Badly reviewed long running shows

[Jay94]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 11:25am

There seems to be some degree of revisionist history surrounding the reviews of long running hits, either they were praised or disliked depending on how the story goes. Some would have you believe that Oklahoma was poorly received but I'm not sure that was the case.

So for the record, what are some shows that were badly reviewed that ended up being big hits?

[aj88]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 11:28am

I remember being in college and I had one particular Theatre professor who claimed that while directing Oklahoma, the original production had received such negative responses but everything I read suggests otherwise....then again, he ALWAYS gave wrong information about reviews and performance amounts of shows.

Jekyll & Hyde may not have recouped, but it did run for a few years on weak reviews and very few Tony nominations.

Didn't Wicked also get some very mixed notices as well?

[Sunny11]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 11:47am

Motown the musical. Well a couple of years might not be considered long running but it recouped after poor reviews.

[Borstalboy]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:00pm

Blood Brothers, Miss Saigon, Pippin, Evita, I Love You You're Perfect Now Change and, yes, Phantom all got mediocre reviews.

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:08pm

We've seen a whole lot of shows that got mixed reviews when they first premiered that went on to become hits such as Beauty & the Beast, Aida, Mamma Mia!, Wicked, The Color Purple, Mary Poppins, Rock of Ages, Memphis, Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, etc.

@13:33

[Bilbo3]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:22pm

Anyone know if the NY Times review for Beauty and the beast is still floating around somewhere?

[aj88]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:24pm

http://www.nytimes.com/1994/04/19/theater/review-theater-beauty-and-the-beast-disney-does-broadway-dancing-spoons-and-all.html

I believe this was it. Somewhere between the transition of Frank Rich and Ben Brantley.

[disneybroadwayfan22]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:26pm

Wasn't Wicked panned when it opened?

[Bilbo3]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:37pm

Thanks so much, aj88. What a snotty review.

 

"Wasn't Wicked panned when it opened?"

 

I could be wrong but I think it was mixed at best. Definitely not overly positive raves but I don't think it was panned.

 

 

[Jay94]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:37pm

I've always been confused by the fact that a lot of badly reviewed shows still went on to win a ton of Tony Awards. I would imagine that the New York critics (which apparently have a lot of influence) would sway voters enough to not vote for something.

Updated On: 4/11/15 at 12:37 PM

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 12:57pm

Please keep in mind that theatre critics and reporters used to have been Tony voters before losing their privileges back in 2009 as a result of a 'conflict of interest'. Since then, they always assumed that the remaining Tony voters (a majority of them being road producers) were just gonna vote for the more commercially viable show over the more critically acclaimed.

2010:
Memphis beat Fela!

2011:
The Book of Mormon swept!

2012:
Once beat Newsies

2013:
Kinky Boots beat Matilda

2014:
A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder beat Beautiful: The Carole King Musical

[Jay94]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 1:18pm

Clearly Once and Gentleman's Guide winning disprove this to some extent. However, I've never understood the logic behind this argument which seems to come up during every Tony season. Why would the producers feel the need to support something that is already commercial and doesn't need an award? Wouldn't road producers want to get behind something with less commercial appeal in order for them to later tour it with added awards prestige?

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 1:59pm

Jay, I think the logic is that they are looking at the longer, big picture. For example, Gentleman's Guide's gave it a quick boost and it has now recouped, but the grosses have quickly fallen to unremarkable, which is rare for a Best Musical less than a year after winning the big award. 

Beautiful has remained a hit, but instead of turning into a 1.4 mill a week hit that will stay way for several years it has instead maintained an impressive but not astonishing gross. 

The logic would be turn Beautiful into a mega-hit that will last a decade, rather give a boost to smaller show that will fold in a year or two. 

I don't necessarily agree with all this, but I think it's why people claim the votes will go to an already commercial property rather than one that really needs the award to survive. 

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 2:32pm

Let's take a look at some statistics, shall we?

2010 Best Musical Nominees:
American Idiot
Fela!
Memphis
Million Dollar Quartet

Three of the nominees were some sort of jukebox musicals, two of which had more ambition (American Idiot and Fela!), and Memphis was the only original musical that season.

The older Tony voters felt American Idiot just wasn't their personal cup of tea, Fela! had been struggling at the box office (pretty much because a lot of people never even heard of Fela Kuti), Memphis was the little show that could, and Million Dollar Quartet's nomination was clearly the award.

2011 Best Musical Nominees:
The Book of Mormon
Catch Me If You Can
The Scottsboro Boys
Sister Act

Two of the nominees were crowd-pleasing musicals based on popular films (Catch Me If You Can and Sister Act), The Scottsboro Boys was a critically-acclaimed Kander & Ebb show that moved from Off-Broadway to Broadway, and The Book of Mormon was an original musical by the creators of South Park.

Mormon was clearly the juggernaut, Scottsboro Boys would've done better if it was still running, and the nominations for Catch Me If You Can and Sister Act was pretty much their awards.

2012 Best Musical Nominees:
Leap of Faith
Newsies
Nice Work If You Can Get It
Once

Three of the nominees were based on more obscure movies, two of which actually had a chance of winning (Newsies and Once), Newsies was Disney's first well-received musical since The Lion King, and Once was the more inventive show that moved from Off-Broadway to Broadway.

Leap of Faith's nomination was pretty much a win for not being Ghost nor Spider-Man, Nice Work If You Can Get It was just happy to join in, Newsies was already commercially viable enough, Once needed the Tony more.

2013 Best Musical Nominees:
Bring It On: The Musical
A Christmas Story: the Musical
Kinky Boots
Matilda

Two of the nominees were closed shows based on popular films (Bring It On and A Christmas Story), Kinky Boots was based on a more obscure British independent film, Matilda was a British-import based on a beloved Roald Dahl novel.

Kinky Boots kind of did seem commercially viable because of Cyndi Lauper's name, but the backlash against Matilda was that so many theatre producers felt screwed by The Royal Shakespeare Company for turning down their valuable offers to bring the show to Broadway, so several of those screwed producers got their revenge by voting for Kinky Boots.

2014 Best Musical Nominees:
After Midnight
Aladdin
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical
A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder

The most diverse group of nominees we've had in years. A revue, a big Disney musical, a jukebox/biography musical, and an operetta based on some obscure novel which also served as source material for an old Alec Guinness film.

After Midnight wasn't really a musical at all, Aladdin was Disney's biggest hit since The Lion King, some felt Beautiful could've won because it was clearly the more commercially viable, but voters felt Gentleman's Guide (the little show that could) needed the Tony more.

 

[mar6411]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 2:40pm

How do you know what the voters thought?  I assume this is your speculation?

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 2:44pm

^That, and also from reading Michael Riedel's columns.

[mar6411]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 2:52pm

Oh.  Speculation.

[thedrybandit]

Posted: 4/11/15 at 2:59pm

"Blood Brothers, Miss Saigon, Pippin, Evita, I Love You You're Perfect Now Change and, yes, Phantom all got mediocre reviews."

 That Phantom got mediocre reviews seems to be something ALW/Mackintosh have been saying in recent years to attempt to get Love Never Dies off the ground (At least, that's the theory I've heard). I just went back to look at the original NY Times review, as well as a couple of others, and they're glowing reviews.

[ScottyDoesn'tKnow2]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 3:02am

"Didn't Wicked also get some very mixed notices as well?"

Yeah. I think most of it was about lost potential since the original source material was on a totally different intellectual level than the sanitized simple musical. Also the fact that many thought it was over-produced, over-bloated with mediocre songs save for one or two. I remember that Kristin Chenoweth got the mostly rave reviews while Idina got mixed-to-great notices.

I can't say I disagree with the initial reviews. I know Stephen Scwartz walked out of the Tonys after he lost Best Score but I think in a fair world, he would've been last in that category as Caroline, or Change; Taboo; and Avenue Q had superior scores.

Updated On: 4/12/15 at 03:02 AM

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 4:54am

I would not call RIch's NYT review a rave for Phantom.  He was at the top of the heap amongst critics who were horrified that British shows were taking over Broadway (and not just cuz he didn't like the shows, but cuz they were British,) and I say that as a huge fan of his work (remember his Crazy for You review which was rightfully glowing but much of it was all about how thank God the Americans were back.)  Either way he raved about Hal Prince's direction (rightly so but he was a huge Prince fanboy,) and the designs and Crawford.  He seemed to think the rest was ****--but those are big elements of course, and the fact that Phantom won for direction and design and actor but not in the other categories seems to basically go with the reviews (OK, not so much Best Musical but Into the Woods didn't get raves really either.)

But you're right that CamMac does like to spin a good story (witness the ridiculousness about his new productions of Phantom/Mi/Saigon being handed down to the cheaper assistants of the past designers and directors being because he felt it was about time the younger generation got to make their stamp on the work.  Umm right.)  However, he's quite right that Les Miz got a lot of negative press in London when it was at RSC and it was CamMac and his money that pushed for it to transfer to the West End.

Backing up to the first post--I recently read Oklahoma! The Making of an American Musical which is a fascinating, wonderful book that is so dryly academic (to be fair, that's its market,) that I had to take long breaks between reading chapters.  Still, it very clearly lays to rest the notion that Oklahoma had bad press.  It got some mixed reviews out of town but mostly positive and several flat out raves (the "No Jokes! No Girls! No Chance!" or whatever anecdote was apparently basically a glorified gossip columnist from out of town who telegraphed that to a New York reporter and then it got elevated over the years to imply all the actual reviews said that,) and the actual New York reviews were nearly all unequivocal raves.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 4:56am

Chicago wasn't a massive run in 1975 (though the legacy of the revival seems to make some people think it was a flop,) but, like Fosse's earlier Pippin as mentioned, the critics weren't too kind to it overall.  Praise for the performances, quite a bit of praise for Fosse's production but Kander and Ebb's score was often seen as derivative (though it wasn't as harshly attacked as Schwartz' for Pippin,) etc. 

[ScottyDoesn'tKnow2]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 5:23am

"Chicago wasn't a massive run in 1975 (though the legacy of the revival seems to make some people think it was a flop,) but, like Fosse's earlier Pippin as mentioned, the critics weren't too kind to it overall.  Praise for the performances, quite a bit of praise for Fosse's production but Kander and Ebb's score was often seen as derivative (though it wasn't as harshly attacked as Schwartz' for Pippin,) etc. "

I don't know if it was the rivalry talking but Hal Prince made comments about Bob Fosse copying Cabaret with Chicago.

[Junior Babcock]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 6:25am

It may be hard to believe but THE SOUND OF MUSIC was not thought of too kindly by the New York Times. I seem to remember the reviewer wrote something to the effect that the show was "not only too sweet for words, it was too sweet for music."

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 6:32am

Many critics didn't like the film either for the same reason.  Not all that surprising to me.  I mean I like SOM but I do get the sickly sweet criticism.

 

Prince apparently commented that someone should have told Fosse that Chicago in the 1920s wasn't Weimer Germany.  Maybe it was some jealousy over Cabaret suddenly being associated with Fosse and not Prince?  And then (as kinda dramatized in All That Jazz and mentioned in his bio,) Fosse was paranoid when he had his heart attack during working on Chicago that the bakers were trying to get Prince to take over. 

One major review for Chicago (I forget which?) complained at length that the music was miked to a deafening level that made the lyrics unintelligible.

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 4/12/15 at 8:08am

I can't say I disagree with the initial reviews. I know Stephen Schwartz walked out of the Tonys after he lost Best Score but I think in a fair world, he would've been last in that category as Caroline, or Change; Taboo; and Avenue Q had superior scores.

Also keep in mind that the reason behind Avenue Q beating Wicked for Best Musical was because the producers of Avenue Q knew that Wicked was such a big financial juggernaut that they told all the road producers who were Tony voters that Avenue Q was gonna be going on tour, meaning that the show needed the Tony more to stay alive. Shortly after the Tony's that year, it was revealed that there was no tour for Avenue Q, the producers only made an exclusive deal with Las Vegas.