Anne Rice's Review of "Lestat"

[Laura King]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:05pm

Just in case you were thinking the reviews were pretty uniformly negative, here's Anne's.


April 30, 2006

LESTAT ON BROADWAY: In a word: magnificent!

The New York premiere of LESTAT was April 25th, 2006.

I’m overjoyed to report that I was there on opening night, stunned and amazed, and I’m eager to tell you just exactly what I saw.

But let me say this first: I didn’t really create the character of Lestat de Lioncourt. He lives and breathes in some nine different books that I wrote. But how he came to be is truly something I can’t explain.

So if I write here about Lestat as if he was somebody else’s baby, there’s a reason for it. He’s been out there on his own from the start.

Yes, he was based on my husband Stan -- on Stan’s vigor and beauty, on Stan’s will and Stan’s courage. And my son, Christopher, has grown up to be Lestat, and that’s a puzzle that commands respect.

Yet Lestat is my alter ego, lover, muse and the unabashed hero of my crippled, genderless soul. I’m in love with the guy. I prowl the world looking through his eyes from time to time. For decades, there was nothing I couldn’t express through Lestat’s voice.

So when a production captures Lestat perfectly as this unique and thoroughly original musical by Elton John and Bernie Taupin has done, well, I can’t mumble about it, feigning humility. That would be pointless. I’m too enchanted, too intoxicated, too frankly thrilled.

Now back to what happened on the stage of the Palace Theater in New York last week.

After years of anticipation on my part, I saw the curtain rise, and who should be there but my hero, complete and entire from the first second, so fully realized that I am on the verge of tears. Hugh Panaro was a giant as he moved around the stage with the grace of a panther. His voice was lustrous and immense as he sang Elton John’s rich, melodic and truly glorious music. Bernie Taupin’s brilliant lyrics got right to the point. In essence, Lestat put it out there: I’m young, I’m strong, I’m you! -- and I’m gonna die!

Why do I say this when my hero is an immortal? When the “theme” of the musical is that he will live forever? Because we are all both mortal and immortal, creatures locked in time, yet conceiving of eternity, and that is what the play was most certainly about.

I knew instantly the production was a triumph; and to the final curtain it never let me down. In those first few moments there was an explosion: here was the bravery, the skill, the power -- to deliver a true adaptation of something I’d somehow managed to unearth in my long and frantic excavations of the mind.

Effortlessly and briskly the musical moved the hero into the presence of Carolee Carmello as Gabrielle, Lestat’s mother, and with astonishing power this actress worked a curious miracle, wringing a depth from that character which was beyond what I myself had ever understood. Yet this was Gabrielle -- and this was Gabrielle and Lestat together. At once they transcended the mother and son bond; the alchemy of metaphor was unleashing a muted fury. These were any two people who had loved each other unselfishly and yet with total and consuming need. The heat was white. The audience was spellbound. You could feel the exhilaration in the theater. The great bursts of applause had begun.

And we were traveling swiftly into an alternative world in which our most pedestrian concerns and our greatest anguish could be confessed and examined to their very roots.

The night went on like that, with surprise after surprise, depths yielding to depths, with members of the audience often in tears.

Roderick Hill was vulnerable, seductive and heartbreaking as Lestat’s boyhood friend Nicolas. Allison Fischer brought down the house as the child Vampire Claudia, a woman trapped forever in a little girl’s body, unschooled in compassion, yet steeped in pain. Jim Stanek was the embodiment of Lestat’s tragic grief-stricken partner, Louis. As the arch antagonist, the Satan of Lestat’s trials, Drew Sarich was deeply engaging and mystifyingly sympathetic. Marius, the ancient one, came to quiet strength in the person of Michael Genet, offering Lestat wisdom instead of despair.

Every voice in the ensemble was tremendous, flexible and shamelessly gorgeous; song after lovely song broke forth. The plot, direction, story, and staging all moved with irresistible timing thanks to the genius of Rob Roth and Linda Woolverton -- until we were at last awakened by the final curtain from a hypnotic spell. I didn’t want this to end. I wanted to be with my beloved Lestat. A celebratory joy had gripped the theater. I’d witnessed a triumph all right. It was one of the happiest nights of my entire life.

Of course the entire concept of the musical is romantic in the finest sense of that word. It’s deliberately over the top.

Lestat is the essence of the romantic man of sensibility, privileging his insight and his will to survive over the voices of authority that would relegate him to the realm of the damned. In him, the vampire is a metaphor for the outsider in all of us, the predator in all of us, the alienated one and the rebellious one, the being who wants to live forever and yet be held tightly in some one’s loving and forgiving arms.

The show is about redemption because the characters won’t give up on it. It’s about transcending in any way that you can.

To create a musical this pure and this committed to the big questions is to fly in the face of the weary world at every turn.

How dare you talk frankly about good and evil in an operatic context, one might ask. How dare you mention the name of God? How dare you present characters who care whether or not God exists and what He thinks about us and our suffering? And above all, how dare you affirm that heroes can and do rise to articulate our worst fears and our strongest longings? How dare you do all this in a consummately entertaining and frankly beautiful piece of work?

LESTAT makes no concessions whatsoever to cynicism, irony, or camp. The ambition and the achievement are enormous here. The character and the play reach directly for the heart of the audience and will settle for nothing less.

Is it any wonder that every song is a show stopper? That cries accompany the exuberant clapping over and over again? That standing ovations greet the final bows? You leave the theater grateful for the nerve that went into this work knowing that you will never be able to fully analyze how and why these strange, eccentric and extreme characters changed your soul.

It’s a long road from Epidaurus to the Palace Theater. New dramatic forms have dazzled us and will continue to do so. But only the stage can make the magic I saw in LESTAT. Only living human beings coming together for a certain uninterrupted span of time in which they act, and sing, and pour their hearts out, can achieve this wondrous feat.

That’s what I saw and felt on Tuesday April 25th, 2006 at the premiere of this musical. There’s no doubt in my mind that readers far and wide will love it and embrace it, no doubt that Lestat has moved from literature to legend in a divine theatrical incarnation in my own time.

Anne Rice,
April 30, 2006

[Caroline-Q-or-TBoo]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:13pm

wow. haha

[teebz]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:14pm

anne rice is flat out CRAZY

enough said

[rickydrummer]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:28pm

Well, she probably doesn't see a lot of theatre. Ohh! They sing! *standing ovation*

[ElphabaRose]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:37pm

Biased much?

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:40pm

At least she used paragraph breaks.

But hey, everything springs forth perfectly from her brain, we must remember.
http://schmeiser.typepad.com/the_rage_diaries/2004/09/where_was_this_.html

[joanna2]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:40pm

She may be crazy and she may be biased, but I'm glad she liked the show. The characters are her babies.
And like I said, she may be crazy, but I love her.

[blaxx]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:42pm

That is so cute.
My favorite artists are the ones who are not necessarily negative but objective even towards their own work or their adaptations - obviously not this woman's case.

[jimnysf]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:56pm

"I knew instantly the production was a triumph; and to the final curtain it never let me down...as he sang Elton John’s rich, melodic and truly glorious music. Bernie Taupin’s brilliant lyrics got right to the point...members of the audience often in tears...The audience was spellbound. You could feel the exhilaration in the theater. The great bursts of applause had begun.".


LOL! I needed a good laugh tonight. Thanks Anne. By the way, what kind of drugs is she taking?

[sondwisenheimer]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:57pm

Of course she wants her loyal readers to think she swooned over the show. She stands to make - or lose - a lot of money in royalties. Not to mention that she doesn't want the taint of failure affecting her franchise.

Don't forget the bizarre full-page ads in Variety she placed first damning and then gushily praising Tom Cruise as Lestat. She knows the power her full endorsement of an adaptation has where her fans are concerned.

[Lamc16]

Posted: 5/4/06 at 11:59pm

how sad is that?

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 12:28am

"the alchemy of metaphor was unleashing a muted fury..."

... uh, to mix metaphors ...

[BobbyBubby]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 12:50am

Of course she loved it, she's making money off of it.

[Roninjoey]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 1:13am

Ah, Namo beat me to my favorite line.

A particular episode of South Park aside (which is singularly more bold than any element of Lestat), I've never seen anyone spew more **** from her mouth. They massacred her characters and she knows it. She has no scruples.

And what a claim. Lestat is about as bold as cottage cheese. It asks none of the questions she seems to think it does, and theater has been asking those questions for thousands of years, and will continue to do so with or without Lestat.

I can't believe how full of herself she is. If I ever met her, I'd unfortunately have to cut her.

Grr. It makes me so mad, sometimes. These people. Elton John and Anne Rice are, at any rate, perfect for one another. People who need to get the **** away from the stage! Elton doesn't really care anyway and she can keep to her trashy books.

[CurtainPullDowner]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 1:19am

Will She accept less money when the House is half full?

[sondwisenheimer]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 1:22am

...or will she see the House as half empty?

[Eliza0114]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 1:43am

So help me God, I loved it. I've seen it twice now. Roderick Hill... Hugh Panaro... all Gods in their own right. Granted, the plot had some HUGE holes... well, here's how I phrase it. It's a mediocre show done well.

Maybe I'm just on a Broadway high right now since I just got back from seeing it again. Who knows?

[EAD1974]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 4:52am

Anne Rice is simly one of the nicest celebrities I have ever met...Both times I met her at signings she was warm and loving to her fans and made it a point to let all of them know how much their reading her books means to her. She is not a cynical person at all, and truly always speaks from her heart...The fact that so many of you would assume she only praises the show because of greed just shows how cynical most of YOU are. Just because someone is passionate about what they create does not=Crazy. There is no reason AT ALL to believe her comments come from any place but a genuine love of the show. When Tom Cruise wast cast as Lestat and she didn't like the idea, she didn't care what the studio said and spoke publicly about it, despite that it meant the potential loss of millions for her if the movie failed. When she saw the movie and liked it, she wanted her fans to know she had a change of heart and publicly said so by taking a page out in Variety. I don't see what makes that so "crazy", except that in seems in show biz you are apparently supposed to keep your mouth shut about things you created or something. Mind you, she stood to make millions off the adaptations of Exit to Eden and Queen of the Damned too, and she made no such ringing endorsments for either of those projects simply to make more money, although according to most of you that's what she's doing with Lestat right now...making a false opinion simply to make more money. Is that what you would do?? Oh, and Roninjoey....the show in no way "massacred" the book; whether you think the show is good or not, it's very faithfull to the text. I think the show has flaws, but I think the show does carry a lot of the Metatextual-ness ( OK, that may not actually be a word ) of the books. The idea that you would want to "cut her" for liking the show and endorsing it just because you don't is not really cool. OK, that's my 2 cents for now...although I may need to stay away from this topic as not to pop a blood vessel LOL

[WonderBoy]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 10:58am

Very well put EAD1974. She said herself that she has been away from these characters for quite some time now so, I can only imagine that by witnessing a re-told story of them in the form of LESTAT was a breath of fresh air to her. By the way, the woman doesn't need the money as she is very well off.

[Fosse76]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 11:45am

"I knew instantly the production was a triumph; and to the final curtain it never let me down...as he sang Elton John’s rich, melodic and truly glorious music. Bernie Taupin’s brilliant lyrics got right to the point...members of the audience often in tears...The audience was spellbound. You could feel the exhilaration in the theater. The great bursts of applause had begun."

She's clearly delusional. Elton John's glorious music? She must have been listening to his old stuff on an iPod during the show, because there was no evidence of music at the performance I saw. "Members of the audience often in tears..."? Well naturally after being totrtured for 2 and a half hours!

[joanna2]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 11:48am

I'm glad everyone here is so cool.

[papalovesmambo]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 11:48am

next up:

robert jess roth's impartial review of lestat as "transcendant."

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 11:59am

Ugh...more reason to hope this piece of crap dies soon!

[jimnysf]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 12:23pm

"Members of the audience often in tears..."? Well naturally after being totrtured for 2 and a half hours!"

LOL but in order for that to happen, they would have had to stay awake.

[WonderBoy]

Posted: 5/5/06 at 3:16pm

Or sober up a bit.