Favorite People to Play All the Roles in Les Miz?

Chuck Wagner and Dave Clemmons were the best Javert/Valjean team I have seen.

Fuschia Walker was the funniest Madame Thenadier.

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John Owen-Jones is a VERY gd Jean Valjean. But I MUST admit that Ruthie Henshall is the ONLY Fantine!!!!!!!!! SHE IS THE BEST!!!!!

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Ruthie Henshall is by far my favorite Fantine. I never really cared for any of the others. Judy Kuhn is probably my favorite Cosette...I love Michael Ball as Marius. Philip Quast is my favorite Javert, what a voice! There have been so many wonderful Eponines... But I will say Lea Salonga. :) And I do love Colm Wilkinson as JVJ. And I adore Michael Maguire.

So pretty much the whole dream cast from the 10th Anniversary. I have to say they did a wonderful job casting it.

I've seen the show over 30 times, so I'm just going to list people I've seen in person rather than via the rather restrictive medium of cast recordings.

Valjean
Randal Keith. I've seen Colm Wilkinson and thought he was amazing, but Randal was more the complete package. I know Colm has fans because of his vocal idiosyncrasies (sp?), but I prefer Randal's purer voice. (Besides, I don't know if Colm consistently tries to adlib as much as he can between his lines, but he sure was that night.)

Javert
I'm not sure. I have only seen one Javert I really disliked, and he was a former opera singer who seemed to have decided he could get by on vocal prowess alone.
If I had to choose, I might see Stephen Bishop or Stephen Tewksbury again. Both were strong and imposing -- Bishop was scary and Tewksbury was a cocky bastard.

Fantine
I have to pick two -- Thursday Farrar, who was with the tour for a short time in 2001, and Linda Pierson Huff, an understudy who should've been promoted at one point. Thursday was strong without being too strong to believably die (as was the case with a few others I can think of), and Linda was small and fragile without being wimpy. Lovely.

Young Cosette
Emma Hunton! The only Young Cosette I've seen never have an off day, and I saw her several times (I think she must've grown a foot between the first and last times I saw her... :) ). What a beautiful voice without being too "Hollywood."
(If anyone saw the episode of Drew Carey where he entered a karaoke contest, Emma was the little girl he sang with.)

Mme. Thénardier
Aymee Garcia had the perfect balance between outrageous and scary. Some go over the top and some just aren't scary enough. Aymee also has a powerhouse voice which she used without showing it off.

M. Thénardier
A fantastic understudy by the name of Stephen Colella. He was too young for the part, so I'm plugging his name to come back for the revival. :) But other than that, he was hilarious but still slimy. I wouldn't want to meet him in a dark alley. Or a brightly lit alley, for that matter!

Gavroche
Dutch Whitlock played the part on tour for a short time in 2001. He was technically too old and too tall for the part, but it worked to his advantage since in contrast to the London cast, the American casts tend to find kids who are tiny and squeak. Dutch did none of that and I swear he must've read the book or at least the Cliff Notes. :) He completely embodied the character -- a strange little fairy gamin, indeed!

Eponine
Ma-Anne Dionisio made me love the character again. Physically, she's attractive and very cute, but unlike many other popular Eponines (*cough*DianaKaarina*cough*) didn't play it like a kewpie doll or use a lot of really annoying emotive gestures. Ma-Anne's voice isn't as powerhouse as a lot of others, but it worked to her advantage because she was soft and scared and quiet.
She had the most believable death I've ever seen. It was almost frightening.

Marius
I have a lot of favorites. I have seen probably 7 or 8 Marii and the only one I have vehemently disliked is Peter Lockyer.
Stephen Patterson was endearingly dorky with a really strong voice that sometimes overpowered whichever Enjolras he was performing with, but other than that, I liked him. :) And he had great chemistry with Stephanie Waters (who was Cosette for most of the time he was with the show).
Scott Hunt was mini Marius, but he was charming and sweet without being too saccharine.
Edward Juvier (the final Joly in the Broadway cast) was a young, teenaged Marius discovering the world. Some of my friends have described his voice as a "tenor Josh Groban." Yes, this is a compliment. :)

Cosette
I've liked them all. I know, that's a cop-out, but I have. Congrats to all these wonderful actresses who make me root for them rather than the teenyboppers in the audience who root for that dirty obnoxious one in the trenchcoat...

Enjolras
It's a tie! Dallyn Vail Bayles and Ben Davis (of Bohème fame). Both were incredibly strong without being stoic or employing stock "Follow me, men!" gestures. Dallyn employed a sort of cold anger to the role; I only saw Ben once, but he was very energetic without being hyper.
And what voices.

Updated On: 12/13/03 at 09:15 PM

Marius - Seany. End of story.

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I thought this was a thread about ONE person playing ALL the roles in Les Mis. And my vote would go for none other than Carol Channing. She is the only woman I know who could pull off both Val Jean and Fantine! (I'm not dissing her, I LOVE TGC!)

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I can't believe I forgot Enjolras!!!
I'd have to go with Michael Maguire, I believe, from the Dream Cast; he sang the role quite passionately. I believed him, and he had a great voice.

Jean Valjean - probably Ivan Rutherford. J. Mark McVey did a lot of things right, but lacked the dynamicism that Ivan had. I loved Rutherford in the moment before "One Day More."

Javert - David McDonald, who has the single most thrilling "Stars" ever and should've replaced Philip Hernandez before the show closed. McDonald just has a stronger overall character than Hernandez, even if nobody ever did the suicide like Hernandez does.

Fantine - Lauren Kennedy. She had a voice like gold, and her entire performance was some very subtle, understated acting.

Marius - probably Kevin Odekirk. Peter Lockyer had some good days when he got drawn out of his shell, but I think his character's just not as good as Kevin's was.

Eponine - Dana Meller. Hands down, with a bullet, Dana's Eponine is not only my favorite interpretation of the role, but my favorite performance ever, period. She was just so complex and intriguing and every movement and all of her physical acting were so intensely right - and she sung like an angel. No one's come close.

Enjolras - Christopher Mark Peterson. The man has a hidden extra lung somewhere, and just has the charisma and stage presence for everything. He's one of the ones who just got better every time I saw him.

Cosette - Dana Meller. Hey, we're doing best people, not dream cast, right? Dana had a sensitivity and sweetness and angelic quality to her Cosette that was never exactly paralleled. She left me liking Cosette and wanting more for her character. Other than Dana, Melissa Minyard did a great job, a little more down to earth and rebellious. Sandra Turley was fine, but too...just...yeah. Conventional.

Grantaire - David McDonald, again. He just had more layers to his R, and a better Bamatabois, than Paul Truckey - who was more fun. Plus, he grooved on the whole Grantaire-as-pacifist-with-homoerotic-thing-for-Enjolras from the novel.

-Wayne

As far as Terrence Mann goes, I have nothing against the guy (I thought he was great in the movie version of Chorus Line)and he has a great voice, but he really didn't seem too into his part when I saw him in Les Mis. There was just no fire in his performance as Javert. He also sounded like he was singing through his teeth...

I'd love to see Julie Hanson as Cosette and Veerle Casteleyn as Eponine. *nods*

Bonnes fêtes,
Juliette Capulet

Valjean-J. Mark McVey

Javert-David McDonald

Fantine-Jayne Paterson

Marius-Peter Lockyer all the way!!!! And Josh Young is a close second.

Enjolras-Chris Peterson or Ben Davis (go Ben!)

Cosette-Sandra Turley

Eponine-Catherine Brunell

M. Thenardier-Nick Wyman

Mme. Thenardier-Aymee Garcia

Factory Girl-Susan Spencer

Grantaire-David McDonald

I need to study for finals...can't finish the list now

The others that I especially loved were Sandra Turley as Cosette, Nick Wyman as Thenardier and Jayne Paterson as Fantine. Les Miz is special to me because it was my first Broadway show. =)

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