Posted: 5/11/15 at 10:49am
Posted: 5/11/15 at 10:55am
Marc Kudisch would be my choice for Lee.
Updated On: 5/11/15 at 10:55 AM
Posted: 5/11/15 at 10:59am
At best, I could perhaps see Hensley as Rutledge, but his never was a particularly great singing voice, and his work in Most Happy Fella leads me to believe the voice has deteriorated a bit with age.
Several of these roles work best using actors who sing, rather than singers who act - d'Arcy James is definitely the latter, and would be (I think) pretty tiresome and one-note as Adams, a role that needs an actor whose sense of wit and dry charisma can offset the haranguing nature of the role.
The only real "big" (male) singers you need are for Lee and Rutledge. The other roles are better cast with actors first and foremost.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:00am
""Waltz", also. A musical with actual melodies (Rogers still had it, or mostly had it, at this point) as opposed to "near melodies" which has become to norm for most musicals now."
Explain to me the difference between and "actual" melody and a "near" melody.
I know where this is going, and it's going in the direction of comparing Rodgers to After Eight's FAVORITE composer, and we don't need another After Eight around here, do we?
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:04am
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:06am
PAINT YOUR WAGON was pretty male heavy. Granted, it had a female dancing ensemble and the female lead. But all the choral work was done by guys.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:06am
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:08am
Character-ful singing is dying like the dinosaur. Everyone has to sound so "perfect."
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:08am
As has been pointed out ad infinitum, every song has a melody. Here's a good definition of "melody: "the succession of single tones in musical compositions, as distinguished from harmony and rhythm."
Whether the individual likes that melody or not is purely subjective. No song is inherently "more melodic" than any other. Even an atonal song has a melody.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:09am
I would not categorize Brian d'Arcy James as simply a "singer who acts." At all.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:12am
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:16am
"It's actually kind of startling to think of how, actually, there aren't a ton of suitable musical theatre actors around now for a show like 1776- even for smaller roles."
I believe that several of the principle actors in the original production weren't thought of primarily as "musical theatre actors." But I think actors could cross back and forth from musicals to plays with greater ease in the 50s and 60s than they do now.
Perhaps Jay Binder should cast his nets in a different direction for this one.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:21am
"I would not categorize Brian d'Arcy James as simply a "singer who acts." At all."
Some would. Some wouldn't. But he works infrequently in straight plays (and, in my opinion, is not an actor of much invention - he learns his lines and can play a mood).
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:26am
Howard Da Silva, of course, had originated some great roles in musicals by the time he played Ben Franklin, but he also appeared in plays as frequently as musicals -- to your point, newintown, that it was more common to see actors with a foot in each world. William Daniels had mostly done plays before 1776, with the exception of ON A CLEAR DAY. Thomas Jefferson was Ken Howard's first significant role, and he went on to win his Tony for CHILD'S PLAY. Ron Holgate trained as an opera singer.
As for Brian d'Arcy James, he's done a fair amount of plays, perhaps even a large amount for an actor who's primarily known for doing musicals, and I've found his work to be consistently compelling. But, of course, you're welcome to your opinion.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:34am
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:36am
Of course, Larry - when to comes to a question of "good acting," it's really nothing but opinion.
Victor Garber impressed me, most recently, as an actor who was able to cross back and forth from musicals to straight plays seamlessly, but he rarely does musicals at all now. And Madeleine Kahn did both.
I can think of some musical actors (Lieslie Kritzer, perhaps) who would be able to do so, but they just don't seem to get much opportunity. Most musical actors today, though, strike me as merely competent actors but adept musicians (like Sutton Foster in those really awful TV shows she does).
Updated On: 5/11/15 at 11:36 AM
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:39am
Yes, that's true -- although I would call your statement that James "works infrequently in straight plays" inaccurate.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:41am
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:46am
"Well, if I am correct, he's only done two straight plays in the last five years. "
The same is true of Marc Kudisch (Hand to God, The Wayside Motor Inn) and Michael Cerveris (In the Next Room, Nikolai and the Others). Kudisch actually hasn't done many straight plays in New York; I think you think of him as an actor who moves between musicals and plays because he happens to be in a play at the moment.
If my numbers are right, in the last decade, Brian d'Arcy James has appeared in 7 musicals and 5 plays in New York. I'd call that a pretty even distribution. That's more in line with how things used to be -- when actors more freely moved between musicals and straight plays -- than the more frequently segmented system today.
Updated On: 5/11/15 at 11:46 AM
Posted: 5/11/15 at 11:48am
Just reviewing his major theatre credits, he has 16 musicals versus 5 straight plays (none of which had a long run). If "infrequent" strikes you as less than accurate, at least it's clear that he works far more frequently in musicals (excluding TV/film work, which, outside of Smash, has been relatively low profile).
Posted: 5/11/15 at 12:02pm
Posted: 5/11/15 at 1:20pm
I have no idea if he can sing or is even a good stage actor, but part of me thinks Vincent Kartheiser would be a great Adams based of his work on Mad Men. And lovely as Lauren Worsham is, I want a Martha who can belt to the rafters, and she seems like a pretty straightforward soprano. Jessie Mueller would be brilliant, but I doubt she'd take a role this small.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 1:40pm
This guy?
Posted: 5/11/15 at 2:20pm
Thanks for the info about CABIN IN THE SKY, Besty and everyone. It sounds like an interesting musical and it's great that it'll give a chance to the actors of color working on Broadway at the moment.
I'll always be disappointed by an Encores! season that doesn't include MACK & MABEL (which others on the board have told me is exclusively a Jerry Herman issue) and SEESAW. Still, this seems like a respectable line-up.
Funny that someone brought up APPLAUSE earlier. I was listening to a recording of that production, which I was able to see live, a few days ago and was struck by some of the bizarre casting choices that made sense at the time. It was a fun production though.
Posted: 5/11/15 at 2:34pm
"PAINT YOUR WAGON was pretty male heavy. Granted, it had a female dancing ensemble and the female lead. But all the choral work was done by guys."
With the apparent changes to the original, Zorba was kind of male heavy too in terms of perspective.
I'm going to take an unusual position and say I wouldn't mind a star vehicle without the star in question if they could find the right person for the role. It's a short run (not sure about how long they rehearse) so they could presumably pull in someone great if that person was interested in the project. I'm thinking about Applause or Coco or The Act. True star vehicles.
