Camelot

I LOVE Camelot. I don't know why, but everytime I listen to my OBC recording it just makes me happy. Julie Andrews might have something to do with that.

Who would you cast in a Camelot revival?

---

The show itself is boring as hell, but the music is some of my favorite for any show. Lerner and Lowe are so under-appreciated nowadays. A revival cast...hmmmmm....

Arthur: John Lithgow
Guinevere: Keli O'Hara or Laura Benanti would be good.
Lancelot: I would love to hear Norm Lewis sing "If Ever I Would Leave You"
Mordred: Mario Cantone would be PERFECT

---

I actually thought of Gets as Mordred - I almost wrote that! Funny...

---

Guinivere needs wit. I can't think of a less wit-less (not to mention boring) performer than Kelli O'Hara, strictly from the Karen Ziemba School of Charisma.






Winthrop Paroo
River City, Iowa

I outgrew that phase since the Professor. What a shyster.




Winthrop Paroo
River City, Iowa

Updated On: 6/23/06 at 10:09 PM

Thias is ridiculous - why does everybody want to cast a geriatric Arthur? Michael York???

Arthur is supposed to be barely an adult in the first scene. And do you know how many years pass between the first and second scenes? FIVE YEARS. Richard Burton was, I believe, in his late 30's when he originated the role.

Unfortuneately, most people have the awful 1980's Richard Burton/Richard Harris revival in their heads. WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!

Give me Ewan MacGregor as Arthur.

How about some alternative casting?

---

Updated On: 6/24/06 at 11:25 PM

Michael York has already played King Arthur. It was in a Whoopi Goldberg TV film called, "A Knight In Camelot"


http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0176892/

---

I saw the original Broadway production of CAMELOT, and I can assure you that it was anything but boring. The cast was heaven-sent, and I've never seen its like before or since (and I saw the original London cast of MY FAIR LADY and a hell of a lot of shows, since). MY FAIR LADY was the superior show, and it's cast was wonderful, too; but, there was something extremely magical about that CAMELOT cast. There's no one today that can take their place. No one.

As I have recounted here before, my very first experience in musical theater was when my parents took me as a tiny boy to the opening of Camelot at the O'Keefe Centre in Toronto (the World Premiere) and I was hooked. And then to sit through that insufferable Richard Harris revival ("Hello, operator? This is Richard Harris. Connect me with the stage. I know what my people are thinking tonight...") I have directed the show a couple of times and I have to say that what is left of the script (opening night was AT LEAST four hours long in '61) can hold an audience's attention. And I have been lucky enough to have a pair of comic geniuses playing Pelinore, which really brightebned up the night. If memory serves, the Richard Burton revival (and Harris) began on the eve of the final battle between Arthusr and Lance, which helped give the show some ooomph. In the original, the opening is pretty static, with Bruce Yarnell and John Cullem and the company gazing into the audience and talking about Arthur. With the new bookends, the show has some more context.

Personally, I think the show could be re-written even a bit more.

BTW, my father told me that the night we saw the show, Lerner, Loewe and Moss Hart the director were all in the cardiac ward at Mount Sanai Hospital. Grueling production, apparently....

Oh, and BTW again that overture. That amazing overture. Wow. Although the opening chords in the Tams Witmark parts are slightly different from the record. I remember I got the conductor to have the first 12 bars re-jigged to match the record because everybody remarked on that when they heard orchestra rehearsals....

---

Updated On: 6/24/06 at 01:11 AM

Add me to the club, Freeadmission! =)

I am so with you on Lerner and Loewe. My Fair Lady has always been my favorite musical and I absolutely adore Camelot and Brigadoon. I would love to see major New York revivals of any of their works. Several times over the past couple years, it has sounded like My Fair Lady is on its way, but that has yet to actually happen.

Bernadette as The nasty Fairy ...... i can't think of the character's name.

I hate the book it is WAY too long.

thank you dear