It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

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It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 8:22pm

I understand that this show was a flop but I was thinking about how it might fare if it were to be revived today. As a limited run, maybe?

I don't know much about the show but I've loved all of the songs I've heard (Strongest Man in the World and You've Got Possibilities being favorites). I've seen clips of the made-for-television version on the Look Up in the Sky DVD with an overly giggly Lesley Ann Warren. I don't know how Lois was portrayed in the stage version but in the few clips they showed Lesley made a strong, independent women into a brainless school girl.

So, could this work with the right cast and right director?

"All our dreams can come true -- if we have the courage to pursue them." -- Walt Disney We must have different Gods. My God said "do to others what you would have them do to you". Your God seems to have said "My Way or the Highway".

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 8:53pm

As a campy Off Broadway show, yes!

Listen, I don't take my clothes off for anyone, even if it is "artistic". - JANICE

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 9:14pm

I love the show and would like to see any actual production make it...I think it could do really well as an off-Broadway show or as a limited run.

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 10:26pm

I saw the original & it was really a fun show

Bob Holliday played the title role like Dudley Dooright. I can see Cheyenne Jackson playing him in a revival.Jack Cassidy
played a mud slinging columnist & was terrific. They also had a group of chinese acrobats called the Flying Lings. They feature in the shows finale a boffo number in an abandoned power plant "Pow Bam Zonk"

There was no Jimmy Olson & Linda Lavin played another DP worker reporter who had the hots for Clark. The late Patricia Marand played Lois very mater of factly. Superman singing The Strongest Man In The World to Lois while bending a standing lamp was a hoot

The show just made you forget your cares. It was entertaining & got positive reviews. For some reason, it never caught on. By the way, Holiday wound up selling homes in the poconos

Poster Emeritus

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 10:33pm

I can see Cheyenne Jackson playing him in a revival

He played the role in a concert version conducted by Georgia Stitt in, I think, 2007.

They feature in the shows finale a boffo number in an abandoned power plant "Pow Bam Zonk"

There's a short clip of that number on the "Look Up in the Sky" DVD

The late Patricia Marand played Lois very mater of factly

Good. IMO Lois Lane is one of the orginal women's libbers. What I saw of Warren's portrayal gave me chills and not in a good way. She auditioned to play opposite Christopher Reeve and she lost the role to Margot Kidder for the same reason. She played Lois as giddy and stupid. As a note...Stockard Channing also auditioned and played Lois as too hard.

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 10:34pm

I think it could totally work with some book revisions. I'd prefer Superman over Spider-Man any day.

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 10:36pm

Actually, Dallas Theatre Center got permission to write a new book, it opens next May in Dallas, who knows if it'll have a life from there.

http://www.youtube.com/huskcharmer

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 10:41pm

This is a clip from the Look Up in the Sky DVD that I've been referring to. If you're a Superman fan it is a must see.

That actor who is seen lifting the guy is Patrick Wayne. The role of Superman was going to be his but he walked away to be with his ailing father - John.
Casting Superman

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 10:42pm

We saw a version at Drury Lane -Oakbrook (just outside of Chicago). It was okay. The songs are good. The book is very weak. The changes to get rid of the stereotyped "chinese acrobat troupe" as alternate villains led to in this production - russian communist spied. The TV version had just gangsters.
I'm not sure the show could be a hit - it's not really camp enough and it's not serious enough.
But, I do love lots of the songs.

#10

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 11:00pm

Another production changed the Chinese acrobats to French "Cirque de Soleil" types.

Political correctness says you can't make fun of the Chinese, but the French are fair game.

#11

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/17/09 at 11:44pm

I wonder if the new book will use some of the more "recognizable" Superman characters and cut or change some of the "original" ones? For instance, the absence of Superman's boss and Jimmy Olsen, as well as a generic villain who wasn't even generic villain Lex Luthor felt forced.

#12

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/18/09 at 10:45am

The whole TV version is an embarrassment

Pow Bam Zonk in the original was a showstopper & very well staged.

The number with the Chinese acrobats "Everything's Easy When You Know How" was ever never recorded or due to time constraints never put on the LP & never made it to the CD. I think it was never recorded

Poster Emeritus

Updated On: 7/18/09 at 10:45 AM

#13

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/18/09 at 1:14pm

Encores! It would be amazing.

#14

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/18/09 at 1:27pm

I really hope that the new book is good; my major problem with the show (only from reading the book and listening to the score) is how it pretty much ignored most of Superman's comic book history and they could easily add a lot to the book to round out the world. Why Jimmy Olsen is not in the show but we can spend substantial time with a new supporting character's secretary is kind of inexplicable. And make Lois' character less Damsel-in-Distress-y. I mean, she always winds up in danger, but it should be because of her own initiative and gutsiness...not because she gets kidnapped on her way home. In the show, her big dream is to be married and settled down in suburbia. This is not the Lois kids even in the 60s grew up reading about and seeing in the cartoons.

Updated On: 7/18/09 at 01:27 PM

#15

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/18/09 at 2:24pm

Agreed. Today, thanks to the successful movie series and the Smallville prequel series, people are more exposed to Superman's "extended universe" than they used to be. Superman and Lois Lane are still big names, but more people than usual would know Lex Luthor, Jimmy Olsen, and even names like Bizarro and Mxysptlyk, thanks to pop culture saturation.

#16

re: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, it's Superman

Posted: 7/19/09 at 7:55pm

Yep, I saw Cheyenne Jackson play the title role in the 2007 York Theatre Musicals in Mufti's presentation a few weeks before he was inserted into XANADU to take over from James Carpinello. He was excellent as were most of the other leads. Lea DeLaria played the crazy professor. The weakest link was Shoshana Bean. Because the concert was sung without amplification, voices that had not-so-great technique and lacked the resonance necessary to reach the audience sadly stood out. And on the front Bean failed big time. You could hardly hear her compared to her co-actors and the York is a small space.

It's a quirky, fun show but I doubt it can be revived on a greater scale.

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