Dangerous Beauty in LA (Pasadena)

My thought going into the re-opened Pasadena Playhouse was what will a musical set in 16th century Venice sound like? Answer - bland pop rock. Not terrible, some nice songs that could fit into just about any musical - just not one set in 16th century Venice.

What was there about the movie that someone thought needed musicalizing? I guess it's the empowerment of women theme which hangs heavily over every moment. We get the point in the first ten minutes but the point keeps being made anyway.

The cast has a lot of Broadway people in it including the desperately undangerous Jenny Powers who cannot muster any kind of charisma in the lead. James Snyder is likeable and does well as her swashbuckling beau while Michael Rupert does what he can as the windbag Voice of Reason. Megan McGinnis is in it but doesn't really have a part. Bryce Ryness, to his credit, gives his all as the drunken wastrel who turns bad guy in act two but his enthusiasm is, alas, not catching.

The unit set is efficient and eye-catching enough to garner applause at the opening curtain and there's a chorus of writhing courtesans wearing too many clothes. Oh, and there's a lot of poetry.

The whole thing is just limp.

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The theatre is unchanged. As is, alas, the taste of its artistic director.

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How was the always fabulous Laila Robins?

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Wow, I forgot Laila Robbins was in it. She plays the courtesan mother of courtesan Jenny Powers - it's a family business - and has an endless song which she sings very well. I didn't know she could sing!

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I've given Laila Robins vocal coachings. She hasn't sung publicly in years and really broke out of her musical shell last summer at the O'Neill when she was prepping for an audition for something and workshopping amusical. We were there working on 'Picnic at Hanging Rock', which she was masterful in as the headmistress. Laila has a really lovely voice, especially while singing Joni Mitchell. Here's hoping this musical gig gets her out there in the musical world some more!

Sad to hear it isn't that spectacular. It's got quite a wonderful cast -- especially the great Michael Rupert.

Laila is such an amazing actress. Still can't get her performance in 'Frozen' out of my head. Can't believe she didn't get a Tony nomination for that... I keep hoping she'll do her Jefferson Award-winning Blanche DuBois here (which people marveled at while she did it for Steppenwolf), but with the need for star-power these days, that seems sadly unlikely.

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What a shame. At least Laila is treading the musical stage again...

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I'm not a fan of the movie, but for some reason have been looking forward to seeing this. Were the costumes any good? Because that's what I came away from the movie thinking, "oh the stage costumes for this could be gorgeous"
I hope the show gets better, as I do want to see it.

Is there a recording available? Mrs R is in love with anything Venetian and we were there a few times.This sounded interesting.

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I will say this about the costumes. I was impressed by the way the woman’s courtesan costumes changed onstage from look to look.

Although I wanted to scream out, "Zippers were not invented back then!"

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Interesting, as the Pasadena Playhouse production is billed as the "world premiere production".

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Looks like Variety agrees with the board here. Powers especially takes a hit for playing it too much like Little Women.

It seems we probably won't be seeing this in NY anytime soon.
Variety review