usual liberties?
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#18
Posted: 10/10/12 at 6:52pmPippin's always been a wild seesaw between light and darkness. In the original production, bloody body parts are flung onstage while Vereen and co perform that slow soft-shoe glorifying war. Pippin knifes his dad to become the new king. And the finale has always been a very literal invitation to Pippin to self-immolate. Believe me, Paulus needn't do any rewriting to bring the dark to the piece.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#19
Posted: 10/10/12 at 7:03pmis MJT from spiderman
Broadway Legend Joined: 8/25/06
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#20
Posted: 10/10/12 at 7:19pm
Tree2: Pippin was my first Broadway musical ... I promise I have a very clear impression of it.
I do remember the elements you've mentioned, and i do of course recall them as dark (though the flying body parts i thought were played as a gag). so, sure, there's some dark there, but for lo these 3X years now my overall sense of the show has not been of darkness. the presence of dark elements does not necessarily translate into a dark story.
although you didn't mention it, i also fully appreciate that the main character spends much of the play deep in the throes of existential angst ... somehow, though, i don't think of the work itself as being existential.
moreover, on the slightly more pedantic side, i intended to question (or open up to question) the marketing department's assertion that the common understanding of the work is one of darkness and existentialism.
perhaps it's my (then) tender years combined with the wonderful melodies, but i've always thought of Pippin as one young man's journey toward finding himself.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#21
Posted: 10/10/12 at 7:23pm
but i've never thought of it as being existential
Pippin's entire MO is an existential crisis.
Broadway Legend Joined: 8/25/06
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#22
Posted: 10/10/12 at 8:01pm
PRS: respectfully, i disagree.
imho, Pippin's entire MO is RESOLVING his existential crisis.
that arguably makes the play anti-existential, if (IF) anything.
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#23
Posted: 10/10/12 at 8:04pmI always thought Fosse's take on the material (not the authors' necessarily) was that it was a piece ultimately about suicide... But that's just my take. Either way, Fosse was smart enough to disguise a lot of the darkness that seemed to be his concept (something perhaps he had more trouble doing with his staging of Chicago but that was post his heart attack, right?)
Broadway Legend Joined: 8/25/06
Andrea Martin Will Be Berthe in Diane Paulus's PIPPIN#24
Posted: 10/10/12 at 8:08pmi guess another way of asking my original question would be: is the generally received understanding of pippin that it's "dark and existential"?
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