DOTV revival- Page 2

Posted: 10/20/04 at 11:32am

As Much as Flops are not revived. I do believe that some have been or will be.
I mean look at Merrily We Roll Along (and yes it was considered a flop having only performed 5 shows)

And Starmites was revived (albeit off Broadway)

I just wish they would get it together and just release the german version of DVD so we could all see how it was supposed to be done.

[broadway86]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 3:13pm

I really hope that this revival isn't happening.

[WOSQ]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 3:29pm

I feel like this topic is a Jeopardy answer:

"I'll take 'Hindenberg-Like Events' for a thousand, Alex.

The answer is "a revival of Dance of the Vampires".

What is "What would be worse than the reelection of George W. Bush?"

Right, for a thousand!"

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 3:30pm

You MUST be kidding. The show did NOT get mostly mixed reviews -- it got one of the nastiest slates of reviews in recent memory. Crawford's performance (especially his ridiculous appearance) was also roundly panned. And moreover, Ben Brantley's, the only review that actually counts, was one of the harshest of his entire career:

"Where's a mask when you need one?

Michael Crawford, who sported a dashing half-mask for his Tony-winning performance in 'The Phantom of the Opera' in 1988, would have done well to have donned a fuller version for his return to Broadway. Rigged up as a taxidermic variation on his Phantom persona, Mr. Crawford opened last night in a show called 'Dance of the Vampires' at the Marquis Theater. It is an enterprise to be associated with only under the veil of anonymity.

Actually, some far from anonymous names, in addition to that of Mr. Crawford, spice the credits for this clueless musical adaptation of 'The Fearless Vampire Killers,' Roman Polanski's spoof horror movie of 1967. This is a production that inspires you to check your program open-mouthed at intermission to make you sure you didn't misread it.

* * *

Did David Ives, the author of the blissful 'All in the Timing,' truly collaborate on the light-as-lead book? And those funguslike sets that look so expensive and so cheap, that junior-prom lighting: they can't be the work of David Gallo and Ken Billington, can they?

It isn't, of course, just the undead who salivate at the smell of blood. Theater disaster cultists, a breed that makes Vlad the Impaler look small-time, have had their fangs at the ready ever since the early buzz began on 'Vampires,' which features songs by the rock composer Jim Steinman and was first presented in Vienna with a book and lyrics in German by Michael Kunze.

Hopes were high that this musical might be in the league of platinum-plated flops like 'Carrie' and 'Moose Murders.' And it's true that there are moments that climb into the stratosphere of legendary badness.

No one, even after a quart of straight gin, would be able to erase the memory of Mr. Crawford as a blood-sucking aristocrat and Mandy Gonzalez as his toothsome prey, shrieking a revised version of Mr. Steinman's pop hit 'Total Eclipse of the Heart.' The scene is perfectly accessorized by a phalanx of pasty, hooded creatures, holding (I swear) what appear to be flashlights beneath their faces, like monsters in a homemade spook house.

For the most part, however, 'Vampires' exudes the less exalted, simply embarrassed feeling of a costume party that everyone got all dressed up for and then decided wasn't such a good idea.

* * * *

This show, on the other hand, wants to be campy, preachy, lewd and romantically rhapsodic all at once. It careens through everything from a limp Gilbert and Sullivan-style patter song to a series of all-ghoul dance numbers that, with their tattered shroudlike costumes by Ann Hould-Ward, suggest a bunch of drunk high school kids trying to replicate Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' video.

The overall effect is of a desperately protracted skit from a summer replacement variety show of the late 1960's, the kind on which second-tier celebrities showed up to make fun of themselves. Dialogue sample: When Mr. Auberjonois's character introduces his assistant (Max von Essen) as 'my young factotum,' a loutish inkeeper (Ron Orbach) says, 'If that means what I think it does, those two can leave right now.'

Mr. Crawford gets his share of such clunkers, including his opening line, made after his entrance from a skull-festooned black casket: 'God has left the building.' Perhaps he chose 'Vampires' as his ticket back to Broadway because his role here does bear a resemblance to the diabolical but lonely Phantom. It even has its own version of 'The Music of the Night,' a lumbering ballad called 'Come With Me.'

Such parallels tend to blur memories of Mr. Crawford's genuinely haunting performance in 'Phantom.' Mr. Crawford, who has done time in Las Vegas, appears to have picked up a stylistic trick or two there.

With his swept-back lacquered hair and black-on-white contour makeup, he looks like a Goth version of Siegfried, Roy and Wayne Newton combined. Now that, you have to admit, is pretty scary."

NY Times Review of DOTV

Updated On: 10/20/04 at 03:30 PM

[LittleFish8386]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 3:36pm

BroadwayGuy2---You and the Adamness look adorable in that picture.

I hope the best for both of you!

[Mr. TN]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 4:43pm

Margo, who is that message to because I think we are shifting from DOTV to Woman in White with the reviews. Just for the record my post was strictly about the reviews from The Woman in White. The DOTV reviews are I believe the worst in my recent memory. I believe I found one semipositive review. Theatremainia.com perhaps?

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 4:46pm

Sally stated on the previous page:

"The show did get mixed reviews, more good than bad, I think--with the influential Sunday papers giving mainly good ones. Crawford got almost all good to *very* good reviews."

[ChristineDaae]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 6:42pm

Shop~ where did you hear this?? This would be awsome! I loved DOTV!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Sally]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 8:46pm

<< Sally stated on the previous page:

"The show did get mixed reviews, more good than bad, I think--with the influential Sunday papers giving mainly good ones. Crawford got almost all good to *very* good reviews." >>



I’m sorry if I was not clear, but I was replying to this message:

<< 3) Producers are hardly lining up to throw away more millions on a Michael Crawford-led show, at least on this side of the Atlantic. Unless Crawford has $14 million of his own money to put into it, don't look for him to be starring in DOTV or anything else here anytime

**(his role in The Woman In White is not the lead and given the mixed reviews, it won't be coming here anytime soon).** >>


I was indicating that while the reviews for THE WOMAN IN WHITE were mixed, in this show, Michael Crawford’s reviews were for the most part VERY good. I know what they were like for Dance of the Vampires

[bronxboundexpress]

Posted: 10/20/04 at 11:45pm

Margo, are you the same Margo critic interviewed on the Broadway documentary? If so, you're attractive.

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 10/21/04 at 12:26pm

On behalf of Margo Jefferson of the Times, I thank you (but, no, that's not me).

Updated On: 10/22/04 at 12:26 PM

[rockfenris2005]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 12:50am

Margo! I am very disappointed with you! It's the first time I've ever felt that way! You seem to think that D.O.T.V. was written and mounted directly as a disaster. Have you forgotten the original production? Have you forgotten Vienna? Didn't you know it started life as the most successful musical in German history? That it won 6 Euro awards? Best Score! Best Book! Best Director! Best Lead Actor! Best Lead Actres!!! The highlights CD went platinum. The complete was not far behind. It resurrected theater in Stuttgart. It caused a mass sensation in Hamburg, even after it was massacred on Broadway! The TRUTH IS, unlike Carrie, which was directly written as a flop, Michael Crawford joined Dance of the Vampires and turned it from a gothic 3-hour rock opera to a stupid musical comedy. It's Crawford's fault. He's directly to blame. Because of him, the world never saw the true Dance of the Vampires from Vienna. Because of him, Jim Steinman had a heart-attack. Because of him, Warner Bros. dumped Batman the Musical. DOTV isn't a flop. If it's truly a flop, in its true version, then you haven't seen the German show!

(I hope you're not a fan of Polanski. He directed it)

[rockfenris2005]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 12:53am

This should furtherly inform you:

http://www.realmofdreams.com/steinman/index.html

(DANCE OF THE VAMPIRES)

[rockfenris2005]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 12:53am

This should furtherly inform you:

http://www.realmofdreams.com/steinman/index.html

(DANCE OF THE VAMPIRES)

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 1:03am

I know all of that rockfenris (without consulting any links). What's that got to do with anything though? Whatever the history was, whatever awards other versions of the show won, whatever Crawford did, whoever's fault it was all completely irrelevant to those people who shelled out $100 to see the travesty which eventually ended up on stage here in NYC. THAT production was the one and only one I was referring to and the reviews HERE IN AMERICA were the only ones I cited. It could have been the single greatest piece of musical theatre in the history of the artform prior to arriving here for all NYC knew. But what we ACTUALLY got was CRAP.

[Plum]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 1:12am

Our Margo is cooler than the New York Times'. :)

[rockfenris2005]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 2:59am

I love Margo! Everything she says is GOLD! She's like the God of this message-board. But when people talk about Steinman, in an ill-manner, jocular or not, I get very sensitive. And I will say, to the day I die, that Crawford ruined Dance of the Vampires. He ruined what could have been another blockbuster, like Rent and Phantom. He ruined the success that Steinman wanted since college and The Dream Engine. Steinman deserved that success, after all his fights, but Crawford ruined it. If I ever see Crawford, serious, I'll spit in his face. I'll stomp on his toes and make him feel like s**t

[rockfenris2005]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 3:01am

For extra information:

THE REVIEWER WAS WRONG!!

It was not the Marquis Theater, it was MINSKOFF!!

The song "Come With me" is not a rip-off of "Music of the Night" because it was composed in the 1970s. Believe it or not, it's subtly used in "For Crying Out Loud" - the last song on Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell. And that song, that glorious song, is better than anything in Phantom of the Opera. Steinman should've written Phantom, not Webber

[Sally]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 1:55pm

<<... But when people talk about Steinman, in an ill-manner, jocular or not, I get very sensitive.

And I will say, to the day I die, that Crawford ruined Dance of the Vampires...>>

How are you feeling?

[JohnPopa]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 3:55pm

The failure of DOTV had nothing to do with Warner Bros' stopping work on 'Batman: The Musical.' It had more to do with Warner Bros' realizing, oh yeah, we don't have a theatrical production company in place.

[Theatreboy33]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 4:00pm

Rock, your utter hatred for Michael Crawford, is downright disturbing. Its one thing to not like a performer, or to blame them for ruining something you are passionate about, but it seems to me that youve never met the man, nor were you directly involved in the production. So the viewing of your webpage was downright scary. Why should anyone hold that much hate in their heart for someone they don't even directly know? DOTV failed. Hundreds of shows dont even get that far. Please, find the strngth to move on and give up on the utter despise you have for Crawford. It seems to me your greatest tool would be simple apathy.

[bronxboundexpress]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 5:59pm

No, I am the god of the message board.

Posted: 10/22/04 at 6:06pm

I actually find the demos from the english language version to be a guilty pleassure and I would have liked to have seen the show on braodway just to say I have. But if i want to hear the lushness of the score and listen to how it should have been I listen to the German Cast. I am still trying to get the double cd but it is always sold out whenever I get my germasn friends to look for it. Oh well.....

[Musetta1957]

Posted: 10/22/04 at 11:49pm

There is no German cast recording of TdV. There's the original Vienna cast, though.

Speaking of which, I love Aris Sas on the English demos.

[Poppy]

Posted: 10/23/04 at 12:41am

If they would play it like it was originally done, it just might be a hit. Crawford's appearance and voice ruined it for me.