CAROUSEL (2018) Previews — Page 14

Why revive it now? Because the issues that it deals with still resonate very strongly (sad to say) for many people. Fun Home and Dear Evan Hansen depict suicide. Probably no one on here would dispute that suicide is a bad thing. But depicting it and the aftermath and how it affects people can be cathartic to those who have been through the experience of mourning for someone, or for people with empathy. Same is true for domestic violence (DV). I really wish the show were as outdated as some extremely privileged people who have never experienced DV seem to think it is. But sadly, it is not.

Miles2Go,

Here are my two cents when it comes to reviving old shows, whether in full production or at a venue like Encores or Mufti: give me the complete score, note for note and as much for the book as possible, but the score must be intact. The actual physical production does not need to be recreated brushstroke by brushstroke. Sweeney can thrive under a big Hal Prince production, an insane asylum actors with instruments John Doyle production or the current immersive production playing downtown. You don’t mess with the score though.

Just this week I saw the otherwise wonderful Mufti production of Subways are for Sleeping, except for the fact that “I Said It and I’m Glad” had been cut. (I didn’t mind the changes to the book, because with an old, commercially unrevivable show, who cares?) but the target audience for Subways is clearly the group who knows and loves the score vis a vis the cast recording.

Carousel is in a different category than a Mufti, obviously, as it is attempting to go beyond a concert setting, but the rule still applies. If you don’t give me the score then you’re not giving me the show and you will have an unhappy ticketbuyer regardless of how well anything else is executed.

When I hear creative teams discuss needing to change with old shows I always want to ask them why they’re reviving the pieces in the first place. If you don’t like the way Next to Normal deals with mental illness? Write your own show about mental illness. You don’t like the way Evita portrays Eva Peron? Write your own show about Eva Peron. You don’t like the way Carousel handles domestic abuse? Then write your own show dealing with this issue and themes. No one is stopping you!

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I am really surprised to hear that the Rodgers and Hammerstein organization granted the right to cut some of the score. I agree with Whizzer, that's just a big no. I have tickets for 3/24. I was really looking forward to this production when it was announced. After reading what people have to say about the show, now not so much. I am thankful I was able to see the brilliant Lincoln Center production twice. Regarding the chemistry or lack thereof between Jessie and Joshua, that's much too bad. It's either there from the get go, or it's not.

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This whole thing is bumming me out. Revivals are by far my favorite category and I have a ticket to this and My Fair Lady within the month. I almost wish I could skip Carousel at this point. I'd rather skip it than be disappointed.

Long time Broadway Board Lurker First Time Poster! Spoilers ahead so stop reading if you want to go in super fresh or avoid a TLDR kind of post.

Context/Disclaimer: I'm 25 years old (in May) and a practicing Theater teacher, who has been rightfully obsessed with theater for the better half of my life. Carousel is my favorite R & H show. Also I saw it during the first Saturday matinee in previews, so my review may or may not reflect on the final product after opening.

Okay, so I'd give this production as it is now a solid 7. It is magnificently sung by Mueller, Henry, Fleming, and especially Lindsay Mendez. Her Carrie is so much fun and in in different ways from previous Carries I've had the privilege to see. It's hard to describe, but she seems to be the only major character to escape the awkward acting direction. She's just super funny and not in a cloying sort of way.

Some stand out numbers are Josh's Soliloquy, If I Loved You/Bench Scene, and Mr. Snow. The Orchestra is 19 pieces or so and it is a wonder to hear this score live. This cast recording is going to be FIRE!!!!

However, there are plenty of nitpicks that built up over the course of the evening to unnerve me. I'm gonna try to keep my thoughts concise.

The Carousel Waltz will in no way compare to the 1994 NTL version. I was 1 at the time, but I've watched it so many times on Youtube and it still floors me. Essentially, moving screens and the descending top of a carousel lowers onto the stage as actors pantomime horse shapes below it. Jessie as Julie, is seated on one legitimate carousel horse on SR as this happens. Its weird.

The Starkeeper acts as a framing device and I HATE it. Actor stands silently dressed in a trenchcoat and shabby wings and watches Billy's actions CONSTANTLY. The way its staged now he literally gets in between characters and just stands there being like "Don't Do it Billy. Oh dang, he did it anyway." The payoff is so little and unneeded.

The set is simple and a nice medium between abstract and not. Think way more intense than the most recent Sunday in the Park revival, but nothing really to write home about. It works, but like I said that 1994 revival has me jaded. I did loooooove the backdrops tho. Costumes are typical, colorful, and not groundbreaking. Some characters are dressed far above their station, but i''ll let it slide.

The chemistry between Jessie and Josh is almost non-existent when not singing. I mean they are only together for two months in show time, but it still feels awkward and unmoving, more often than not. I don't remember feeling an emotion when they were just talking.

THEY CUT GIVE IT TO EM GOOD CARRIE WHICH IS THE BOP OF THE SHOW AND NIGH UNFORGIVABLE. In hindsight, they did this so Renee Fleming could hit a few more trills and have an extra verse in June is Bustin Out All Over (Mind you I'm obsessed with Renee to the point where I have Armida posters everywhere, but even I was like c'mon this score is perfect don't cut it.)

Jigger comes across being as tough as a wet piece of bread, but he is a great dancer, so that's good I guess? Not really...

Okay, I've heard a lot of complaints about the choreography, but i really enjoyed it. Blow High, Blow Low, and the Hornpipe have been extended and I was like "Damn Guys! I wish I could move like that." The nice couple in back of me obviously didn't feel the same and left immediately afterwards. I was still a bit bitter about no Give it To Em Good Carrie at this point. But seeing Josh slay Soliloquy after all that intensive dancing was masterful. Best part of the show.

Renee Fleming, Opera Diva Eterna is gifted the line "I BROUGHT THE RUM!" She then proceeds hobble offstage. If anyone had actually been alive in the audience during it (my crowd was almost all white people over 60) it would have been great. I was rolling in my seat though, it was stupid, but in a fun way.

Even though they are both in the Playbill Geraniums in the Winder and Stonecutters Cut it On Stone were not in this performance. Another shameful cut as I enjoyed Carrie and Enoch's story/chemistry and with those songs gone, so too is the development between their characters. I hope...nay pray, that they add them in before opening.

Billy's death is staged in an impossibly strange way . I know in the original text and even in Liliom, Billy falls on his knife. In this production, from the one second I could make out, he accidently slits his own throat? Yeah... It's as strange as it sounds. Also Julie, at first seems to only just a bit miffed that Billy has died. What an inconvenience...but Jessie's wail on her penultimate line in the act made me believe for just a second that Julie cared. I liked that second.

Overall Act I was solid and the audience was into it. I just found it funny that these white people acted like they never heard Miss Renee sing before. I don't get it...she brings it to you every ball?

Act II has and always will be soooooooooooo much shorter than Act I. Heaven is staged with fog, curtains, and actors moving in a kabuki/yoga before brunch sort of way. I was eh.

The Ballet was nice. They lowered a worn, 2-D carousel top to suggest the vaguity of time passing. I liked it. However, the audience did not know when the Ballet was over and I was the only one clapping. That's never happened to me before at a show and honey, you best believe I knew when the Ballet was over! Wake up ya old biddies! I forgave them this sin, as there was an applause break during Blow High, Blow Low/Hornpipe earlier.

Let's just say Louise's actress is a great dancer...not so much an actor.

However, I really enjoyed the graduation scene. Again, cast is in great voice, but they end the show on Starkeeper unfolding his wings with his arms outstretched to Billy in a real Angels of America meets The Lion King sort of way. I def was not feeling it.

Overall one of the best Carousel casts vocally, worst cast direction wise. I went in wanting to love it more than I did, but the direction here is just plain awkward. They do have 5 more weeks of previews...WHICH IS INSANE, but as of now there's so much to fix. I'd go see it again, probably because I love this show so much, but it's a shame to see this awesome cast stumble through this story like newborn deer into heavy traffic.

"I can't imagine Rudin isn't aware of these issues and is going to let the team sit on their hands for 5 weeks and lose him $18 million."

Rudin is no stranger to flops or losing money: Face Value, Passion, Seven Guitars, The Judas Kiss, On The Town, The Wild Party, Caroline Or Change, Gypsy (Peters), Shuffle Along, etc. I imagine that he's learned how to deal with it by now. I'm sure none of it is his money.

A very interesting series of debates if you happen to be coming to them with a fairly open mind. I hate to see Oscar Hammerstein criticized. He was such a giant of Theater, taking us from Show Boat to Oklahoma and beyond and even leaving us Stephen Sondheim before he made his final exit. What does a writer do except depict reality?

Julie may be a poor role model for today’s women, but among lower class whites of the time the need to find a man for security and protection was real, and loyalty to the man was an often admired female trait. Life among lower class whites today is probably not all that changed today. We hear little about these people. Not much representation in the mass media depiction of law, medicine, crime detection and dopey young people at loose in the cities.

What do you do with A Streetcar Named Desire? Would you say that Stanley and Stella are so over the top that Stella will never have an influence on others? What about Grand Opera? Lots of abused and eventually dead women there. Shakespeare? The Merchant of Venice?

I’m probably more cautious about casting than others. Carousel is going to have an older than norm audience and they will not find it so easy to ignore the racial differences. A risky move to me. (And hate to see the two minorities in the villain roles.)

What if we had a dark-skinned Julie and an Irish Billy Bigelow? Is it reasonable to expect the audience to evaluate their relationship only on the difference in sex, without even subconsciously factoring in the difference in race as affecting their actions with respect to each other, and the way that the townspeople viewed them?

"According to IBDB, Scott Rudin produced the Patti LuPone-led revival of Gypsy, not the one with Bernadette Peters."

My error. But it still lost money.

"^were any of those critical flops, though? This might be his first."

Face Value closed before opening, so who knows? It was said to be quite dire. On The Town wasn't terribly well received, nor was The Wild Party, which the Times said took "the fun out of hedonism." And Shuffle Along wasn't particularly beloved as a whole, rather than as a chance for Audra MacDonald to sing.

I'm sure several other of his multitude of projects also received their share of drubbing from the daily papers.

Updated On: 3/5/18 at 01:09 PM

I would be interested, Miles2Go2, to know if you've seen a Porgy and Bess in a full version as written by Gershwin (et.al.), including his orchestrations, which he considered as much a part of the score as the melodies, harmonies, counterpoint, etc. And, if so, what you think of the authors' version, versus the adaptation (because that's what it was) by Paulus and her team.

Updated On: 3/5/18 at 01:49 PM

I think (and I may be wrong) that it may be much easier to love a revised/adapted version of a work if one isn't familiar with the authors' original version. If you've seen (and loved) an original production, changes to the book and/or score in later productions can seem misguided, or even just perverse.

I have one exception to that idea - Cabaret. Although I didn't see the original production, I've seen many productions of the original version, and enjoyed the Mendes' revised adaptation (although not as much as Fosse's movie). But Cabaret is rather unique, with several different versions - novel (or part of a novel), play, musical, movie, and revised musical - all very different from each other, and all rather successful.

Updated On: 3/5/18 at 02:19 PM

"I think anyone with the slightest keen and critical eye when it comes to theatre would be able to pick up on these problems regardless of their level of familiarity with Carousel as a musical."

No doubt, but I was referring more to Porgy and Bess, the revisal of which I found abysmal, but in comparison to what Gershwin wrote.

Sondheimite said: "bk said:
"Why tell this story today? So people like you can tell everyone why they shouldn't tell this story today because you simply cannot understand anything except how things are perceived today and with all due respect, that is a total bore. Oh, and doesn't "beat" his daughter - what show did you see?"

Probably the show Carousel where the character of Billy hits his daughter Louise. Just my guess... you know... the show we're discussing in this thread that is about a man who beats his wife and hits his daughter in a way that implies that he would beat her regularly were he alive?

"

Hits his daughter? You mean he SLUGS his daughter, is that what you mean? Because I've never seen any production of Carousel where Billy BEATS or HITS his daughter - he slaps her hand is what he actually does. Words have meanings - the poster to whom I was responding used the word BEATS. If you think slapping someone's hand is BEATING then I don't know what to tell you. You of course, used a different word - HITS. I wouldn't use that word either, frankly, at least not in the way I've seen that scene played many, many times.

Updated On: 3/5/18 at 03:18 PM