I'm disappointed with some of you (Little Mermaid)- Page 3

[BobbyBubby]

Posted: 1/31/07 at 5:35pm

While some of us need to not judge a musical before it opens, I think people also shouldn't list it as their favorite musical if it hasn't even opened! I can't even begin to list the number of people who list Little MErmaid and LEgally Blonde as their favorite shows.

IF we shouldn't judge, neither should those who love a show before even seeing it.

[dramaqueen2]

Posted: 1/31/07 at 5:43pm

oh, capn, my capn!

i agree! i applaud your post. =)

[CapnHook]

Posted: 1/31/07 at 6:14pm

OurTime - what you are describing is skepticism and that is perfectly fine, as I have stated twice now. The PROBLEM comes when instead of saying "I don't understand how you can roller skate if you have fins, but we'll see how it goes" people are instead making comments such as "Little Mermaid is going to suck! Roller Skates??? What a gimmick!" "Disney is dumb! Why change Ursula to be skinny? She is SUPPOSED to be huge!"

People are being skeptical but are taking it one step further and already judging how they will respond to the choices. And in this instance, we don't even know ANY choices except the director that has been announced and music demos that are swimming about.

SeanMartin, I understand your viewpoint as well. But when that spreads online, the ignorant absorb it up and it creates this negative online buzz.

[neddyfrank2]

Posted: 1/31/07 at 6:32pm

sondhead- That is interesting since I know several people involved with it (in a much bigger capacity than ensemble) and they laughed when I asked about heelys. Plus, the show hasn't been fully cast yet so I am wondering how your "ensemble friends" would know about the roller skates?

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 1/31/07 at 9:20pm

>> And the artists on Broadway leave themselves wide open to criticism and deserve a certain amount of fairness

Look, it's a job, not Art. And certain things come with the job, like speculation as to whether or not this will be worth over a hundred bucks a seat before the reviews come out. There are people working the sound, but there are also people buying the tickets that support the people working the sound. They too deserve a certain amount of fairness. And at the cost of putting fannies in seats these days, a healthy skepticsm isnt just warranted, it's a healthy defense mechanism. Whether we want to admit it or not, Broadway is becoming more and more a crap shoot these days: big expensive productions that cost a lot to see and wind up in the gutter two weeks after opening because they just werent worth it. And for that very reason we see producers relying more and more on formulaic stuff because they mistakenly think it's an easy buck with a built in audience.

Disney, on the other hand, is trying to straddle two worlds of late: it's going more and more back to that well of rehashing its old stuff and putting it on stage -- and at the same time trying to have Julie Taymor without actually having to hire Julie Taymor. They tried desperately to recreate the LK magic with Tarzan, and look what happened. Yikes. And now theyre turning to two people with opera backgrounds to mount Mermaid, because (I believe) they want to make Art yet again, to convince everyone that Disney can indeed mount an edgy, stylish production. Well, I can assure you right now that it will at least *look* edgy, but whether or not it's right for the material is another question. My money right now says no, because the sense of the score is so very different from the kinds of productions this director/designer team have done in the past. This is Disney, not Verdi. It's like asking Chenowith to sing Turandot: possible, but not very likely to be that good.

But the more I hear about Disney onstage, the one cartoon that seems the obvious choice -- HERCULES -- is almost never mentioned as a candidate.