GENTLEMEN'S GUIDE TO LOVE & MURDER -- Previews — Page 3

Contrary to others on the board I thought A GENTLEMANS GUIDE was delightful. An evening that sets out to make you laugh and smile and by my view totally succeeded. I'm not saying it's brilliant or 50 years from now you'll still be talking about it. Just that it's a show that is well worth the money you pay ( and nowadays that's saying a lot ) and you'll leave with a smile on your face and call your friends the next day and recommend it. The acting is wonderful with the brillant Jefferson Mayes setting the standard. The score is lovely. Some of it is wonderfully witty like I Don't Understand The Poor and some is just beautiful like Sibella. I hope any of you on the fence about this show will give it chance and know that many people feel differently than the naysayers. I guess I should end by saying I've been posting here a long time and I'm not a shill. I think more than twice before recommending a show for the one fact alone- shows are just so damn expensive. Don't let this one pass you by.

I guess it does look shillish. Since I had gone to the show I thought I would try to see what other people thought about it. I found this message board, saw some of the comments and thought since I had been, I should post my two cents. Of course there is room for improvement and I would agree with some of the points made on this board, *potential SPOILER*(the main being why keep "killing" after what he had attained) but I would recommend this show to my friends. I even convinced my parents to go this Saturday.

Why did only 3 continue?

Who did Bryce replace? My guess is that they wanted to go with a "name" or someone who has opened a Broadway show before - as he as done with "Ghost." They do that all the time. Look at Les Miz. Replacing half of them with Broadway "names."

Wicked Fanatic- Here you go:

Act One
Prologue
You're a D'Ysquith
I Don't Know What I'd Do
Foolish To Think
A Warning to Monty
I Don't Understand the Poor
Foolish To Think (Reprise)
Poison In My Pocket
Poor Monty
Better With a Man
Inside Out
Lady Hyacinth Abroad
The Last One You'd Expect

Act Two
Why Are All the D'Ysquith's Dying
Sibella
I've Decided to Marry You
Final Warning
Poison in My Pocket (Reprise)
Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun
Stop! Wait! What!
That Horrible Woman
Finale

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"I've decided to marry you" is a SHOW STOPPER!! THAT'S the kind of thing I want to see in a show!

Is Brooks Ashmanskis still involved in this production? No one seems to be commenting about him and he's (if nothing else) a very noticeable actor.

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I saw the show in Hartford and even then I wasn't entirely sure of the voice-over, only because Monty just sat onstage during it and didn't engage the audience personally, which he then does in song anyway. Ken was pretty good in the show when I saw it, very funny and could play both romantic and slightly awkward when the show called for it. I did think that because the show went through so many deaths in Act 1, it left most of the romance to Act two, which I wasn't by then entirely interested in.

Heyyyyyyyy, guys. Could those of you who heaped praise upon this show and strongly recommended it, please PM me your address so that I can mail you the bag of dicks you're owed? Jesus Christ. This is great (or even mildly satisfying) theatre to you? Were you people raised by wolves?

I felt like I stepped into a Broadway house and was greeted with dinner theatre. This had so much potential on paper. Could have been uproarious, giddy, wicked fun. Instead it was flat, obvious, dull, confused. And what a wet blanket of a score. The score had so many vivid colors from beige to off-white and the book was just painful.

Bryce Pinkham is pretty strong leading man. I'd like to see him in a stronger play or musical. Jefferson Mays was surprisingly dull and some of his characterizations were just bizarre from the older Lady Hyacinth whom he played like a linebacker in drag to the final victim, Lord Adalbert who appeared out of some Jr. college idea of a Monty Python character. Lisa O'Hare as the "naughtier" love interest, Sibella, is very beautiful, sings wonderfully and has very good comedic timing. She also looks way too contemporary for the setting. And it's not just her look. Even the styling of her hair and some of her costumes were completely period inappropriate. Such odd choices.

The set was ugly and chintzy and the use of cheaply produced background projections on a scrim was dismaying.

While the score was mostly mush, throughout the evening I kept thinking how lovely most of the orchestrations were -- especially for a small 10+ ensemble. If only, the quality of the songcraft could match the orchestrations. Oh, and looking at my Playbill now, I see why I had that reaction. Mr. Tunick. God bless him. The composer, Steven Lutvak, should thank Mr. Tunick for not merely arranging his music but for elevating it with taste, wit, elegance and emotional weight. Trust me, if you heard these songs on just a piano, you'd figure they'd been written by a high school student. No offense, high school students. Ugh. What a waste of an evening. And I really wanted to like it.

Updated On: 10/27/13 at 04:06 AM

The show was an absolute delight in Hartford and even better on Broadway, where the Victorian false-proscenium set looks perfect nestled inside the intimate Walter Kerr.

I liked Ken Barnett in Hartford (and will like him, I'm sure, in the future), but Bryce Pinckham brings a level of menace and sexiness to the character of Monty that helps you care about a main character who is a charming but remorseless murderer.

And Jefferson Mays is just dazzling, turning in a star performance that is even more better the second time around.

The women were also pretty terrific, especially Jane Carr from Nicholas Nickelby. I hear they're putting in an extra little bit at the beginning for her.

But it's the writing that I think will make this show soar: the music and the lyrics are so witty and well-crafted. I'm surprised more BWW posters weren't turned on by the literate lyrics and wordplay.

Not to mention Steve Lutvak's melodic gifts! Talk about tunes you can hum: "...I've decided to marry you!..." "...that horrrrrrrr-ible woman...!" "...you're a D'Ysquith!..." "...why are all the D'Ysquiths dyyyy-ing?..." and my favorite: "...the last one you'd expect...")

I think, if marketed correctly, the show can become a favorite among the vast audience of PBS-watchers, theatergoers who like to watch TV like Masterpiece Theatre, Agatha Christie mysteries and Downton Abbey.

I urge everyone to go see it. And I urge some of the posters who felt so-so about it to go back and see it again! (Y'know...sometimes when you're expecting one thing and you see another, you're so disappointed that it's not what you mistakenly thought it would be that you fail to appreciate what it actually is.)

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Updated On: 10/27/13 at 12:05 PM

CYA, I thought the stage business that had Monty climbing to the top of the set, but


SPOILER....................SPOILER....................LOOK AWAY

I think it was so set up the scene at the end, when the D'Ysquith family member (who had been mopping the floor in the prison) announces his intent of off Monty.

Updated On: 10/27/13 at 05:22 PM

At a certain point in the first act of this musical, I felt a growing --- and glowing --- sense of astonishment. After enduring the assorted agonies of various critics darling musicals --- about as appealing as trudging across the Russian steppes in the dead of winter, or wading through a sewer without a gas mask --- suddenly here was a musical that actually amuses, engages, and entertains! How did this ever come to pass?

What a pleasant change to attend a show that is deft, intelligent, charming, and laugh-out-loud funny! The music, if thin, is by turns jaunty and lyrical, and captures the proper tea-and-crumpet spirit of the piece. The lyrics proved clever and apt.

Jefferson Mays was delightful in his multitude of roles, and Bryce Pinkham was exceptional, with talent and charm to spare.

An altogether winning evening, and by far the best musical to be seen here in quite some time.

P.S. From the comments of some of the pedantic (and longwinded) spoilsports here, it seems that some people are more concerned with dissecting a show for Broadway World than with actually enjoying what's going on on stage. It's sad, when you come to think of it.

Updated On: 10/27/13 at 08:48 PM