LEMPICKA Reviews — Page 3

Can anyone post a gift link to the NYT review?

Thank you x

EDSOSLO858 said: "DTLI Consensus:Though completely original and ambitious in topic and scale,Lempickanever quite lets us see Tamara’s brushstrokes.

4 mixed (including the NYT), 4 negative, 1 positive.

https://didtheylikeit.com/shows/lempicka/"

The positive review is from NY Theatre Guide from a critic nobody knows!

I would call the Times review negative, not mixed. Green takes the show to task for making up too much instead of being historically accurate. The second photo included with that review makes it look like a campy British comedy show.

After following audience reactions during previews here & on reddit, I'm not surprised by these reviews.

When something is camp on purpose, it is different from something that is trying to be serious but goes off the rails.

Theatrely

LEMPICKA is Bold, But Frustratingly Generic — Review

https://www.theatrely.com/post/lempicka-is-bold-but-frustratingly-generic----review

"Messy and maddening, new musical Lempicka has all the pedigree for something groundbreaking but never finds its own distinctive form. Tackling the life of semi-forgotten Art Deco master Tamara de Lempicka with an unapologetically queer, feminist lens and a contemporary electro-pop sound, the new musical only sparingly succeeds at matching its subject’s artistic boldness, more often falling into genericism and cliché."

I do think one metric for "mixed" is being able to pull quotes. "THRILLING. SUPERIOR BELTING" (NYT) is better than what a lot of shows have to work with. Green also felt Eden's performance & vocals were compelling, which is more positive than some of us felt about her.

None of that really matters since the show hasn't sold well in its first 3 weeks of previews and I doubt it will take off now considering all the other options out there.

Updated On: 4/15/24 at 01:23 AM

ErmengardeStopSniveling said: "I do think one metric for "mixed" is being able to pull quotes. "THRILLING. SUPERIOR BELTING" (NYT) is better than what a lot of shows have to work with."

"often feels incredible" - NEW YORK TIMES

Early discussions about the spring being too crowded to allow shows to find their niche audiences have now proven prophetic. This is the kind of piece that might've inched forward, surviving by building on a cultish following. But with so much to choose from for consumers, it has Paradise Square written all over it: a show built around a powerful leading performance and a game support but too little else to recommend. Pull quotes about belting, all kidding aside, don't put butts in seats. Unless we know the belter. Without a star over the title - which is a kind of commercial imprimatur, i.e., someone who's known invested her talents in the material - it's still just damn near impossible to figure out who the audience might be.

Who would've kept it running? Menzel or the equivalent. People on this board will scoff, insisting that this is Espinosa's moment. But if this is a star making/validating vehicle, not a single review made the claim.

Updated On: 4/15/24 at 05:28 AM

Maybe they shouldn’t have tried so hard to…

Destroy the paaaaaaaaast

Destroy conventionnnnnn

Holdren in Vulture:

Look, I Made a Woman: Lempicka



The musical somehow turns a radical bisexual painter, living and loving in Paris between the wars, a little bit boring.

https://www.vulture.com/article/theater-review-lempicka-broadway-musical.html

"I am politely requesting a moratorium on musicals that begin with some version of “How did I wind up here?” Maybe we’ve all paid a little bit too much attention to Jean-Luc Godard’s most Instagram-quotable epigram: At this point, putting the beginning, middle, and end in that order feels like a vaguely radical act. The irony is that Lempicka—Carson Kreitzer and Matt Gould’s new musical about the tempestuous life of the Polish émigré Art Deco painter Tamara de Lempicka, which begins with the old artist looking world-wearily back—is obsessed with radical acts. It badly wants to be bold, but as any high-school kid can tell you, there’s no surer path to awkwardness than trying too hard. Lempicka the woman was unquestionably fascinating, flawed, and fabulous; Lempicka the musical often goes flat. There’s an uncharacteristically tepid quality to Rachel Chavkin’s direction—as if she’s repeating herself rather than enjoying herself—along with a sense of varnish over the proceedings. We can see the glossy, cool surface, the assertive industrial lines and curves of the painter’s work, but we’re missing its true audaciousness, voluptuousness, and vitality. The show pushes and poses — it doesn’t let us in."

Fun fact, Lempicka opened on the 112th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.