Broadway Producers Putting Together Fall Reading of CARRIE: THE MUSICAL — Page 5

Just because it was the 80s did not mean it had to look so 80s.

You're right, but it was designed to look like the present day. Which was the 80s. Godspell didn't have to look so 70s, either. It was a concept that failed for Carrie, but that isn't news, nor is it unique to the destruction scene.

The argument about a piece looking 80s because it was set in the 80s does not really fly when they effect that they were using had no relation to what she was able to do.

Actually, the argument does fly when it was in response to something like "the destruction scene looked so 80s". If your point is that the use of lasers was irrelevant to the scene, then that's not the same thing. The ENTIRE SHOW looked 80s and it looked that way on purpose. If the effect was misused, that is due to poor direction, design and staging, which was prevalent throughout the show. Saying that the use of lasers in Carrie looked so 80s, is like saying the use of hand-held microphones in Hair looked so 60s. Of course it did! It was a product of its time and it utilized special effects that were available. In the case of Sunday in the Park With George, the really 80s-looking lasers were used effectively, but in te case of Carrie, they weren't. It doesn't mean one show looks MORE 80s than the other because of the use of lasers.

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Why? Because it was a flop? After the recent Guys and Dolls production, which only went to prove that it's not the material, but the production that can define a hit, a revival of Carrie does not sound so ridiculous. In the case of Carrie, the only way to cause any more damage to the show is to revive it exactly as it was originally produced.

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"This is one of the most dreadfully stupid ideas I've ever heard."

I don't see anything stupid about it. A staged reading costs next to nothing to produce. Why not explore the material a bit more on the cheap? As many have said, both in the industry and the fans, the first workshop in 84 showed a lot of potential. If they are restoring some of that material maybe they will find that a full-scale revival is a possibility someday down the road.

I just feel (and I could very well be totally wrong on this) that this is not a show that would ever be financially successful. I don't think there is enough of an audience for this type of show. I could see it maybe as a limited run, but a full-scale revival? I don't think the outlook is great frankly.

It doesn't help that it's viewed as one of the worst Broadway musicals ever, but you all knew that already.

Jeffrey Seller came to talk to my class today. He said that he has only committed to a reading and not a revival. He said the reading is to see whether or not he can fall in love with it, which means a revival is not out of the question. Also, AEA AGMA SM, readings cost more than you might think. He said today that readings typically cost at least $10 K, and usually no more than $30 K.

How about fans of the film?

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Many people aren't all that huge fans of 'CARRIE' anymore. Most people I know would read or watch Stephen King's 'IT' or a few of his other works over it. I'm not saying Carrie doesn't have it's fans, but to hope that a film from the '70s with a not-so-favored movie revival, I don't know where Carrie's film fanbase stands.

In what year is the novel set? One of the things that did not ring true for me in the original film is that these jocks and bitches at Carrie's high school would be the very LAST people to give a crap about being banned from the prom. In fact, those kids probably wouldn't have gone at all in the first place and just laughed at the nerds that did. This became even more problematic in the musical, set, apparently, in an '80s Las Vegas aerobics class heavily influenced by Olivia Newton John's "Let's Get Physical."

I think the bullying and the school devastation issues can ring true, but not if the whole thing hinges on Chris not being able to go to the prom! Sob! Sob!

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To me the investment in the prom by the mean girls rings totally false. I remember thinking when I saw the Carrie movie when it came out that it might have made sense if the girls had no desire to go to the prom UNTIL they got banned from it. Then they could get enraged and scapegoat Carrie because that's the perfect excuse they need.

These rotten stoner just-this-side of juvenile delinquent kids suddenly going, "Oh the prom, it's so special" makes them suddenly seem as if they '60s never happened.

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I agree in a way Namo but i think its drawing on the fact that (get ready for the stereotypes) that most of the popular girls live from the prom, its what they wait for all year round.

Also i think with Chris it has more to do with the fact that she feels wronged, she does not understand that she has done anything wrong so does not feel she should be punished. I think the prom thing is just an off shoot of that.

Also i think the novel is set around 1976 or 78

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Carrie was first published in 1974, so the action was set in early 70s. I get where Namo is coming from, but I think the prom attitude also has a lot to do with the community. I know in the 80s, in a small-town suburb of Houston, the prom was a big deal to practically EVERYONE. Stoners, maybe not, but the character of Chris is supposed to be an upper class daddy's girl who likes to play on the wrong side of the tracks. But that has nothing to do with her thirst for power and manipulation of all those under her in the social pyramid of her domain. She wasn't just banned from the prom. She was humiliated by the teacher in front of all her friends and the one girl who, more than anyone else, she believes is deserving of endless humiliation and torture. It's not so much that Chris can't go to the prom that sends her over the edge. It's that Carrie CAN go to the prom. And that Sue takes Carrie's side and abandons Chris. Chris was knocked off her pedestal and would do anything to climb back on.

King knew exactly how to play it out so that Chris's motivation to take things to the extreme actually seems plausible given the foundation he laid for her personality. Sympathy and kindness for Carrie was enough for Chris to crack. The prom was just a device to serve as a stage for the town's apocalypse, but it was very wisely used.

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Updated On: 10/21/09 at 12:05 PM

Who is playing Carrie in the reading?