KPOP Reviews — Page 2

These are, predictably, not great. If they don't have a decent chunk of money in the bank to do a major ad blitz –– which would then have to translate into sales –– CITS will be free for a spring opening. It's just throwing money in a burning hole at this point.

Dan, why can't more people on this site be a fun guy like you? Did you see the show 3x now?

Last I checked, they had rush tickets available at 1:00 for a 3:00 show. A friend of mine attending said there were a lot of vacant seats too. On opening day? Not a good sign indeed.

(I say that but I'm rooting for this to succeed, as it is easily the most fun I've had in a theater—book aside)

PipingHotPiccolo said: "dearalanaaaa said: " this won't survive to the Tony's without convincing real kpop fans or traditional audiences to see this.

"
Agreed but I think you've giving K-Pop production way too much credit by suggesting that anyone would have ANY idea that there even is a plot here to speak of... the marketing has been vague, at best. And if all your average ticket buyer knows is "oh theres a show of Korean pop music"--unless you are already a fan of it, I just can't fathom why anyone would plunk down $100 for the privilege.
"

That's the other part this marketing team really doesn't understand... KPop fans are very competitive for their specific groups and f(x) is a fairly unpopular group without enough hardcore stans running out to see Luna. They have 600k monthly listeners on spotify, which is less than Jax (singer of Victoria's Secret, the only song from them on the radio), and Billlie (a recently debuted girl group in kpop). KPop fans won't attend the show because there's not enough of them who are interested in anything outside of charting/streaming and collections for their own groups. Korean people aren't attending it because kpop is already in their country. KPop being fun and interesting is not the marketing pitch these people expected it to be at all. They need a Gen Z on their advertising team ASAP. I wish the cast the best and if they really want to be KPop stars they can audition for Fantigo, JYP, CUBE, YG, StarShip, or any other company creating KPop groups that exist outside of a music vacuum. 

(I still hope to hear the cast recording though!!)

I just feel like Broadway is going to trend to cater to the Bridge and Tunnel crowd - so lots more old white man jukebox shows and old movies. And interesting works, like this, are going to get side-lined. Sucks. 

RippedMan said: "I just feel like Broadway is going to trend to cater to the Bridge and Tunnel crowd - so lots more old white man jukebox shows and old movies. And interesting works, like this, are going to get side-lined. Sucks."

I disagree. As someone who’s not old or hot, I like plenty of edgy shows on Broadway. But just because it has fun songs, good lighting and great dances, it doesn’t make up for the lack of a compelling story. As plenty of reviewers have said, the story is half baked and conflicts unresolved. It doesn’t quite know what it tries to be and that shows in the lack of clear marketing. 

I saw it early in preview and it was a disaster despite my high hopes from the off Broadway run. Looks like there’s been a lot of revisions since then but it’s still not enough to make it coherent and compelling.

The biggest problem is that the songs don’t really advance the storyline. You can argue why it’s necessary but that’s basically what separates a musical from a play with music. 

Sometimes when you work on something for so long, all the ideas seem clear to you in your head but that’s not necessarily the case for new audience. This really would’ve benefited for more workshops when they decided to transfer to linear storytelling. 
 

 

Maybe they should’ve tried to stage the current revision off Broadway first. 

Kad said: "I don’t know how much workshopping they could’ve done- it’s been in development since the off-Broadway iteration."

The show has gone through several workshops in recent years. 

Huss417 said: "RippedMan said: "I just feel like Broadway is going to trend to cater to the Bridge and Tunnel crowd - so lots more old white man jukebox shows and old movies. And interesting works, like this, are going to get side-lined. Sucks."

I think it's time to stop thinking the "Bridge and Tunnel crowd" are less than someone in the city."

Just looking at what's popular on Broadway now, I think you're right. Jewish stories and older generation jukebox musicals. Those seem to be drawing crowds. Anything outside of that is struggling. 

The music is one of the show's strengths and I wished they had marketed the music more before previews started.

Before youtube (I grew up in the 80s/90s),  I recall some new musicals would send a CD promo with 3 songs in it. I remember my family getting one in the mail for Scarlet Pimpernel and I loved listening to the 3 songs again and again! lol. I didn't know who the actors were back then but I knew I wanted to see the show next time I'm in NYC since I really liked the music.

If you look at the older threads on KPOP before previews started, I recall people were asking if there was any place they can listen to the music before going to see the show but none of us really knew since we didn't know which songs they kept or cut from the off-broadway version. I shared my favorite MwE songs sung by Ashley Park and there was the 54Below Helen Park concert but I think that was pretty much it. I do think marketing could have been better. 

Still wishing the best for this show and hopefully they'll make it through the holiday season.

Ensemble1665759202 said: "I'm sorry, did the New York Times really describe the first Broadway show composed by an Asian American as "squint-inducing" in their official review? Unreal."

I know this isn't the point of your post, but I don't believe it's the first Broadway show composed by an Asian-American, as I believe Jay Kuo of Allegiance from a few years ago fits that bill.