Kate Reinders... — Page 2

I thought about that the other day...how difficult it seems to get to those roles (Glinda and Elphie)because looking back a lot of them start in the ensemble/understudy..then hopefully up to standby...then into those roles and it takes years. I'm guessing the girls just really want the roles or they're tough roles to fill and whoever fills them perfers to use them.

I congratulate Kate on getting the chance to come to Broadway (I will be seeing her in the show July 11th,) but I can say that I personally am not happy about her being Hilty's successor.

I have "heard" alot of Kate as Glinda, and for me, her performance was just.... boring. Her vocals were fine and she is even funny where she needs to be, but her performance never transcended being mediocre. I felt like she didn' take the role anywhere. Where as Kristin and Jennifer and Megan and Kendra have all done things with the part that were original and fresh, Kate just kind of did nothing with the material... she never came into her own basically. It wasn't that she was bad, because honesty she wasn't, but her performance was just very "amateur" to me.

I am willing to give her a fair chance, however, and hope she improves.

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Updated On: 4/18/06 at 09:18 AM

August, I don't know about that. I have also seen and heard Kate's understudy, Sarah Jane Everman, and she makes much more of the character than Kate ever did.

Considering Joe Mantello directed all three production of "Wicked," I have a strong feeling that, if Kate wanted to, she could have done alot more with Glinda. And if she WAS directed that way, my only guess as to why is that maybe she isn't a natural comedian like the others that have played the role. See, alot of what Kristin and JLT and Megan and Kendra did came from THEM. They weren't DIRECTED to make Glinda that way.. they made her their own. That is something I feel Kate never did.

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KJ, I am not basing my opinions on Kate only on bootlegs. I also saw her live twice and her understudy live once.

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Just to add my 2 cents:

The whole stand-by gets the lead role thing isnt true at all. Saycon didnt get Elphaba when Shoshana left. Laura Bell Bundy didnt get Glinda when Cheno left. The producers can get whomever they want to take over roles (ie: JLT coming out of nowhere to take Galinda.) And if this rule were true, poor Sean McCourt would have been given something better to do years ago. His wizard was by far the best Ive seen out (Vereen, Garrison and Grey were the others)

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Actually Laura Bell Bundy was negotiating to take over, but they didn't offer her enough money so she left. I would say a majority of their casting is recycled, but there still casted new people (Julia Murney, JLT)

If you ask me some of the best elphaba's and glindas they were not recycled. Look at Julia, or JLT!

Updated On: 4/18/06 at 04:06 PM

I have a feeling that Julia will be recycled. She leaves the tour around mid-September and Eden leaves the Broadway production in early October.

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At the stagedoor after a performance, someone asked Julia if she would be going to Broadway. She just stared at them and said, "Ummm....no."

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first of all who is laura bell bundy?
second..kate and ana made a promise to not do broadway without the other? i can see how glinda and elphie's might bond...well, they WILL be on broadway together..just not in the same show! LOL!!!

Andrea, Laura Bell Bundy was the original standby for Glinda. Her other Broadway credit is creating the role of Amber in Hairspray. The rumor is that she was asked to take over as Glinda when Kristin left, but her demands (both monetary and otherwise) were outrageous, so instead the producers got Jennifer Laura Thompson to take over.

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It is impossible for them to walk off stage after the cornfield scene together hand in hand, because it segways into "No Good Deed" (aka the actress playing Elphaba never leaves the stage once she enters.) In fact, it is impossible for them to walk off stage hand in hand after ANY scene, because there is never a time where Glinda and Elphaba both leave together and the action continues. The only time that could even be possible would be after the Ozdust Ballroom/ "Dancing Through Life" sequence, but they both remain on stage for "Popular."

This is the first I have heard of a rift between Kendra and Stephanie. What else have you heard to support this? And I disagree with your statement in an earlier post, implying that other Elphaba/Glinda pairings let their off stage differences effect there work on stage. I assume you were inferring about Kristin and Idina, and I don't think they EVER let there differences outside the show transcend to their performances on stage.

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