Curtains Reviews- Page 2

[queenbee2]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:22pm

MrWayne-

I was just about to say the same thing. While I didn't care for the show much at all, I thought from all the fuss here on the boards that critics were going to flip over this show and declare its greatness. As stated, the show wasn't for me, but the audience seemed to be having a good time, and reviews on here have been pretty stellar.

Will be interesting to see how the Times sees it.

-QB

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:23pm

I wish it could be Isherwood, but doesn't Brantley do all the Broadway musical reviews?

Anyway, Brantley was there when I was, last Sunday.

Updated On: 3/22/07 at 10:23 PM

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:24pm

Isherwood tends to do the ones that he reviewed before they transferred from Off-Broadway (BRIDGE & TUNNEL, SPRING AWAKENING).

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:25pm

Mr. B was mixed. Positive notices for the cast, but the show didn't thrill him.

As befits a musical about a musical, “Curtains” — the talent-packed, thrill-starved production that opened last night at the Al Hirschfeld Theater — features an assortment of upbeat anthems to this business we call show. But the number that best captures the essence of the latest (and, sad to say, one of the last) of the collaborations from the songwriting team of John Kander and Fred Ebb is a low-key ballad called “Coffee Shop Nights.”

The song is performed, most engagingly, by David Hyde Pierce, who (this is the good news) steps into full-fledged Broadway stardom with his performance here. Mr. Hyde Pierce, playing Frank Cioffi, a Boston police detective investigating a murder within a doom-shadowed musical-comedy company in 1959, is describing the limited pleasures of being an unmarried cop.

“It’s a perfectly fine life,” he sings, with feeble conviction. “I’d give it” — and here he pauses, for a moment of honest self-assessment — “two cheers.” That’s more or less the feeling inspired by “Curtains.” I sincerely wish I could say otherwise.

But unlike “The Producers,” which ends its long New York run next month, “Curtains,” directed with a soft hand by Scott Ellis, fails to convey a passionate and bone-deep understanding of the shows it satirizes. (Rob Ashford’s lewd, crotch-centered choreography for the “Robbin’ Hood” sequences would have repulsed audiences of 1959.) What it really brings to mind is less vintage Broadway than vintage prime time.

http://theater2.nytimes.com/2007/03/23/theater/reviews/23curt.html
Updated On: 3/22/07 at 10:25 PM

[muscle23ftl]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:27pm

Where is Barnes' review?

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:28pm

Typically, he saves his most enthusiastic praise for the pretty blonde, even though in this case, she doesn't deserve it.

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:29pm

Theatremania is Mixed-to-Positive:

""We're a special kind of people known as show people," goes a self-congratulatory song in Curtains, the Fred Ebb-John Kander-Rupert Holmes-Peter Stone backstage murder-mystery musical that has finally opened on Broadway after over a decade in the making. What the song doesn't say, while glorifying one of the most demanding and often most disillusioning careers imaginable, is that some show people do learn how to put on a damn good show whenever they set their minds to it. Kander and Ebb revealed the secret in Chicago when they advised, "Give 'em the old razzle dazzle -- razzle dazzle 'em."
So, as they've been raising Curtains for Broadway consumption, the show's creators -- minus the late Ebb and Stone, but including director Scott Ellis and choreographer Rob Ashford -- have ladled on the razzle and the dazzle until they've fashioned a product that defies exiting consumers to say they haven't been entertained. Only a curmudgeon -- perhaps someone like this reviewer -- could walk away muttering about the substitution of craft for inspired musical comedy art.

Curtains operates according to an unwritten show-biz tactic: The Just-Enough Maneuver. There's just enough mystery story that makes sense. There are just enough witty wisecracks among the lame ones, and just enough songs (in William David Brohn's arrangements) that land before evaporating as the final note fades. There are just enough energetic dance numbers, including an Agnes de Mille send-up that younger patrons won't get, and just enough colorful sets (Anna Louizos), costumes (William Ivey Long), and lighting effects (Peter Kaczorowski). But there are more than enough adroit performances by a large contingent of proficient Broadway performers, all of them giving 110 percent."


http://www.theatermania.com/content/news.cfm/story/10351

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:33pm

With a couple of exceptions, I... for the most part agree with Brantley, although I think my feelings toward the show as a whole were a bit more positive than his. I had little outwardly bad to say about it, yet it just felt like it was missing a certain spark that I so badly wanted it to have, especially because it is such an endearing show. For me, the image of a firecracker waiting to be lit hits the nail on the head.

Updated On: 3/22/07 at 10:33 PM

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:34pm

Luckily, there are some crafty pull quotes from Brantley's review. Good luck to the press team tomorrow.

"David Hyde Pierce steps into full-fledged Broadway stardom with his performance here."

"Brightly packaged, with “Kiss Me, Kate”-style sets by Anna Louizos and costumes to match by the industrious William Ivey Long, “Curtains” lies on the stage like a promisingly gaudy string of firecrackers"

"a top-of-the line cast"

"Ms. Ziemba, like Ms. Monk, is an appealing and polished veteran who never makes a technical misstep." Updated On: 3/22/07 at 10:34 PM

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:34pm

There are plenty of quotes from the reviews in general, that's not going to be a problem.

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:36pm

They could even pull a Dirty Rotten Scoundrels:

"The" - NY Times
"Best" - Daily News
"Show" - Ny Post
"Ever" - Newsday
"On" - Variety
"Broadway" - USA Today


That said, at least it hasn't been completely panned thus far. Updated On: 3/22/07 at 10:36 PM

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:38pm

No, it hasn't been, but these aren't the kind of reviews that sell a million tix the next day.

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:39pm

Barnes' review isn't usually online before 2 or 3am.

[Dre2387]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:41pm

Brantley's last paragraph is a good one too, espeically the last line:

"Choreographed as a dexterous blend of sendup and valentine by Mr. Ashford, the number expresses the sheer, lightheaded love of that silly and sublime form, the musical, that is what “Curtains” is meant to be about. The song is called “A Tough Act to Follow,” and nothing that precedes or follows it is on its level. But it is a worthy tribute to the long and rich partnership of Mr. Kander and Mr. Ebb, one of the toughest acts to follow on Broadway."

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:41pm

Rath - a shame, no?

[MrWayne]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:42pm

Good point Raith...the show was at 84.1 percent last week and these reviews are certainly not going to bump that by much. It should enjoy a decent run though with David Hyde-Pierce fronting it.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:44pm

No show is perfect, but this one deserves to run as much as plenty of others that have. We'll just have to wait and see what the next days and weeks bring at the b.o. I have all kinds of faith in the press office, they've done a yeoman's job so far.

[D2]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:47pm

The word of mouth on the show, and not just on this board, is quite good, and that's going to help. Even my mother's heard about it, and not from me.

[MasterLcZ]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:48pm

Remember, Brantley was very cool on DROWSY as well.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:49pm

But how were the rest of the reviews, Master?

D2, that's good to know.

[neddyfrank2]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:53pm

Drowsy Reviews

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:54pm

I wouldn't be surprised if the show got a decent bump in the next few weeks (it'll be interesting to see the grosses a week from Monday). Lots of people out there (beyond the world of the boards) don't even realize that a show is open for business before they actually see reviews in the papers. The reviews are more than decent overall with lots of superlatives thrown in and I'm sure a lot of folks will be interested in buying tickets once they figure out that this is a new show by the creators of Cabaret and Chicago, starring David Hyde Pierce (who's getting mostly raves so far).

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:54pm

Summarize, neddy. Mostly good, bad, mixed, what?

[MasterLcZ]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:55pm

Brantley, John Simon, Jacques Le Sourd and Clive Barnes were the only critics NOT to get moist over DROWSY.

Personally, I think CURTAINS is a more solid show than DROWSY, but the fact that there are better Kander & Ebb scores and shows makes CURTAINS suffer by comparison. But I think CURTAINS is more than anything else, a real word-of-mouth show, and most of it (at least what I've heard) has been overwhelmingly positive.

Updated On: 3/22/07 at 10:55 PM

[neddyfrank2]

Posted: 3/22/07 at 10:57pm

I didn't read the reviews, I just looked for the thread.

I think they were mostly good.