Kristina — Page 2

It's sad to see some people left BEFORE intermission. I've listened to the score and it's VERY gorgeous, but knowing they left without getting to see Helen sing You Have To Be There is the worst!

Broadwayjim:

You're right about "Lice". That has got to go even if you concede it's historical accuracy.

It may be thate Moberg is so "untouchable" in Sweden that his estate doesn't want that part of the story cut. Stranger things have happened.

Clearly, however, there has got to be a better way to involve Ulrika and Kristina in an
on-board "catfight".

Unless I'm wrong, in the novel Robert is hitting on Ulrika's daughter. I think a sisterly piece of ill-advised overheard advice about Robert taking up with the daughter of a harlot, even one who declares herself "saved", would be enough to
light a fire under Ulrika and kick start a white-hot feud.

The mythical history of God's creation of lice should be scuttled even more readily. in the same vein, it would surfice to merely suggest Kristina has "ship fever". Let the audience connect the dots.

Also, as I understand it, there are three incarnations of the work, each markedly different than the other: the Malmo production with Robin Wagner sets; the workshop and the concert.

Finally, I remember hearing the original concert album of "Les Miserables". Anyone who doubts clever theater people cannot turn a sow's ear into a silk purse must listen to it--if they can. Cameron Mcintosh with his go-to guys made it the legend it is.

This has been a long way of saying that while the jury is still out on a Broadway run there's more than enough there to bring it at least to the level of, let's say, "Miss Saigon" and when you throw in the globe-straddling built-in audience this piece already has, it's going to be hard to stop.

You probably had a similar experience. A couple in my row came from Sydney; a few more people from Japan.

I don't think it would be any different if "Kristina" landed at the Gershwin. There are a LOT of people bewitched by the thing and my guess is that in three months when the CD is released, sales will be used as a litmus test for a Broadway run and they can almost be guaranteed to be huge.

Updated On: 9/25/09 at 06:28 PM

The TaljkinBroadway.com may be the most-schizophrenic review I've ever read.

Exhibit A:

"It?s when faced with something like this that you see what so many of the other (sung-through) entries lacked: an intimacy of character, of situation, that draws you in and lets you experience the world through other eyes, much the way the most significant plays and musicals of the past always have."

Exhibit B:

"Here (in 'Kristina') you're never given the chance."

Exhibit C:

"All the performances are just variations of the same basic quest to spin gold from fishing wire.

Exhibit D:

"Sjöholm does committed work as the stouthearted Kristina, singing beautifully through a towering songstack of ballads, belt tunes, and anthems pockmarked with unparalleled emoting potential. Watson?s voice is even stronger, a commanding dramatic tenor that lends firm and necessary authority to a somewhat reluctant romantic lead that becomes a major transformative force. Odekirk is spectacular as the tragic Robert... ."

Which side of the street is this guy working?

And his solution to the shows problem is a model of economy: throw out the book, the lyrics, and save only Anderson's music.

Isn't that what they tried to do in "Lestat"?

Updated On: 9/24/09 at 07:57 PM

I was there on Wednesday and it was difficult to make out the text, but the music is so GLORIOUS, it was hard not to be blown away. Please realize that I went in expecting to listen to a glorious score sung in concert format with a stunning orchestra. Perhaps some people were going expecting Mamma Mia (UGGG) or a fully realized stage production, but I wasn't.

Russell Watson has a voice that just doesn't stop!!! I seriously think he can do ANYTHING with it.

Kevin Odekirk was also a powerhouse and you could have heard a pin drop during "Gold Can Turn to Sand."

I also agree that anyone who left before "You Have To Be There" was performed should seek SERIOUS help!! It was the #1 song I wanted to hear live and ESPECIALLY performed by Helen. She delivered like you wouldn't believe! The audience seemed to want to be on their feet before she even hit the last note. TRULY BREATHTAKING!

However, I have a hard time seeing this as a successful Broadway show. The material will need to be majorly modified. It feels like an opera, but doesn't necessarily sound like one. I think it can be done, but would have to have the right persons hands on it and B&B will need to be willing to have it cut and reworked. I did say to my friends that if Les Miz can be the hit it became, this material is FAR SUPERIOR from a music standpoint.

Can't wait for the CD to come out. I have the Swedish version, but will buy this concert as soon as it's released.

---

BBBW, to satisfy my curiosity what shows lately have moved you?

I'm assuming that you had no interest in it from the start given that you sound completely surprised by what you experienced and that your motivation was to get out of the house on somebody else's dime.

Also, what are the demographics, here? When you say it's the most boring self-important piece of crap you ever sat through are we hearing the words whose
life on the periphery of the theater goes back to opening night of "Rent" or to
being at opening night when "Hair" first opened in the 60's?

Finally, assuming you put your money where your opinions are as a producer or backer of some sort, what did you happen to hear from any of the many backers in
the house that would support your absolute conviction this "piece of crap" will never come to Broadway.

NOW that's a bet I would love to take but I do have an unfair advantage: I KNOW this is headed for Broadway barring something extraordinary (i.e.,Helen's refusal to participate and the inability to find a replacement B & B believe can do the part justice. ) I can assure you the WILL is there to bring it back and financing will not
be a deal-breaker.

Like a handful of other critics who play at the game, you have missed the most obvious fact about the concert. It's goals was to explore AUDIENCE reaction, not the idiosyncratic opinions of individuals who only went because it was free. Equally as important was the goal--and this might have been the primary objective--was to get it recorded for Decca so the work could gain familiaruty in English and its appeal germinate organically.

For what it's worth, you did not see "Kristina" the musical. You saw a concert with one of the two key elements that "drive" the narrative arc extracted: dialogue. This was for the purpose of seeing which songs would make the final cut, in what form,
and to read the audience's response.

So many people who attend theater or opera are like armchair quarterbacks: they've never played the game at the highest level but they can always tell you why a quarterback should be cut from a team or why a coach has to go.

And about your friends. I'm very happy for them that they are working but they have NO idea about the current state of talks abut a Broadway run and such talks have been ongoing for at least a year with the assumption it was an inevitable.

You can take or leave what I am saying as you please. The fact of the matter is that
the response to the theatrically wafer-thin concerts performed was considered, behind closed doors, as sufficient circumstantial evidence that "Kristina" should be given the opportunity to be presented to the public fully staged, dialogue and Robin Wagner's sets intact.

But, again, the question is fairly simple: "If not Helen, who?"

Updated On: 9/25/09 at 10:00 AM

BBBW you confused me.

You said you love Chess, yet you stated " The big problem is, like Chess, that nothing happens in the story. The is either no story to musicalize or they picked the worst moments to musicalize.
"

So what exactly do you love about Chess? and did you find anything similar in Kristina?

I think you can love Chess for its score (and lyrics, if you're weird like me and think Tim Rice is actually quite talented) and ignore the fact that the plot is almost non-existent. Only the Swedish incarnation has managed to make Svetlana an actual character, for instance, and what really drives the characters aside from Florence is shrouded in ambiguity. I thought the Albert Hall concert was a total mess in almost every way, but the entire evening was redeemed by the songs themselves regardless of how well they were sung, not the plot that linked them. It's always been an awesome concept album.

I've not seen Kristina so I can't compare, although I have listened to the album more times than is healthy (I've listened to Du Maste Finnas alone over 600 times since I bought the album last year...) The music is undeniably beautiful. But there's only so far that can carry you with no sense of the actual plot, and for people unfamiliar with the piece beforehand how do you expect them to know what's going on if not only all dialogue and staging have been stripped out but the lyrics are almost unintelligible as they apparently were for most of Wednesday's performance? Chess at the Albert Hall had exactly the same problem, and although I know the show like the back of my hand it was one of the factors that made the evening very disappointing.

If the concert was purely to see what would work musically and they're going to go ahead with a theatrical staging anyway then that's fine. But clearly it wasn't a good way to guage the dramatic momentum of the piece for a US audience.

(Not that I'd complain if they brought the concert to either the Albert Hall or the Royal Festival Hall, preferably with Helen stil in it...)

Thank you DeNada...

I was given a copy of Chess about a year before it came to NY and flipped. I LOVED it... I couldn't wait for it to come to NY. I didn't really understand what was happening, but I loved the score. Then I saw the show... They tried to give it more of a plot, but it didn't really work. I saw it again and it was definitely better... and I thought it could've run, but by then it was too late. BUT the big problem with it as a theatrical piece is the lack of movement of character in the music. I'll be very interested to see what happens if they bring Chess back. Maybe they've learned enough about it's problems now to make it work...

And at Kristina, it was very hard to figure out what was going on. I'm sure I would have enjoyed it more if they even had a synopsis in the program. I was told there was a lot more projected narration but for some reason it was cut.

Can Kristina make it to Broadway? Well, of course if they have the money anything can make it to Broadway (I'm looking at you Dance of the Vampires... which was just as awful in Germany.) But will it run? I sincerely doubt it. Would I be happy if it did have a healthy run? Of course.

Re: ThankstoPhantom.

Broadway has always been as much about entertainment as it has been about accounting.

It's a numbers game.

Now, with respect to the suggestion that a fair percentage of the audience found "Kristina" a bust, keep in mind that forums and message boards are NOT representative of the general public.

As an example, there are tens of millions of Dallas Cowboy fans who compulsively
watch or listen to every game of the season on Dallas' schedule. Only a minute number weigh in on discussion boards to discuss a given game. It would be reasonable to suggest that for every one who finds such an investment of time
engaging, hundreds of thousands or millions never post on forums.

Consider for a moment Streisand's forthcoming appearance at the Village Vanguard.
She will perform before 100 people who won a lottery of sorts. No amount of money could "buy" a ticket.

One hundred fans.

Let's make a few assumptions. First, these one hundred will be passionate Streisand fans. (Why should it be otherwise?) Second, if two out of a hundred leave after her
second set, it says next-to-nothing about the quality of her performance or the potential sales of the new release she will be featuring during the concert. It certainly does not even remotely suggest what would happen if she decided to play
the Greek Theater next year.

Carnegie has 2,700 seats more or less. If an equal number of people left after the
first act that would be evident by at least 500 seats. I cannot give you precise numbers but at least at the parquet level, there were few empty seats observable at
the beginning of Act II. This is not to suggest those who remained enjoyed what they were seeing only that the anecdotal evidence of a significant rush to the exits is quite likely baseless.

With the exception of myself, I don't know of one of 10 or 15 people now who have decided to express their opinions publicly on a discussion forum. One man inhis 60's confessed to wishing the night was two hours shorter but he qualified that by saying he had a prostate gland the size of a Voight volleyball.

I haven't seen the concert. But I find it very strange that people have an opinion as if it where a theatre production.
It's a concert and should be judged on that basis.
Now I have seen the original Swedish production and it was the most memorable evening in my life. It lasted for 4 hours, normally way too long, but I didn't mind at all. The production had stunning sets from Robin Wagner and was one the best directed musicals I have ever seen (and I see a lot..). The story is extremely moving. I didn't understood a word of the Swedish lyrics, but the music, the actors everything moved me. The director, Lars Rudolfsson is a genius.
There is no way you can judge the book on basis of the concert, because there is so much more in the theatre production.
I don't know what the future will hold for Kristina. Perhaps it's to sophisticated for Broadway, perhaps it's to sad. But it's story is an very American story and it should have it's placce on Broadway. Whatever the future, this music will live on for ages.

"(I'm looking at you Dance of the Vampires... which was just as awful in Germany.)"

(DOTV: Your idea of awful = my idea of awesome.)

(CHESS: The London Production of CHESS x The Broadway Production of CHESS = your opinion on the subject uninformed on anything but the awful Bway production.)

CHESS London versus Broadway: They are two different shows thanks to Richard Nelson. Michael fvcking Bennett at least had a hand in the London production, and the sets were unmatched at the time for whatever that's worth. The cast speaks for itself, or sings, as it were, as does the score which remained nearly identical to the concept album with the score much more filled out of course. It worked well on the whole, thought it IS too cynical for it's own good, and would have been a legendary show had Bennett lived to see it to fruition with HIS concept.

(I don't think it's possible to truly find so much at fault with KRISTINA given the comparison to ANY score currently on Broadway not in revival. And even then, WSS is the only one better.)

A Good Nightmare Comes So Rarely,
I'll Show You Yours,
If You Show Me Mine,
P

Triple Bravo Whiskey, you entered this discussion loaded for bear:

"Holy Crap.. That must have been the most boring self important piece of crap I ever sat through. I went cause I had friends in the cast and got a comp, but it was pure torture to sit through."

That, to me is incendiary, and while it may have escaped you, contains an ad-hominem attack, no less so than mine.

You are tacitly alleging that "Kristina" was written by Benny for his own self-aggrandizement, rather than to express an artistic yearning that he has kept pretty much to himself for more than 30 years.

Again, the rules here seem somewhat murky: you feel you can cast aspersions on Benny's motives for writing the piece (in your opinion not only was it A vanity piece it was one of the most blatant exhibitions of artistic narcissism you have ever witnessed), do so with impunity, and play the part of the innocent victim who was
just tossing out an "opinion" of the concert devoid of any malice directed at a particular individual.

Perhaps I read too much into "self-important piece of crap". Since you didn't specify
any particular individual, who was it that you believe was laboring under delusions of grandiosity concerning this piece? Benny Anderson for wanting to see it performed symphonically? Lars Rudolfsson for believing Moberg's four-volume saga was epic in scope? Paul Gemignani for his sweeping arrangements and requirements for a complete symphonic orchestra?

There may be numerous failings of this concert but insinuations of runaway egoism
on the part of the production team seems a bit of a reach, if not a transparent display of projection.

Updated On: 9/25/09 at 08:31 PM