Cheryl Clark: Chorus Line's (2nd) Greatest Cassie?- Page 4

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 2:35pm

Not at all, Namo. I'm offering my interpretation of what I see, not everyone else's, and not the director's. I thought that was pretty clear when I said things like "for me" and "I think" and "what I see."

Maybe not.

EDIT: If you agree with my interpretation, that's great. If not, that's fine, too. It's just my personal impression or breakdown of Music and the Mirror. It's not the "bible" for it. Others may (and do) see it differently.

Updated On: 7/20/10 at 02:35 PM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 2:40pm

Michael loved the kind of ambiguity that unnerved the audience and kept them guessing, while at the same time delivering the kind of razzle-dazzle steps and staging that would make them applaud. He liked to "mind-fu*k the audience" AND entertain them--simultaneously.

So I think the question of are-they-in-their-heads is like the questions about Follies regarding ghosts and Loveland: There is not one simple answer, because Michael staged it with an ambiguity that let's you decide conflicting things.

So Robbie is right about the push/pull of the performer's desire to please the audience versus doing-it-for-yourself. Michael/Zach asks them to be honest and revealing, but because they are performers (and because this is a musical), they do that by entertaining us.

Oh--and I'm sure Michael would LOVE This discussion!

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 2:45pm

"Michael loved the kind of ambiguity that unnerved the audience and kept them guessing, while at the same time delivering the kind of razzle-dazzle steps and staging that would make them applaud. He liked to "mind-fu*k the audience" AND entertain them--simultaneously."

Exactly! Didn't he create the whole finale as a moment of frustration for the audience? He spends a whole evening showing us just how individual these people are, only to dress them up in the exact same costume, doing the exact same steps, so we have trouble figuring out who is who as they step forward for their final, individual bows. Granted, if you're in the first few rows it isn't that hard. But i remember the first time I saw the show, other than Ritchie and Val (her pigtails), I struggled from the m-teenth row to know who I was clapping for. They all sort of "disappeared" into the same person in the chorus.

A total ambiguous moment in the show. "Yay!!! Wait, who is that again?"

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 3:06pm

Ambiguous? That seemed totally deliberate and exact.

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 7:59pm

Wow, walk away for a bit....

I side with Ghostlight, I think that Goldyn is a FANTASTIC performer, but her Cassie is way too young and while she is dancing the patooey out of the role, and was the strongest singer of all the Cassies in the revival, it does come off more as Goldyn saying "Hey look at me" not Cassie.

I do agree that the dance needs to be acted. However, I had never considered the flying mirror section to be a moment of her discovering her deep passion. I think it was just her moment of quasi-surrealism of, these are here. I can use these to show myself off. I think she is already aware of her passion. I read, one time, that this section was also what Zach saw in his head. A dancer so in tune that the music, mirrors and body are all synced up. I kind of like that.

I don't think the second point B12B mentioned is where she really proves herself as a "star." She needs to have sort of a "Now, I am going to knock your socks off" but where I think she really does it, and is missing from the revival, is towards the end when the footlights come back up and she does the turns back and forth to the mirror, and then does the hip shake. That's when she's saying "I'm a star, and if you didn't know it, watch me do about a zillion crazy turns, fold myself in half and then do them again!"

One thing a lot of Cassie's do is smile. Smiling, for me, only works when it's a natural "I'm doing what I love" smile and not a "I'm smiling because when you smile big and do jazz hands they don't notice your feet an audition!" which Goldyn, Richert and to a degree Nikki Snelson both did.

This is probably my favorite moment in ANY musical. I think it's interesting to see what the different women do with it. And, the more I look at Clark, the more I am inclined to agree that she is technically spectacular, but she isn't acting he piece. Goldyn is close, if she could lose her self in the role more (in 10 years, I would love to see her return) and I partially wonder just how much rehearsal time she had for the role. Would she have grown into it more? I think so.

This was a bit all over, but yea.

Oh, and PRS, the mirrors turn around when she starts the dance, and then just after the song break, the others fly in, until the tempo picks up, and they fly back out.

[wildcat]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 9:26pm

Moving right along...

Can anyone locate the tv appearance (can't remember the programme) of Leland Palmer performing "Music and The Mirror" when she was playing Cassie in the first L.A. company?

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 10:03pm

^ Are you sure it's Palmer? From what I've found she only did 5 total performances, and was a replacement (McKechnie opened, Reinking and Fredrick were the early replacements). She apparently couldn't handle the similarities between herself and Cassie.

Also, I don't see how we were off the topic...considering it was a discussion of the number.

[wildcat]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 10:09pm

It was most definitely Leland. I remember getting such a surprise because I didn't know she was playing the role (I saw Vicki Frederick play it). It was a guest appearance on a television special but I can't remember what it was.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 7/20/10 at 11:22pm

Anyone interested in early Donna? Here's a Hullaballoo namber with a little Donna at the beginning and a solo in the middle (0:45-1:00):
The Yardbirds - I'm A Man (Hullabaloo)

[ACL2006]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 12:29am

While I agree with everyone in saying Goldyn danced the sh!t out of that number, I'll agree with ghostlight in saying she fails to act the number as well. I don't think she fully grasped what the number was about. She's clearly out to say, "hey, look, my kicks are higher than Charlotte's. My turns are better than Charlotte's. Etc."

husk: Goldyn wasn't the best singing Cassie. I guess you never got to see Jessica Lea Patty perform the role.

I'm still waiting to see Goldyn return to Broadway. I know she just finished Peter Pan at Papermill, but I would love to see her as either Velma or Roxie in Chicago.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 12:35am

Thanks for that link, PJ. It doesn't get much better than Donna doing the frug in front of Jeff Beck.

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 12:37am

ACL-
While MANY raved about Jess Patty, I found her dull. She didn't sing it as well as Jess Goldyn, and she did a lot of hair whipping, which just didn't work for me at all.

Actually, the farther I get from it, and the more I watch her dance it in the video, the better I like Charlotte. The one thing I do dislike, is at times, Charlotte seemed more determined to prove that she could get through it, than that it was something she could do at the drop of a hat.

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 3:16am

She's clearly out to say, "hey, look, my kicks are higher than Charlotte's. My turns are better than Charlotte's. Etc."

I don't get some of you on this board and your assumptions. What an obnoxious accusation. How do you know this for a fact? Were you in this woman's head while she was performing?

GET REAL.

All I see is an extremely talented, gifted performer doing an incredible job with a legendary musical number.

Updated On: 7/21/10 at 03:16 AM

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 7:37am

Yeah, I have to say I don't agree with husk's assessments at all. Sorry, guy!

EDIT: And PJ, I love early Donna! I actually have this on DVD. I have those Hullabaloo sets that were released about 12 yeas ago and then went out of print. Gold mines of go-go!

Updated On: 7/21/10 at 07:37 AM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 8:14am

Ultimately in these matters, there is no right or wrong. All that matters is our passion.

And Namo--Is Donna doing the Frug? or the Boogaloo? I could never tell them apart

[jimmycurry01]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 8:18am

I am going to join the "its good, but lacks passion" camp on this one.

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 8:23am

PJ, who said "right or wrong" but you?

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 9:31am

And just to clear something up, the "ambiguity" PJ and I commented about lies in the collective and varied impressions of the audience, not in an individual perception.

In other words, my opinion alone isn't "ambiguous," Michael Bennett's direction isn't "ambiguous", but the collective reaction to what is happening on stage is ambiguous.

Michael Bennett made "exact" (as you put it, Namo) directorial choices, knowing (as Bennett himself put it) that he was creating a moment in the show that would illicit multiple interpretations and contradictions. The ambiguity is in the collective reaction, not the individual one or the directorial choice.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 9:53am

Why, exactly, did Marquise become CarlosAlberto?

[best12bars]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 10:02am

To get to the other side?

I'm convinced there are really only 5 people posting on BWW with multiple screen names.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 10:26am

CarlosAlberto certainly seems to be his angriest one yet.

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 10:29am

I love those old Hulabaloo sets...all the dancers are great and I love, love, love Lada St. Edmund. That b*tch could move! LMAO!

[ACL2006]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 10:47am

husk, I found Patty's Cassie to be gentle in a way, but still filled with heart & passion. I loved her singing, IMO, the best singing Cassie out of the four I saw in the revival(sorry, Nadine, you were the worst).

BTW, was anyone lucky enough to see Lorin Latarro go on as Cassie? Never got to see her perform the role since she only went on a few times.

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 11:25am

I'm not angry Kringas/Phyllis Rogers Stone. Not at all. Your misinterpreting my posts, I'm definitely not coming from an angry place.
Sarcastic, yes. Angry, no.

Updated On: 7/21/10 at 11:25 AM

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 7/21/10 at 11:39am

Kringas was locked down when account was hacked, so you can push it next to my current screen name to make it look like I keep changing mine, but that's not the case Marquise/RetroBoy/Marquise/Dark Angel/Marquise/Usnavi/Marquise/CarlosAlberto.

You still usually come across unhinged these days.