Is Fun Home too good for Broadway — Page 2

I'm sorry, but this has to be one of the dumbest proposals or questions I've heard.

Lol. Here comes the hater who TODAY preached about how rude it is to criticize a show in a thread about it.



Whizzer: That's an okay question! Yes, I do still experience that. More explicitly with gay men, but I think that's also because women who would find my identity problematic are understandably more careful and filter me out in advance. There is so much complex weirdness around it, it's hard to talk about in brief. I'll PM you a link to a thing I wrote in case this whole social area is of interest to you. Don't want to derail this thread with personal issues too much!

I have, but this is one of the dumbest.

After Eight, I have a question, and I do not mean it sarcastically or in a rude manner, I'm just curious... What is the most recent show that you've seen that you truly enjoyed? What's the most recent musical, that you believe, had deserved it's Best Musical award? Again, I don't mean this in a rude way, as I truly do value your opinions on this board. :)

In so many different ways, Eight is like if Donald Trump talked about theater.

Updated On: 5/28/16 at 11:20 PM

¿Macavity? said: "I may very well be, I'm just feeling very anxious about all the shows that are closing at a moment's notice."

Even were it to close before Labor Day, it will go down as a hit that played over 500 performances. That is not a short run.

Macavity,

I don't remember every Tony nominee for best musical down through the years, but La Cage aux Folles was certainly one that I remember as deserving most resoundingly its best musical ---- and best score --- Tony Awards.

As for the most recent shows I enjoyed to the greatest degree, I guess for musicals it would again be La Cage aux Folles, and for plays, Forty Carats.

let that sink in everyone. After Eight hadn't enjoyed a Broadway musical in 32 years and yet he still continues to attend. What dedication.

I enjoy being able to see everything that I can get my hands on and have informed opinions, but my friends tend to have limited time and funds.

For one pair, all my recommendations to them thus far has seemed to resonate. I explicitly did not recommend Fun Home, but they went to go see it anyway (because it was critically well-received and has so much positive word-of-mouth). Not surprisingly, they felt lukewarm towards it at best and cold at worst.

They thought none of us enjoyed it because we weren't the target demographic. They thought that people who were less tolerant or less open-minded would find it the most impactful. Maybe that's true. I've lived in NYC all my life, was part of my high school's GSA, am currently an ally in my workplace's LGBT network, lost count of the # of years I've fundraised for AIDS Walk, and became overwhelmed with joy when same-sex marriage finally became legal in the US.

I felt no connection to any of the characters (and did not like the music, honestly). I thought you needed to have some relatable experience to any of those characters to feel an emotional investment.

On the other hand, our friend (who is LGBT) saw it before all of us, and she was really moved by it.

Who can say what is "good"? The only thing you can know is what you like and what you connect with, and even that's not always consistent.

There's a bunch of people out there who don't like it but don't bother to say anything. Forget the wording of the title, this was obviously just to start a lovefest. It is okay to have dissenting opinions, but I think in general people avoid chiming in when it's so heavily skewed a certain way.

TLDR; it's not too good for Broadway. It's fine. I'm happy it moves people, even if I'm not one of them.

"There's a bunch of people out there who don't like it but don't bother to say anything."

The intimidation factor works to the advantage of many shows.

"It's a 90 minute show with a small cast, no huge spectacle that ends with a suicide and doesn't have any 'name' behind it. "



It had/has the power of the "arbiters of culture" and the media mega-machine behind it, and that's as good as gold. And it's just that gold that enabled it to move to Broadway and then to run there as long as it has. If word of mouth is finally catching up with it, then that's a good thing.

Updated On: 5/29/16 at 07:11 AM