CAROUSEL (2018) Previews- Page 20

[theaterguy11]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 3:58am

Re: Highest Judge of All

I have never seen a production of Carousel use the song. Perhaps everybody is copying the NT/LCT choice. I considered myself a Carousel fan for years and I was legit shocked when he started singing it in this production.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 8:24am

To recap, half the posters are shocked and appalled that this revival is altering the score as it was first performed in the original Broadway production, while the other half are shocked and appalled that "Highest Judge of All," which was in the original Broadway production, is now in this revival.

[bk]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 12:09pm

Miles2Go2 said: "Having not seen this revival or any other production, I decided to check out the 2013 Lincoln Center New York Philharmonicproduction on Amazon Prime.

My thoughts a little more than one hour in (just finished Act I):

I agree with others that say that Julie and Billy’s suddenly falling in love as soon as they meet stretches the bounds of believability. Especially since Julie comes across as a fairly strong young woman (I have known women and men who can’t handle being single for long and fall “in love” at the drop of a hat; that doesn’t seem to be Julie though) when they first meet and not prone to be swept off her feet so quickly. However, both O’Hara and Gunn sell the scene and have chemistry. Their “If I Loved You” is beautiful.

Jason Danieley (Enoch Snow) and Jessie Mueller (Carrie Pipperidge) have great chemistry which would suggest that the reported lack of chemistry between Mueller’s Julie and Henry’s Billy in the 2018 revival would tend to point more toward poor direction.

While it is clear that Julie is an abused wife, so far this production makes it clear that while she says the things an abused wife would say, the show does not endorse domestic violence, even covertly.

I may check back in after Act 2."

People falling in love at first sight is unbelievable?  I'd skip, oh, about 90% of all romantic plays and films then.  It's been a staple of drama since the year One.  And believe it or not, it's been known to happen in real life, too.

[mtcond]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 12:18pm

"Highest Judge" was in the 1965 Lincoln Center production, and is on the recording with John Raitt. It's included in the rental package when the show is licensed to regional theaters and schools--but it's not unusual to omit it. It wasn't in the Hytner production, which was fine because no one needed to hear Michael Hayden sing it. It does amplify an ongoing theme in "Carousel", though, the idea that some people get opportunities that others do not. When Jigger and Billy talk about killing someone, Billy asks if Jigger ever worries about being judged by God for his actions. Jigger scoffs and says the best they'll get in Heaven is police magistrates--and once Billy dies he discovers that Jigger was sort of right. The song is his reaction to that, and his anger about the sense of inequality--which was a big issue for him on Earth, too, and will come up with Louise as well. I think it's a helpful song because it enhances a theme that Hammerstein is exploring in the play (arguably more worth keeping than "Geraniums in the Window". Does anyone know if it was in the Lyric Opera of Chicago production?

[Schmuli]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 12:38pm

Amazing how we each formulate different opinions based on our observations. I thought the young lady dancing the part of Louise looked to be in her mid-teens. Exactly the age intended by R/H. If she is indeed older in real life, then she was cast perfectly. I wish I had that youthful look and formula. Btw: a magnificent dancer...over the top elegance.

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 1:27pm

bk said: "Miles2Go2 said: "Having not seen this revival or any other production, I decided to check out the 2013 Lincoln Center New York Philharmonicproduction on Amazon Prime.

My thoughts a little more than one hour in (just finished Act I):

I agree with others that say that Julie and Billy’s suddenly falling in love as soon as they meet stretches the bounds of believability. Especially since Julie comes across as a fairly strong young woman (I have known women and men who can’t handle being single for long and fall “in love” at the drop of a hat; that doesn’t seem to be Julie though) when they first meet and not prone to be swept off her feet so quickly. However, both O’Hara and Gunn sell the scene and have chemistry. Their “If I Loved You” is beautiful.

Jason Danieley (Enoch Snow) and Jessie Mueller (Carrie Pipperidge) have great chemistry which would suggest that the reported lack of chemistry between Mueller’s Julie and Henry’s Billy in the 2018 revival would tend to point more toward poor direction.

While it is clear that Julie is an abused wife, so far this production makes it clear that while she says the things an abused wife would say, the show does not endorse domestic violence, even covertly.

I may check back in after Act 2."

People falling in love at first sight is unbelievable? I'd skip, oh, about 90% of all romantic plays and films then. It's been a staple of drama since the year One. And believe it or not, it's been known to happen in real life, too."

Thanks for the snark. Always nice to wake up to on a Saturday morning. I do skip about 90% (if not more) of romantic films (especially romantic comedies) because I find them ridiculously unbelievable and very poorly written. I admired much about this production. I just didn’t find the way Julie and Billy meet and instantly fall in love believable due to how that scene is written. If I Loved You is a beautiful song though. It was a small quibble in an otherwise mostly wondrous production. You completely bought that scene. I didn’t. Simple as that.  It was easy enough to mostly overlook (but worth noting) due to the great performances and the many other things that the show has going for it. That’s the great thing about art. Different people can have different reactions to it. 

[Jake01]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:05pm

"The Highest Judge of All" was indeed in Lyric Opera's production, yes. The RNT/Lincoln Center production deleted it because, according to the liner notes in the cast album booklet, "Hytner felt it impeded the flow of the story and was in any case inspired by the need to cover a scene change that, in today's technology, can be negotiated in seconds."

I loved Lyric's production, despite its flaws, but remember it receiving harsh criticism from some posters here. It seems like the current revival's sins are more unforgivable, though; Lyric at least didn't make any cuts to the book and score, to my knowledge.

[JAS]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:11pm

Miles2Go2 said: "Thanks for the snark. Always nice to wake up to on a Saturday morning. I do skip about 90% (if not more) of romanticfilms (especially romantic comedies) because I find them ridiculously unbelievable and very poorly written. I admired much about this production. I just didn’t find the way Julie and Billy meet and instantly fall in love believable due to how that scene is written. If I Loved You is a beautiful song though. It was a small quibble in an otherwise mostly wondrous production. You completely bought that scene. I didn’t. Simple as that. It was easy enough to mostly overlook (but worth noting) due to the great performances and the many other things that the show has going for it. That’s the great thing about art. Different people can have different reactions to it."

I hope you’re not suggesting that the “Bench Scene” is poorly written! If you think it is, please give an example of  well written musical love scene!

Billy and Julie have not fallen in love at first sight. For Julie’s part, it’s been a long time coming. When Carrie sings earlier, “When you work in the Mill, weavin’ at the loom, you gaze absent-minded at the roof,” something Julie mentions to Billy in their scene. For Hulie, it’s ben long enough that her best friend has noticed! And when Billy responds with “I can jus see myself...kinda scrawny and pale, pickin’ at my food...” Rodgers uses the same music to show us that Billy, unaware though he may be, has had the same feelings as Julie. It’s Fate that has brought them together. 

“Poorly written”? I think not!

 

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:20pm

^ Wow. You really can’t stand it when people don’t think the same way you do. The scene rang false to me. I’m glad it doesn’t ring false for you. We are both allowed to have different interpretations of that scene and state them. We don’t have to agree as we clearly won’t.

[JAS]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:44pm

Miles2Go2 said: "^ Wow. You really can’t stand it when people don’t think the same way you do. The scene rang false to me. I’m glad it doesn’t ring false for you. We are both allowed to have different interpretations of that scene and state them. We don’t have to agree as we clearly won’t. "

I’m sorry, but where did I say I can’t stand when people don’t think the same as I do? I stated what I thought was wrong with your opinion—an opinion, by-the-bye, not shared by most, who think the 73-year-old scene one of the finest in the canon—and asked for an example of what YOU think a well-written love scene from a musical you could use to show that doesn’t ring false?

I thought this was a conversation.

[Gizmo6]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:48pm

I’m fascinated by the reviews of the previews and the directorial choices.

Hynters production was fantastic and I loved the Spiderwomans showreel of the Broadway production with Audra.

Something I always wondered is why nobody changes the time period?

As for the domestic violence, it’s an awful tragedy of life, hidding it is the antithesis of what theatre should be striving for.

Women and men today will justify a slap or punch by saying their partners hugs make them forget. It’s not justifying it, it’s up to the director to show how institutionalised and harrowing domestic violence is.

As for the race issues highlighted here, no offence but that is a complex problem for USA over here we wouldn’t think of the black man as universal perpetrators of violence because of one character but it’s definitely something the creative team should have foreseen and went with it or changed.

Anyway I’m intrigued to see how this progresses.

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:50pm

I could give you examples of scenes that I think I work better than this one but it’s quite apparent that you won’t be happy until I can see that you’re right. So let’s just say I’m an idiot. You are right. I’m a horrible human being. Let’s move on…

[Gizmo6]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 2:58pm

Ah guys don’t fall out. The bench love scene isn’t a stereotypical love scene on the surface of it but when you scratch the surface it’s very intelligently constructed.

[Dancingthrulife2]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 3:39pm

I wonder whether this revival would fare better if they modernized it and centered it around the living conditions of working class Amaericans today.

[bk]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 4:30pm

Miles2Go2 said: "I could give you examples of scenes that I think I work better than this one but it’s quite apparent that you won’t be happy until I can see that you’re right. So let’s just say I’m an idiot. You are right. I’m a horrible human being. Let’s move on…"

You're not an idiot, you're thin-skinned (if you think my post was snarky you have no idea what snark is) and unwilling to have a conversation with JAS.  When you post on a message board guess what - people respond.  

[Sally Durant Plummer]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 5:16pm

“The Bench Scene” is one of the tightest constructed sequences in all of musical theatre. It also gives us one of the first forays into analyzing the psychological states of characters. You see Julie’s transformation from a girl who has a crush - having visited the carousel to see Billy many tines - into a woman in love. And Billy is tempted to give up his womanizing tendencies and take a chance on this girl - a girl who doesn’t care about his background. And it also gives us that timeless classic “If I Loved You”. Even if the scene “rings false” to you, you have to appreciate that this was a watershed moment for musical theatre that brought more depth and nuance to character development over song. It is clear from that moment where Sondheim cane from and why we writes the way he did. It is, quite simply, a perfect 13-minute piece.

[theatregoer3]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 6:30pm

So I just finished Hytner’s book. He says he always hated the line about someone hitting you and it not hurting and that it’s not just Julie saying the line, it’s the show. He wishes to this day that he would have cut it.

[Fordham2015]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 7:20pm

The $59 seats are listed as "partial view" on Telecharge, but I know different theaters have different definitions for that. Anyone who's gotten those seats: how's the view?

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 7:57pm

I've always loved the bench scene and assumed everyone did.
But I've just read Molnar's scene in Liliom (the entire script linked here..
https://archive.org/stream/liliomlegendinse00molnuoft/liliomlegendinse00molnuoft_djvu.txt

And it's very clear to me that Hammerstein was working faithfully from Molnar, the play being quite popular at the time CAROUSEL was first produced, and that the scene in both Molnar's and Hammerstein's versions is dramatization of the first caliber.

Especially impressive is that the the verse of If I Loved You ("ain't ya ever had a feller you go walking with" etc.) is almost taken verbatim from Julie and Liliom's dialogue.

What's important in this scene (and what happens offstage between it and the next time we see them as a couple) is not that every facet of Julie and Billy/Liliom's growing feelings for each other is told us, but that we learn a great deal about who each of them is and their ways of operating in the world. 

If a great deal is unsaid, left to the imagination about why exactly they end up together, that's exactly how it should be.   Our imaginations have more than enough textual material from the bench scene to work with.

Updated On: 3/10/18 at 07:57 PM

[darquegk]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 8:39pm

It's much like Sweeney Todd- if you go back and read the Christopher Bond play, the structure of its script is reproduced musically down to the minutiae. http://www.samuelfrench.com/content/samples/114686/sweeneytodd-9780573015472_21399_text_5-5x8-5.pdf

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 9:01pm

Miles2Go2 said: "Having not seen this revival or any other production, I decided to check out the 2013 Lincoln Center New York Philharmonicproduction on Amazon Prime.

My thoughts a little more than one hour in (just finished Act I):

I agree with others that say that Julie and Billy’s suddenly falling in love as soon as they meet stretches the bounds of believability. Especially since Julie comes across as a fairly strong young woman (I have known women and men who can’t handle being single for long and fall “in love” at the drop of a hat; that doesn’t seem to be Julie though) when they first meet and not prone to be swept off her feet so quickly. However, both O’Hara and Gunn sell the scene and have chemistry. Their “If I Loved You” is beautiful.”

Okay, I went back and watched the beginning again through the bench scene. I admit it rang much more true the second time. I can why it is so lauded. Maybe it was because I started watching it around midnight last night and I was tired, but I missed that this wasn’t the first time that they’d met, that she had been to the carousel before no doubt due to her infatuation with Billy. Anyway, my apologies. I’ve been in a foul mood all day for no apparent reason and didn’t mean to expose others to it.  

[Schmuli]

Posted: 3/10/18 at 10:16pm

Updated On: 3/10/18 at 10:16 PM

[phan24]

Posted: 3/11/18 at 2:51pm

WaffleOnWheels said: "Just posted this morning:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuWkYugDL_c

40 minutes(!) of press reels from the 1994 production."

THANK YOU

[OlBlueEyes]

Posted: 3/12/18 at 12:12am

I also went back to the Live at Lincoln Center production. I thought that Kelli O'Hara and Nathan Gunn would not say anything that would contradict their principles and beliefs and had enough influence not to be forced otherwise.

This production goes a little easy on Billy. When Julie hears Billy accused of having beaten her, she immediately contradicts this, saying that he had just hit her once. As she is kneeling over the dying Billy, she says softly, "I know why you hit me. It was because you were quick-tempered and unhappy. That doesn't excuse it, but I always knew everything you were thinking." Billy's calling for Julie as he lay dying, and asking her to hold his hand tightly is perhaps the best expression of his love for her.

Billy, at the gates of heaven, when accused of having beaten his wife, also denies this emphatically but admits to having hit her. When asked why, he replies, "I'd say this and she'd say that and she would be right, so I hit her."

Julie does answer her daughter that it is possible for someone to hit you hard and for you to not feel any pain. My take on this was that Julie was thinking back at when Billy hit her and expressing her belief that Billy had not hurt her emotionally when he struck her because she knew that it was not a sign that he did not love and care for her, but only a result of his having been "quick-tempered and unhappy." Emotional pain from finding that he did not care for her would have been on a different level than a moment of physical pain.

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 3/12/18 at 9:06am

Interesting reading this discussion about Julie and Billy having “love at first sight.” I wouldn’t characterize as that at all.

First of all, The Bench Scene is not the first time Billy and Julie meet. Although they didn’t speak, they met on the carousel, when Billy was putting his hands on her waist. Theirs is a textbook example of lust at first sight- not love. Billy and Julie are sex and sizzle. They’re not making plans about what to do when the children are asleep in bed. This is about hormones and desire; Julie especially is living dangerously and recklessly (losing her job) just to break her off a piece of Billy’s Kit Kat bar.

The Bench Scene is a nice surprise because underneath the hunky brutish guy we see interact with Mrs. Mullin, Billy surprises Julie by having some philosophical depth. There’s a sadness too and a sense that he needs someone- and that can be attractive too.

The Bench Scene is like realizing that hot one night stand you could actually be something more. Maybe you like the other person much more than you originally thought, but you’re also not blind to the reality for the situation.