Crazy Concepts of Classic Shows- Page 2

[Kad]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 9:14am

I have always wanted to stage Cats in concert. No costumes, no set, and no choreography. But it would be taken very seriously.

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 9:23am

pirag, your Sweeney reminds me of Drood (which I love)! and schmerg, I really don't like Cats, but I'm also intrigued by your idea.

I'd hardly consider it a classic, but I am dying for a man to play Norma Desmond. my personal pick is Charles Busch, but anyone could do.

I also always thought Che should be riding a bike through the streets of Buenos Aires when he sings "Oh What a Circus," and a friend of mine talked about the idea of eliminating the character of Che entirely and giving his lines to members of the ensemble. I'm not sure how well it'd work, but it would certainly be an interesting dynamic.


oh! and another friend of mine suggested tweaking scenes in Passion so Fosca is a ghost and everything that happens is because Giorgio is hallucinating.

Updated On: 3/10/09 at 09:23 AM

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 9:39am

givesmevoice-
If Busch had the singing voice to handle the role, I'd love to see that, too!

Maybe if we can't get Streisand, Simply Barbra would do it!

[PattiLover]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 10:31am

I've always wanted to direct a production of The Threepenny Opera set in a Wal-Mart with all the characters employees or customers. I think the anti-capitalist sentiment of the play would be positively brutal with such a concept. The Streetsinger would be an elderly man handing out carts to people, MacHeath the GM, Polly a fry-cook at the McDonald's, her parents the managers of the McDonald's, Tiger Brown a security guard, Jenny a hooker who gives bj's in the parking lot...

However, I do think the Threepenny Opera really is the one easily-adaptable show that doesn't need to be adapted to any other period or place-it works perfectly within the boundries Brecht and Weill gave it.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 10:52am

It was just a "crazy concept".

No, darling, you said you'd love to do it.

[jagfkb]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 11:10am

I always imagined a production of Sweeny Todd where it was set in a bombed building in early WWII. The actors were bomb survivors, and Sweeny would, in the end, put a swastika on his arm It would make the entire theme of revenge ever more present. A crazy idea, but it could work. Also, what if the judge was jewish, the beadle was african american, the beggar woman was a gypsy, and pirelli was gay? The people he keeps alive are the ones who are of arian race, and he kills everyone else. In the end, wouldn't that just be amazingly cool?

[gvendo2005]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 11:34am

Yeah, make the "bad guys" the minorities. That's not racist at all. *eyeroll* What would make that same idea WORK is making SWEENEY the Jew, and the Judge and Beadle the Aryans. The Beggar Woman can still be a gypsy, Pirelli can still be gay, but then that just makes it clear that this is a story (in this version anyway) of a government run by insane people for insane objectives and how one victim is so tortured by it that he turns not only on the government but on other victims as representations (in his mind) of the people of those races who had the opportunity to help his people over time but didn't.

[RENT's_Awakening]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 11:47am

My High School director is all about concept musicals. We did "The Wiz" last year under the concept of a rock concert - every character and ensemble was based off a group. Dorothy was Gwen Stefani, The Scarecrow was Keith Richards, The Tinman was Bob Dylan, the Lion was Eminem. Evillene was a generic goth, the Lord High Underling was her sex slave (dog collar, fishnets, and a beater), and Glinda was Mary J. Blige. The set was just a huge OZ, a green O with bright lights around it that flashed and the Z emerging from the O, a bright yellow and it was the Yellow Brick Road. Our only prop was a steel, bare chair for Evillene's throne and all songs were sung into mikes - we had three mike stands set around the stage, a la Spring Awakening. Our lighting was wild and sporadic, with huge lighting trees set onstage. It was great.

He's considering doing "The Secret Garden" next year, with some vague concept of having it set modern day, with a sort of everything is concrete in the city concept, and the garden is a single flower. I dunno how that would work out though...

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 12:14pm

^ That sounds like my old alma mater. Some highlights:
Carousel - a blue cubist set
To Kill a Mockingbird - Scaffolding, a few doors, and "tree" people.
Glass Menageire - large glass structures, each of us with an "animal" trait
Blood Wedding - see above, minus glass structures
Macbeth - In the thunderdome.
Sound of Music - Everything was in a picture frame. EVERYTHING.
Working - we all wore cogs...b/c we were all part of a machine...or something
Diary of Anne Frank - Scaffolding and a chorus representing Nazis and Jews...and giant Nazi puppets.

I didn't do a literal staging until college.

[jasonf]

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

"Lord High Underling was her sex slave (dog collar, fishnets, and a beater)"

Where in the WORLD did you go to high school that THAT was allowed???

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 12:22pm

I actually kind of like that concept for The Secret Garden, but I think The Wiz sounds a bit over the top. it's nice and interesting to play around with the way the story's told, but I think sometimes directors just go over the top.

[Weez]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 12:48pm

One of my friends recently suggested Company with same-sex couples, and I've been thinking of ways to achieve that without altering the text. I thought I had it just about nailed, but the 'Ladies Who Lunch' thread means I'm not so sure anymore (although in my idea, the characters are still the genders they always have been, it's just some of them are played by actors of the opposite sex, eg - Joanne is still Joanne, a woman, but she is played by a man, so if the audience would understand that, the gender issues wouldn't come into it, but then it does all seem a bit pointless; back to the drawing board...).

Someone on the West End board once suggested Sweeney Todd like something by Jim Steinman. Rock orchestrations, flames, buckets of blood everywhere, and probably a lot of leather. I would actually pay good money to see that. O_O

When I get around to directing Hamlet, I'm going to play it as everyone is sane except Hamlet (and probably Ophelia, seeing as that's too ingrained in the text); the Ghost is a non-speaking part, Claudius never killed his brother, and the visual and sound design would probably end up a little too influenced by Silent Hill. I mentally refer to it as "Hamlet -something is rotten in the state of Denmark". (I also have a Twelfth Night in planning which I mentally refer to as "Twelfth Night - colour and light", but that'd be much more traditional and much less crazy/stupid.)

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 1:20pm

Weez-
So in short you'd have a man playing Joanne in a similar way to Edna? Obviously not that style, but that convention?

I can, of all the groups, see Joanne/Larry being the most likely to be a gay couple. And I know it's been tried before.

[Weez]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 1:30pm

Yeah. The list I worked out has Bobby, Sarah, Harry, Susan, Peter, Joanne, Larry, and April as played by men, and Jenny, David, Amy, Paul, Marta, and Kathy as played by ladies (Marta or Kathy could also be male but I like 'em as ladies). The physicality of Harry&Sarah is what makes them male for me, the "ever had a homosexual experience?" is why Susan&Peter are male, and I like the thought of Joanne&Larry as older men who've spent years together. If you're still interested later, I'll go into further explanations, but it's home time for me now. XD

[BNN]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 1:34pm

I've always wondered if the cast of Nine could be reduced down, I think it would be interesting to have a few women play multiple parts instead of a giant hoard of ladies with one role. The only issue is finding how to do this without one woman playing two characters in one scene, which would seem hokey.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 1:39pm

I saw an all-male production of Company. The text was not changed, with a few exceptions (the Kathy character was getting married, to a woman, for example, so he had to explain that he was getting "Married married.") The characters' names were changed so that they were all men. I was really, really skeptical about it at first, but even though the production itself was deeply flawed and ultimately kind of offensive, it made me want to see it done well. I would love to see a truly gifted, visionary director take it on. The production I saw had a lot of things that didn't work, and some of the most indulgent, terrible acting I have ever seen, but there were also a lot of things that worked -- and when it did work, it worked beautifully. I think if it's done well, and carefully, it could be extremely effective. The production I saw kept wavering between camp and sincerity, when it needs to be done in complete sincerity. Of course, references to men as "wives" become somehow funny, but I had to draw a line when it became mockery -- the show should not be making fun of these characters. But in this case, there was humor, and then there was camp. They made Not Getting Married work without lyrical changes, for example. My skepticism had actually been more about Bobby, because Bobby was never, ever, ever supposed to be gay -- but as I understood it, that was because sexuality wasn't supposed to be the reason he wasn't married; it'd be too easy to say, "Oh, he's single because he's gay." There's something else going on there. But, if you put Bobby in a world where being gay wouldn't stop him from being in a committed relationship just like the rest of his friends, then that issue goes away. The actor who played Joanne's character was horrible -- I have never seen an actor chew more scenery than he did -- but contextually and conceptually, the song was one of the things that did worked. If he had been a better performer, it would totally worked.

Updated On: 3/27/09 at 01:39 PM

[TheCharleston]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 1:44pm

The majority of ideas on here make me want to vomit!

RENT Awakening crap - your director should be ashamed for trying to ruin "The Wiz". What a terrible concept.

What's the point/meaning/descriptive verb behind the concept??? Just seems like he was trying to have some fun and put absolutely no true thought into his directorial choices and actions.

Fire that man. He has too much power and lacks any theatrical intelligence.

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 2:45pm

^ The same could be said of Des McAnuff

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 3:04pm

BNN, that reminds me of something I just read a few weeks ago. I found an old interview with Patti LuPone from when she was in Les Mis (I think; I could be horribly wrong), and she talked about the idea of playing one of the other female roles in the second act. She actually wanted to play Cosette in Act II, thinking it'd be interesting since she had just played her mother, but either Schönberg or Boublil said it wouldn't work (the voice parts are too different, I believe was the reason), something about maybe Eponine, but the actress playing Fantine is still too old to be Eponine, blah blah blah.

anyway, I thought it was...thought provoking. there are some parallels for Fantine and Eponine, but it...could be interesting?

Updated On: 3/10/09 at 03:04 PM

[jagfkb]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 3:58pm

No, no, not that I'm being racist, or anything. It was just an idea that wanting revenge could lead to very, very bad things, such as WWII. Also, if you included the Judge's reprise of Johanna, it wouldn't make him a bad guy at all.

[jagfkb]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 4:02pm

...Or, keep the Judge as such a "bad guy", and have the audience WANT sweeny to kill them, only to reveal at the end that they were all minorities persecuted by the Nazis, with Sweeny as a Nazi. How's THAT for a twist!

[RENT's_Awakening]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 4:37pm

My director is admittedly a little eccentric, and he knows next to nothing about Broadway and musical history - his 'concept' with the Wiz is that he thought it had a terrible book, but a brilliant 'rock' score, therefore he chose to accentuate that - make it a rock concert, with all the characters in Oz being rock stereotypes. Even The Wiz was modeled off of Prince. But he can be very literal too, it's just he had just seen Spring Awakening - in a year, we went from this:



To this:

[Theatreboy49]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 4:48pm

Schmerg I would put up the money if I had it for that CATS production. With a great director that could be F****** Brilliant! And it would make me not hate the show and actually want to watch it.

[wicked1492]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 4:49pm

How about Pippin as a circus? The Leading Player as the ring leader and all the players are circus characters (acrobats, lion tamers, bearded lady, etc.) This already happens in the script but the leads would come out of the ensemble as a circus performer. Circus ring, tent, cages and all.

Thoughts?

[hpeabody930]

Posted: 3/10/09 at 5:27pm

Not a musical but I want to direct a production of Picnic where Hal is an african american. I think it would add a TREMENDOUS amount of depth to a play which otherwise is fairly shallow and play into the early civil rights sentiment at the time.