BEETLEJUICE Previews — Page 4

Saw the show in DC and F*CK Brigadoon was not only hysterical, but one of the funniest moments in the show for me. I loved that line !

It's been noted but I'll second. One or two people shared their opinion of a first preview. I don't understand so many conclusions being drawn.

---

As someone who “attacked” the first preview let me clarify. As I said before there are some good things going on here and the evening is not a total wash. It’s just not currently an evening I’d pay more than the $33.33 I paid for it tonight. Yes, the people around me seemed to be having a good time, but first preview audiences are generally more vocal than other nights. There is something going on there, but for me personally the score, Brightman, and some structuring drag down the evening. I was at Hadestown the night before and immensely enjoyed it and this probably suffered by comparison as well. I think the fact that there is no song list in the program is a good sign they are prepared and willing to make change and I really hope they do because this could be a knock it out evening. But for now, in my opinion, that’s not the case.

And yes, all the F BeetleJuice is in reference to jokes made in the show. Not an actual attack.

Adam and Barbara are now boring and bland supporting characters. (Kerry is the one tasked with singing the lyric about Kombucha that tastes like armpit.)

The musical is now Lydia’s show. She even gets the final bow after Beetlejuice! I think they wanted to tap into the Wicked/Mean Girls audience base and put her at the center of the story.

---

I was also there last night and I have to say I had fun with this show. It's from perfect, but I definitely skew more towards the mostly positive side of things. I'll preface this by saying I had not seen the movie until Wednesday night, so I am by no means a die hard fan of the movie so I had no preconceived notions of what a Beetlejuice musical ~should~ be. After reading the reviews from DC on here, I really went in expecting to hate it so I was pleasantly surprised to discover this show was a lot of fun. It is definitely going to be divisive, and it will have its super fans and it will have people who absolutely despise it. I can definitely see this show developing a Spongebob like following (a show which I did not care for).

Starting with the positives, the production value is through the roof. As others have mentioned the set, costume and puppet design are all top notch. The cast is full of Broadway pros, so it should come as no surprise they are all giving great performances. For me Leslie Kritzer was the standout, she was incredibly funny in the small bits she had. I also liked Brightman, although I know I am in the minority on that. Any qualms I had with his portrayal came down to the writing and not his interpretation. The jokes in this show, especially Act 1, almost all landed and this show is incredible funny. This version of Beetlejuice is entirely a comedy, and if you go in expecting that and not the movie I think you will have a good time with it.

Now the bad, Act 2 for me is where this show really goes downhill. It really drags and the plot doesn't really know what to do with itself. The show tries to hit certain emotional beats, and for me they all fell pretty flat and felt very forced/contrived. As others have mentioned, the score is easily the worst part of the show, delivering a score that is bland/forgettable at best and just plain bad at worst. It really does boggle my mind that Eddie Perfect has not one but two shows on Broadway this season. I am sure he is a talented guy, but musical theater composer he is not. That being said, the numbers are staged well for the most part and ooze energy which helps drive the show forward when the music fails to do so. The ballads are slogs to get through though (and there are way too many of them, and they're all basically the same).

I appreciate that they weren't afraid to diverge from the source material, I wish more movie to musical adaptations had that courage. I would actually go as far to say every single character in the show is significantly different than their movie counterpart. That being said, they are trying to tell their own story while also trying to include all of the original characters and beats from the original movie. This results in a kind of jumbled plot and is largely why Act 2 feels so disjointed (The Maitlands for example are barely in Act 2 and when they are they aren't even relevant to the plot). I wish they had either committed to telling a brand new Beetlejuice story with new characters (save for Beetlejuice himself), or just did a straightforward retelling of the movie. As it stands now, its a bit of a jumbled mess.

All that being said, I had a really good time with this show. If you enjoy "shut-off-your-brain-and-enjoy" type shows then you will enjoy this show. If you like more cerebral shows, this is not the show for you (but you also probably already knew that). Overall, this show reminded me a lot of Addam's Family. They both have all star casts giving it their all, even when they aren't given much to work with, great sets and costumes and an underutilized ensemble that feels superfluous. And I see it having a very similar trajectory as well. A modest year or so on Broadway, a pretty successful tour, and then prepare yourselves for it to be done to death (no pun intended) by every single high school and community theater around.

There is no model in the musical so no.

"The lyrics are super inventive and smart" You are either a young teen who knows nothing about lyrics or you work for the show. I believe those are the options here :)"



No. I don't work for them. I was simply feeling happy after the show and I wrote about why I liked it. I loved the performances, set, songs and that it made me laugh. I don't claim to be an expert but I was voicing my opinion and what I saw. I won't be doing that again since the reaction was so mean. Jeez.

Excellent review, Hamilfan2!! The Addams Family comparison is quite an accurate one. Both shows took a pretty sinister and beloved concept and made it cartoonish and almost amateur like. While it’s enjoyable and innocent, they leave the audience wanting more and feeling like they were cheated a teeny bit. I’ve always thought the made up storyline of Wednesday being softened up by love was weird and doesn’t stay in line with the whole Addams Family brand, so to speak. Beetlejuice is very similar in that regard, as it undermines the characters and makes them have different intentions and different personalities. While it IS a courageous risk, it’s a mighty big one.

Unbelievably bad. The obnoxiousness level is off the charts. A truly rancid affair.

Kerry Butler and Rob McClure have charm in abundance. They deserve so much better.

As do we.

Kad said: "Is it a courageous risk, though? Or is it simply trying to turn something into a more broadly palatable and bankable brand and missing sight of why people even liked it in the first place?"

I’d still define it as courageous, technically, because it’s something many would be very scared to do. But, yes, you make a very good point. I definitely agree that they’re trying to turn the show into something it’s not just to please the masses instead of being true to the reason why people probably bought a ticket in the first place.

A discussion I had on Facebook about the pros and cons of Lippa's "Wild Party" might pertain here: the same thing people like so much about Joseph March's "Wild Party" poem is the same thing people like so much about Burton's "Beetlejuice:" the characters are ultimately one-dimensional grotesques. Fantastically appealing paper dolls. It's a performance and a puppet show as much as it is a narrative. The Maitlands are as lame and dopey (albeit relatable) as the Deetzes are cold and big-city neurotic; all the art world figures are high-camp stereotypes and essentially interchangeable. Only Beetlejuice breaks the mold, and that's because Michael Keaton talked Burton into letting him throw out the script and improvise almost every line as an imitation of Pittsburgh actor Don Brockett's backstage behavior and comic sensibility. The reason that there's nobody else in the works of Tim Burton or Michael McDowell like Beetlejuice is that, for all intents and purposes, they didn't write him. So you have one demented child running amok in an Edward Gorey puppet theatre.

That approach doesn't work as well on stage for two and a half hours, since it's less of a visual-based medium. So they had to find some way of fleshing the characters out and turning them from paper dolls into people, giving them motivations and inner lives. Evidently it didn't work as planned.

was really hoping they would have added back in the model because that’s my favorite line in the film :/ . Did they have the line “attention K-Mart shoppers” though?

That line was also scrapped.

YvanEhtNioj said: "Are there any songs from the score that stand out? (I personally like Dear Dead Mom..). How are the costumes and choreography?"

None of the songs stood out to me if I'm being honest. Costumes and choreography I thought were exactly what you would expect. Beetlejuice's hair changes color from scene to scene, which I found to be a weird choice that didn't really work for me. But aside from that I really enjoyed the costumes and thought they did a good job capturing the color and whimsy of the show. Most if not all of the costumes you wanna see from the movie make an appearance (the only major one I noticed not in the show was the girl cut in half sitting on a couch). Choreo is energetic and frenetic, but sometimes feels a bit too chaotic and often feels out of place.

Updated On: 3/29/19 at 01:15 PM