FOLLIES: Thoughts...- Page 3

[lizabombs]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 8:24pm

I thought the other day that perhaps the intermission would work better if they opened Act II with "Bolero D'Amour."

The problem with the intermission is that it breaks this mood that has been cast for the first half. I think it's damn near impossible to get everything back into it with the Ben/Sally scene and then "The Right Girl." It just doesn't work.

But "Bolero D'Amour," I think, would work by creating a kind of Act II prologue that brings everyone back into this world.

[bk]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 8:27pm

I think the original production of Follies ran about two hours and five or ten minutes - but the pace was extraordinary - it just flowed from one thing to the next and, of course, back then you didn't have an audience filled with Sondheads screaming their guts out as if they were watching American Idol. That, for me, was the single most dispiriting thing about watching the new revival, which I saw last night - the audience. It started as the lights dimmed and the craziness of each response got worse and worse until one twit in the row ahead of me STOOD UP after Who's That Woman. Yes, Mr. Twit, it's all about YOU, isn't it? He was the only one but it was clear he was trying to coerce others. If that's what theater has devolved to I may have to stop going. It was exactly the same today at Catch Me If You Can - crazy, screaming insanity. And really, for what?

[Q]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:27pm

"If that's what theater has devolved to I may have to stop going."

bk - you're not alone. It's been discussed here before, and it drives me insane.

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:36pm

^ It's the Interactive Age, bk.

People don't know how to watch movies at home anymore, they have to "interact" with them either on DVD or BD or their home computers. They can't just sit still and be an audience anymore and just absorb what they're seeing. They have to push buttons and "like" it or vote for their favorites or leave feedback and share it with their friends and post it on their walls and chat about it on message boards.

Granted there are still some who can simply sit in a chair in a theatre and watch a show or movie and keep it a personal experience, but it's a new age now. The audience is taught to believe they are as much a part of the overall experience as the performers on the stage or screen. Everybody's a star! Everybody is involved.

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:38pm

What cuts have they made to Follies? I would swear the original, without an intermission, ran considerably over 2 hours. And happily so, IMO.

I think some of the complaints we're hearing about the show not building to Loveland properly are a result of the imposition of a break. If Prince and Bennett couldn't make an intermission work, I doubt if anyone else can.

***

Yikes and double yikes at the audiences you guys are describing.

But I must add that I saw the original shortly after opening with an audience full of Saturday matinee ladies. I'd never heard of anyone in the cast except Mrs. Munster, Yvonne de Carlo.

The matinee ladies, however, burst into applause at each principal's entrance. I even heard a "Look, there's Ethel" when Ethel Shutta entered. And she hadn't been a star on Broadway since 1919!

And then the matinee ladies applauded all over again for each of the formerly famous ladies when she did her pageant walk in "Beautiful Girls."

There was quite a bit of "interaction", even in that era before PCs.
Updated On: 8/14/11 at 09:38 PM

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:39pm

No, it didn't. As Bruce notes, it ran about two hours and five minutes.

[Kad]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:42pm

The idea of going to the theatre and sitting quietly in your seat is actually a fairly recent construct in terms of theatre history.

[ljay889]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:45pm

BK, What did you think of the production?

[ljay889]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:47pm

What cuts have they made to Follies, AC?

The revival is missing the Bolero, and chunks of dialogue from the original book have been cut. The script is more faithful to the original book than the Roundabout revival, but it's still missing stuff.

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 9:54pm

"The idea of going to the theatre and sitting quietly in your seat is actually a fairly recent construct in terms of theatre history."

I didn't say "quietly." It shouldn't be a punishment.

To clarify, I mean that the focus and energy of the audience is directed at the stage and the action taking place there, not toward some self-aware state of euphoria, as in "see how much I love this?"

And you can definitely tell the difference between someone reacting to a show, and someone interacting with a show. Almost as if they want everyone to know they just pushed the "like" button or "voted" for their favorite performer or song.

I may not be saying it clearly.

Updated On: 8/14/11 at 09:54 PM

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 10:01pm

Ted Chapin (page 276, paperback) says BK and AC are correct about the running time. And Chapin has notes, not just my admittedly imperfect memory. So my bad, guys, and thanks for the correction.

In that case, I REALLY don't understand the need for an intermission. (In winter stock, we used to add intermissions to sell drinks. Surely that isn't the motivation now.) Lots of movies are longer than two hours and a few minutes. Hell, the first act of some musicals are almost that long (usually to poor effect).

I'll just add that Follies seemed longer when I first saw it. But in a good way.

***

BTW, as long as I'm issuing corrections. I posted in another Sondheim thread that Follies made the cover of Time and Newsweek in the same week. Skimming Chapin I was reminded that the Time cover ran, but the Newsweek cover was cancelled.

***

BTW2, kad is right about theater behavior. It was basically Wagner who insisted a theater audience behave as if they were in church. During the Restoration, for example, house lights remained on, fruit was sold in the aisles and sometimes hurled at actors, and prostitutes worked the house during the show. "Interaction" with the performers was the norm, rather than an exception.

ETA but that isn't how I want to see Follies.


Updated On: 8/14/11 at 10:01 PM

[RippedMan]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 10:46pm

Any picture of the Follies Time cover?

And why not add an intermission after Terri White's number? Is it too soon? I felt like that would make us go out on a high note, and then come back and settle down for a little bit of drama.

This revival was def. longer than 2 hrs and 5 or 10mins. It felt much longer.

Any did anyone else find the dancing in "That Girl" or whatever it's called a little laughable?

[ljay889]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 10:58pm

And why not add an intermission after Terri White's number? Is it too soon? I felt like that would make us go out on a high note, and then come back and settle down for a little bit of drama.

I believe the original production tried that in Boston.

Dramatically, the intermission makes the most sense where it is now: Buddy walking in on Sally and Ben kissing. History repeating itself.
Updated On: 8/14/11 at 10:58 PM

[Kad]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 11:08pm

It's nice because of the image it closes on. But I don't think an intermission is necessary.

The revival is actually not considerably longer than the original. I'd say, without the intermission, it's running at about 2:10. As I said, I got out of the theatre doors into the lobby at around 10:37, which means it probably ended a few minutes before, and taking into account the fact it didn't start promptly at 8.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 11:20pm

The song is called "The Right Girl." In the original, Michael Bennett choreographed it as a tour de force explosion of Buddy's frustration, express in acting, singing and dance for Gene Nelson, who had been a sort-of second-rate Donald O'Connor in Hollywood in the 1950s.

See if you can make it out on this low-quality video (all we have left):

http://youtu.be/RFxygAHcNGM

[lizabombs]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 11:26pm

The song is called "The Right Girl." In the original, Michael Bennett choreographed it as a tour de force explosion of Buddy's frustration, express in acting, singing and dance for Gene Nelson, who had been a sort-of second-rate Donald O'Connor in Hollywood in the 1950s

Didn't I read that Michael Bennett thought the dance just ended up being a bunch of silly, crowd-pleasing stunts? Because Gene Neslon wouldn't or couldn't do what Bennett wanted, and that Bennett wanted to cut it but didn't feel Nelson would appreciate having his big solo deleted?

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 11:39pm

Nope. You didn't read that at all. As a matter of fact, if you read the Ted Chapin book, you would have read the opposite. Michael and Gene worked intensely together, and the result was a triumph for both of them.

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 11:51pm

Per Chapin, Nelson had trouble with the number and Bennett had to simplify the steps. (Page 202.) But joey is right that Nelson and Bennett eventually found a way to work together. Bennett continued to demand the very best that Nelson could do (and the implication is that he got it).

But I remember somebody saying something similar to what lizabombs remembers. Maybe it even came from Sondheim himself. I'll try to check "Sondheim & Co."

To me as a viewer, "The Right Girl" was the least interesting of the four leads' "book numbers," especially since "Buddy's Blues" totally topped it a few minutes later.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 2:32am

"I find hysterical lines like "We haven't had an honest talk since 1942. Do you think the Japs will win the war?")"

I like that line too. I never said the book is without any good lines, along with some serious clunkers (e.g., "You don't know what love is!")

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 4:59am

And, for me, each of the 6 times I saw the original. Gene Nelson's performance of "The Right Girl" was one of the most stunning mergings of acting/singing/dancing every created for the musical theater.

For Bennett, I think it was the link between "Tick Tock" in Company and "The Music and the Mirror" in Chorus Line.

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 6:40am

joey, I'm sure you're write about Bennett. And as for Nelson, I should have emphasized the "to me" in my opinion. I thought he performed it very well (which is why I sort of remember the comment to which Lizabomb alludes--because it surprised me in its criticism of Nelson). But of the primary musical theater elements, dance was originally the least interesting to me. (I've had a lot education since then.)

***

Now that you mention it, Henrik, "The Lion in Winter" is also a mixture of wit and clunkers. Maybe I have to accept that that was how James Goldman wrote. (Come to think of it, the same could be said of WILLIAM Goldman, so maybe it's a family trait.)

[lizabombs]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 7:30am

This is what I remember, from Sondheim and Co:

"Bennett: Well, let's just say (Nelson) couldn't do it. I finally had to take the tap shoes off and redo the number. It ended with him doing tricks which I absolutely hated, but it was the only way to make that number work, to get any kind of applause at all, and unfortunately, they each needed their big number ... if they didn't have it they would have been very unhappy and it would have showed throughout the evening."

[bk]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 8:04am

best12bars: You're saying it just right. There's a big difference between matinee ladies applauding for entrances and the kind of rabid, insane screaming and woo-hooing going on at Follies and every other musical on Broadway, as if they were watching American Idol. It's disruptive and annoying and all about the audience. When numbers in Catch Me If You Can, each and everyone of them, get the same sort of reaction to numbers in Follies, well...

As to this production - for those of us who saw the original we are, unfortunately, at a disadvantage because for most of us the original was one of the greatest, if not the greatest, productions ever. I found things to like in this production - I liked the cast, the band, but do not like ANY of the book changes - and no, I never had a problem with the original book in the original production - and certainly was not crazy about the staging, although it was certainly competent. I thought the choice to make Lucy and Jessie a Jack Cole number was not a good one.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 8:33am

Bennett was frustrated with the all the tap in the show. He drove the ladies doing "Who's That Woman?" crazy too and finally removed ALL their tap shoes. All the tap sounds in "Who's That Woman?" came from the chorus girls and boys offstage. Bennett was not very nice to the ladies on the way to that solution, but the number ended up being one of the best-staged ever in musical-theater history.

All of Bennett's quotes are like that in Sondheim & Co. He was a very hot-tempered man and he used exclamatory language: I HATED it...it was the most FABULOUS thing...that's what he was like. Zadan also has him saying things like:

"It's really no secret that I did not like the book to Follies...I never believed that the show would be successful."

Well, yes he DID, actually.

"And I think that 80 perfect of Follies was the greatest musical ever done....The concept and the musical numbers could not support the show...the musical numbers were more successful than the show. To tell the truth, I could not talk about Follies for a year after it opened, I was so bitter about its failure. So much of that show was better than anything else I've ever seen or anything I've ever done."

By the time I met him 10 years later and mentioned my teenage adulation of the show, Chorus Line was well-established and the bitterness about Follies was gone. Or at least, he showed less of it to me than he did to Craig Zadan when that book was first compiled in 1974.

The swings around the poles Gene Nelson ended up doing did exactly what Bennett was looking when he wanted the tapping to express Buddy's frustration and anger. In the end, all those weeks of the two of them rehearsing in private paid off.

And then Michael said unkind things to Craig Zadan. But that was Michael. As long as the number got a HUGE applause, it didn't matter what you went through to get it.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 8/15/11 at 8:39am

Gaveston, I find Lion a bad, pretentious play filled with facile conceits. A middlebrow Show Girls, it is highly entertaining as camp and it had the outrageous fortune of being made into an almost inexplicably great movie, thanks to the first rate cast and Harvey's expert direction. Perhaps Goldman shares some of the credit as well for the noverbal aspects of the screenplay adaptation (for which, I believe, he won an oscar).

Goldman also wrote a very intelligent and restrained screenplay for Nicholas and Alexandra.