Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#1
Posted: 2/22/10 at 8:04pmOur TV is filled with ads for the upcoming tour (in Naples, Fl) of Little House on the Prairie. They say "you loved the book, you loved the TV show, now love the BROADWAY musical." Did I miss something?
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#2
Posted: 2/22/10 at 8:10pmGo see it! Besides Melissa Gilbert, the cast was phenomenal! I knew nothing about the series/books and I loved this show.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#2
Posted: 2/22/10 at 8:13pmWell, OK. But my question remains. When did it become a BROADWAY musical?
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#3
Posted: 2/22/10 at 8:38pmIsnt it en route to Broadway? I dunno.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#4
Posted: 2/22/10 at 9:24pmMaybe they're hopeful?
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#5
Posted: 2/22/10 at 9:27pm... or desperate. I wouldn't know. Is the show doing well?
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#6
Posted: 2/22/10 at 9:45pmI have no idea how the tour is doing, but I seem to half remember some kind of "Broadway-dreaming" talk a couple of years back when they were at the Guthrie for a couple of months.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#7
Posted: 2/22/10 at 10:08pm
It was our Holiday show here in Denver. Here is a Denver review:
https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/REVIEW_Little_House_on_the_Prairie_settles_into_Denver_20091217
There is also a thread about the show on here somewhere.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#8
Posted: 2/23/10 at 8:19amSaw it at the Papermill Playhouse in Millburn, NJ. It was "cute". Only saw it because Melissa Gilbert is in it.....
Broadway Star Joined: 11/10/05
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#9
Posted: 2/23/10 at 11:56pm
Maybe Little House on the Prairie hopes for a limited Broadway engagement in the summer. I think that would be neat if the tour made a Broadway stop. Every so often, that happens where the entire company plays an NYC engagement. Dreamgirls and Peter Pan revivals did something similar. And then the shows like Annie at Madison Square Garden during the holiday season.
But aside from that, saying it's a "Broadway musical" is a common marketing device, especially when a show is part of a Broadway season of national tours. Shows sometimes market themselves as Broadway-bound or pre-Broadway and then the Broadway production doesn't materialize.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#10
Posted: 2/24/10 at 3:03am
It was first announced for Broadway back in 1982, but only last year did they launch a tour. Tour opened here in Toronto last month, and let me say that if it ever does arrive on Broadway it will not last long.
For the Toronto board I wrote:
If you have fond memories of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Little House books or the popular 1970â??s TV series, steer clear of the Canon Theatre because your expectations sure to be foiled. The same applies if you are a musical theatre fan out to see this new musical adapted from the novels. Despite a few fine performances the show as a whole just does not work.
* 1/2 (OUT OF 5)
https://toronto.broadwayworld.com/article/Review_Little_House_on_the_Prairie_The_Musical_20100212
The review in the Toronto Star was less complimentary:
The only point in reviewing Little House on the Prairie, which opened Thursday night at the Canon Theatre, is to serve as a warning service for the public.
If you love the books or the TV show that gave birth to this misbegotten musical, then keep far away.
https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/theatre/article/757484--this-little-house-spreads-saccharine-on-the-prairie
On balance, BWW reviewer Marisa Prano gave it a rave when it played in Detroit back in December, and it was after reading her review that I held out hope that the show would be a good one.
I was pleasantly surprised to find out that Act One is packed full of drama that the family must endure, this production did a wonderful job of trying to cover at least all of the major tragedies that the family had to face on the prairie. In Act One alone the Ingalls go through everything from starvation to crop fires. Act Two wrapped up all of the dramatic events from the first Act very nicely. In Act Two, Laura is older and is teaching to pay for Mary to go to the school for the blind and the relationship between Laura and Almanzo blossoms.
https://detroit.broadwayworld.com/article/BWW_REVIEWS_LITTLE_HOUSE_ON_THE_PRAIRIE_Touches_Hearts_at_the_Fox_Theatre_20091207
Cast albums are NOT "soundtracks."
Live theatre does not use a "soundtrack." If it did, it wouldn't be live theatre!
I host a weekly one-hour radio program featuring cast album selections as well as songs by cabaret, jazz and theatre artists. The program, FRONT ROW CENTRE is heard Sundays 9 to 10 am and also Saturdays from 8 to 9 am (eastern times) on www.proudfm.com
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#11
Posted: 2/24/10 at 10:31amI saw this show in Toronto on tour and was largely underwhelmed. No great songs, no terrific dance numbers, no real chance for the actors to shine. I was really disappointed in Rachel Portman's score. She has done such wonderful work in movies and I believe her operatic version of The Little Prince was well received. But the inappropriate power ballads and the the generic identical sounding choral numbers did not make me want to see this show a second time.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#12
Posted: 2/24/10 at 12:01pm
the were in VERY early rehearsals for this when I visited the Guthrie on a tour back in 2007 (?? I believe), and they had scripts out and cast lists but wouldn't let me look at them...haha.
Now as far as I know a friend of a friend is in the ensemble, but I don't think this will go too far.
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#13
Posted: 2/24/10 at 2:07pm
I was really disappointed in Rachel Portman's score. She has done such wonderful work in movies ...
I thing that is the whole problem. When you write a score for a movie it is essentially background music to enhance the mood. But when writing for musical theatre the music is very much in the foreground. Look at some of the great film composers who were unable to create a decent Broadway score: Elmer Bernstein, Manos Hadjidakis, and Michel Legrand come to mind.
Cast albums are NOT "soundtracks."
Live theatre does not use a "soundtrack." If it did, it wouldn't be live theatre!
I host a weekly one-hour radio program featuring cast album selections as well as songs by cabaret, jazz and theatre artists. The program, FRONT ROW CENTRE is heard Sundays 9 to 10 am and also Saturdays from 8 to 9 am (eastern times) on www.proudfm.com
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#14
Posted: 2/24/10 at 2:30pm
My impression of "Little House" when I saw it at Papermill was that it was what Les Mis would be like if all the hit songs were removed. Highly recommended for Little House fanatics just to be able to see Melissa Gilbert.
Marketing this as a "Broadway show" reminds me of all the "Original Broadway production of West Side Story" tours there were in Europe in the 1990s.
Broadway Star Joined: 10/14/09
Little House on the Prairie -- the Broadway musical?#15
Posted: 2/24/10 at 3:37pm
The Guthrie run (which I don't know can be considered an official part of the tour) was nearly almost sold out with moms and little girls (many of whom dressed in prairie girl clothes - which was SO CUTE!). Overall, they seemed to enjoy it. The tour did a stop in St. Paul (I think it was one of the first ones) and the show sold incredibly well there (and the Ordway is substantially larger than the Guthrie). So, that's probably an indication that people really want to see this show (and probably lots wanted to see it again).
The show itself is kind of a mess and it doesn't seem to have fixed any problems with additional working time between the Guthrie showing and the tour. But, Francesca just does not seem to be able to get a hit on her hands in the musical theatre world, so I'm thinking that is perhaps the primary reason why the show isn't working.
So, there is an audience for it, just not a theatre-savvy one. And perhaps that truly is enough for the producers to keep running the show. A full-on B'way production seems highly unlikely, no matter how much they want to tout that to draw attention to the show.
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