Broadway from 1 to 10 — Page 2

Sorry...let me clarify. He hated the show GYPSY and never wants to see the show again (Patti LuPone aside).

(he can chime in when he wakes up)

Haha, I was up early today, and I am just tired of the show Gypsy. There are so many shows that need to be revived and they keep reviving this one, over and over. I didn't hate Patti or the show, but I don't get all the praise from this board.
I think Brooke was a better fit for the role of Ruth Sherwood, also because she is a star, and Donna isn't, despite of her Tonys, she is not a mainstream name. I had no clue who she was until I joined this website.

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My respect for muscle went from zero into the negative numbers.

I am just tired of the show Gypsy. There are so many shows that need to be revived and they keep reviving this one, over and over.

It may seem that way with two revivals in the past decade, plus the Encores summer run (that inspired the 2nd revival), but over 50 years it hasn't been done to death. The original was so connected with Ethel Merman it would have seemed a crime to do the show without her, also Morton Baum who headed City Center in the 1960s hated GYPSY and refused to let it be done (this according to Sondheim, as quoted in SONDHEIM & CO.)

If you look, you'll see some of the other classic musicals have been revived frequently: MAN OF LA MANCHA and HELLO, DOLLY! have each been revived 3 times over the 4 decades since the original long-running (2000+ performances) productions closed. Yul Brynner did KING AND I on Broadway 3 times (1951, 1977 and 1985) plus the show was revived with Donna Murphy in 1996 and at City Center with Barbara Cook (1961) and Lincoln Center with Rise Stevens (1964.)

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KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN has a bloated first act, and some are put off by the subject matter. The score is sublime. It lost a ton of money for Livent and hasn't been rumored for revival.

LA CAGE can be a lively, fun entertaining show and appears set for this season, although in a heavily scaled down production.

EVITA is Webber & Rice's masterwork, and even though it seems to have been constantly on tour ever since the 1980s, it is surprising it hasn't been brought back to Broadway.

ASPECTS OF LOVE has a gorgeous score but flat, boring book and some appallingly bad lyrics. It was also an expensive failure the first time around. (Why was it so expensive? It didn't need elaborate sets and costumes or a huge cast?)

SUNSET BLVD, however, is Lloyd Webber at his very worst. It too was an expensive failure and deservedly so. A horrid dog's breakfast of a score because he was too lazy to write anything new and just recycled a lot of trunk material...and it shows. The source material should be the framework for a fantastic musical adaptation. Instead, whole chunks of dialogue are lifted from the screenplay and set as mind-numbingly dull recitative only to be followed by a 3-minute aria that only restates the same material covered in the recitative. The original was all about the massive set...and without that you have no show.

I had always hoped a stage musical would be updates the story to make the Norma character a former star of Hollywood musicals whose career faded when M-g-M and others stopped making them. That would have given an excuse for some dazzling over-the-top production numbers and given a number of former M-g-M stars like Debbie Reynolds a late-career vehicle!

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Wow. I guess there are all kinds of tastes... Good to remember when reading these boards.

Oh, Patti. How I don't like thee

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*pats muscle on the shoulder* we still love you, lol

Bye Bye Birdie added to the list!

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Updated On: 1/2/10 at 08:51 PM