Carrie the Musical

https://forum.broadwayworld.com/readmessage.cfm?boardname=bway&thread=870462#1480538

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This site came up on Google and would likely answer most of your questions: https://www.graiai.com/carrie2/

there are quite a few threads around here debating all aspects of this classic flop........ search them out.

My opinion????? Some of the score was phenominal, the rest was horrific (not in a good way!). The mother-daughter scenes were incredibly intense, while the rest of the material was an absolute mess. The staging and sets were ridiculous.

Think of Carrie as a cross between Sweeney Todd and In my Life

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Updated On: 12/29/05 at 04:13 PM

If you're interested, there's a book NOT SINCE CARRIE..., which chronicles the entire history of Broadway musical failures. The debacle that was CARRIE is told in the prolog and epilog. Apparently, the music was "gorgeous" and Betty Buckley was phenomenal. But the directing and staging were terrible, even laughable at times. For example, in Act II, during the pig blood scene, the character who was portrayed by John Travolta in the film comes out carrying a bucket of fake blood and plops it over Carrie's head.

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Carrie...*sigh*

I'm one of the few that actually likes the show. I love the score (there are one or two songs that could be cut -- I think "Don't Waste The Moon" and the whole drive-in scene that goes with it is fun, but serves no point whatsoever...). And yes, I include some of the "cheesy" teen numbers in it (IN, for example...yeah some of the lyrics are lame and cheesy, but these are supposed to be high school girls complaining about high school girl problems...it works).

The book for the workshop made a bit more sense, but when director Terry Hands (oy) came on board he basically threw it out and turned it into a near sung through piece, which didn't work because you didn't know WHY all this crazy powers were happening with Carrie. The original script was much clearer.

Hands butchered the show. And his staging made it worse. The set was a gigantic white box, the girls wore white outfits resembling 80's togas at gym, and leotards to their hangouts (say what?), nearly every boy in the school wore black studded leather. There was a gigantic (and I mean GIGANTIC) disco ball at the prom...on the FLOOR (!?). NOTHING in this production's staging made sense....

In talking with a cast member a few years ago at the now defunct Judy's Chelsea (sadness that its gone), I learned that he really did (even though lots of people joke about it) see it as a grand tragedy on the greek or shakesperean scale. Sad. It was just middle American high school horror.

It's my opinion that with a director who understands how to stage musicals and a return to a more structured book, "Carrie" could work on stage as a serious musical. There's a show in there somewhere. I believe I heard somewhere that two of the writers left the Virginia after closing stating that what was on that stage was not the show they'd written, and they hated that fact. This is partly why rights haven't been released...they're hoping for the "right" offer to come around. I don't blame em.

Stagedoor Manor, a theatre camp in the catskills (and a fantastic one at that!) was granted limited permission to do the show and in 1999 staged it using the Broadway script. The audience loved it.

"It was choreographed by Debbie Allen. She hasn't been seen on Broadway since."

Very funny, and unfortunately probably somewhat true. A friend of mine saw it early on in a workshop and then later in a preview and said pretty much the same thing. He thought it was odd, but interesting in the workshop with some problems but some good music. But on Broadway he says it was jaw-droppingly, over-the-top, laugh out loud bad. Although they also changed the costumes and sets but he blames her for that too because he said it looked like one of those really silly production numbers on the TV show of Fame. I love seeing Debbie Allen's choreography because it's just so horrible. It's like there is no idea too dumb for her.

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Updated On: 12/29/05 at 04:58 PM

I saw Carrie in week one, I don't remember now but I think it lasted 3 weeks, which I think was too long, it was horrible in every way you can think, and I was hoping that something like Carrie would make people realize not everything can be turned into a musical. But once again, weve got Lestat to deal with now.

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The original opening, "When Do the Good Times Start" was far superior to "In." It was tight, nasty, and well-written, went in and out of dialogue, and set up the show superbly. The Broadway production was about twelve different shows with as many tones, and the only good one was the two-woman show featuring Betty Buckley and Linzi Hateley.

I heard about the "bucket fiasco" too--apparently they couldn't dump the blood on Linzi Hateley without shorting out her body mike, so they had the actor playing Billy just plunk a pail of strawberry ice-cream topping over her head...

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no, the best lyric is:

I really love the way that you think
If I were your daddy, I'd buy you a shrink.

end of story.

'Everybody either loves it or hates it'

3DImax, this is totally random, but it immdediately reminds me of Patti Lupone on Will & Grace :P

anyway, back to topic, I saw a video of the show in Stratford with Barbara Cook and have to say the songs are quite good, esp the ones with mother and daughter! And the cast was good (it's good to see Charlotte D'Amboise and Sally Ann Triplett in their early 20s!) but the set was o_O??? and the costumes were -O-M-G-! wthat the hell is happenin???? hahaha

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Carrie is possibly my favorite musical. I have a copy of the Stratford run and I simply adore it.
The costumes (body suits) , sets (the disco ball on the floor), lack of dialogue and the fact that they could manage a giant white staircase and not an elaborate devise to spill pigs blood on her head rather than the tiny bucket of strawberry topping. (I know it has been mentioned that it was impossible with the body mic, but look at it this way. She doesnt do much at the prom up until this point does she need a mic? For the scene of the Destruction, if the gym teacher came up to her tries to comfor her, while actually mic-ing her up, she could then use her telekentic powers to hurl the gym teacher away...) I have watched the musical way too often. Staging ideas keep coming to me. I sit there an dthink
"I'd change that..." lol. Come on. You know you do that :P
I think that if it was in a smaller theatre, perhaps the Music Box (which to me already feels slightly creepy....)
If you read Not Since Carrie by Ken Mandelbaum, the original script which had dialogue *shock horror* and REAL sets. Not white boxes. And such.
I also believe that if it started off Broadway it very well may have achieved cult status. (Not that it didnt manage to have a cult following anyway)
I frequently get songs in my head from Carrie. The title song, And Eve Was Week, Don't Waste The Moon, I'm Not Alone and the Destruction... the score of Carrie is still better than a lot of stuff out there now... (Don't flame me!)
There's actually a petition for anyone interested enough to sign it: www.petitiononline.com/carrie88/petition.html
So thats my two cents.
Laura xx
As we know Debbie Allen did the choereography, she also did FAME, note how 1980s both Fame and Carrie turned out to be. Carrie should have been kept in the 70s as it was in the movie, and the book... anybody else wonder if Sissy Spacek went to see it?
Does anyone know what Stephen King thought of the finished musical?

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From what I read online Stephen King supposedly enjoyed it.

I'm trying to think of any other artistic medium where failure is can be so celebrated and revered?

I guess that there are some truly aweful films that are fun to watch..but we musical theatre people can spend as much passionate thinking about the stinkers as we do about the winners.

I don't what that says about us. But it is somehting I really like about us.