Hearing Casey Nicholaw is new director of Disney's 'Hercules' - Page 2

[lucynewlife]

Posted: 4/21/23 at 11:27pm

lapinitsa said:

Yes, he was. It was widely reported. And as Betty22 said, Menken himself gave Nicholaw credit for pulling the show together between Toronto and NY. Does the material for Herc give him the same opportunity? I dunno.

"

 

Good point. IMO considering that the Toronto-to-Broadway Aladdin transformation largely revolved around "Emphasize the Genie as much as possible specifically because of James Monroe Iglehart being given standing ovations mid-show," and "cut all this extra material that was leftover from the earlier version of the film [all the Arabian Nights reprises, Call Me a Princess, etc]" I wonder if Hercules does have the same bones for a "make it palatable for mainstream audiences" as Aladdin did.

 

[RippedMan]

Posted: 4/21/23 at 11:44pm

Hercules has great material. I think it just needs great visuals to match. 

[Mr. Wormwood]

Posted: 4/22/23 at 12:06am

I feel like Casey is a low risk/low reward choice for this show. It'll be fine and serviceable, it certainly won't be a disaster under his watch. But it's not going to be a gamechanger or visionary.

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 4/22/23 at 1:09am

This might have been addressed in prior threads but - How was the book at Paper Mill compared to the Park production? I didn't see it at Paper Mill. What were the major changes in the book and score?

[BETTY22]

Posted: 4/22/23 at 10:12pm

I wonder if Casey will bring in a new book writer? 

[darquegk]

Posted: 4/22/23 at 11:29pm

lucynewlife said: "lapinitsa said:

Yes, he was. It was widely reported. And as Betty22 said, Menken himself gave Nicholaw credit for pulling the show together between Toronto and NY. Does the material for Herc give him the same opportunity? I dunno.

"



Good point. IMO considering that the Toronto-to-Broadway Aladdin transformation largely revolved around "Emphasize the Genie as much as possible specifically because of James Monroe Iglehart being given standing ovations mid-show," and "cut all this extra material that was leftover from the earlier version of the film [all the Arabian Nights reprises, Call Me a Princess, etc]" I wonder if Hercules does have the same bones for a "make it palatable for mainstream audiences" as Aladdin did.

"
 

The Aladdin stage show went through so many reimagining and incarnations that for nearly twenty years Aladdin Jr was licensed based on a very early draft of the stage version. It was only recently updated into a pared down version of the Broadway show.

 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 4/22/23 at 11:38pm

BETTY22 said: "I wonder if Casey will bring in a new book writer?"

Robert Horn's sensibilities feel right for this (assuming he's the one actually putting pen to paper on new revisions). With Bob Martin and Chad Beguelin being Casey's most frequent collaborators, and both in the "Disney stable," I wouldn't be surprised if they had already been asked and turned it down ahead of previous iterations. Perhaps the existing team just needs a new guiding force for their revisions (+ a new design team)

[A.J.]

Posted: 3/24/24 at 11:10am

Trailer from the Hamburg production: https://youtu.be/_GBmHA1xzds?si=-vLRfYD3cVOE6ami

The set and puppet designs are much better than previous incarnations IMO. 
I really wish they hadn’t slowed the tempo for Zero to Hero this much, it sucks the energy out of one of the most exciting songs.

Updated On: 3/24/24 at 11:10 AM

[Kad]

Posted: 3/24/24 at 12:07pm

I wonder if the tempo wasn't slowed to accommodate the German lyrics.