#1
Posted: 11/11/07 at 1:20am
Perhaps there's spoilers here... but with this show it's like announcing spoilers for the ending to TITANIC.
THE LITTLE MERMAID seems to be getting fairly good notices on this board. Perhaps it's improved in the span of 2 weeks, but based on the dress rehearsal I sat through, the show is a muddled wreck.
I cherish the movie deeply blah blah blah like everyone else, but the only reason this show will run is off of deeply felt nostalgia for the film. The Ashmen/Menken songs, performed live, continue to shine for their brilliance. But the lackluster new songs, especially Scuttle's Grade C material, makes one sorely miss Ashman.
The character of Scuttle, so fun in the film, could actually be cut from the production entirely. Besides the costume resembling a ragamuffin bird patchworked together from junkyard scraps, the character does zippo for the plot, and one feels slightly embarrassed for Eddie Korbich, who bravely works his way through it. (The song "Human Things" absotootly needs to go.)
The whole cast, in fact, is uniformly fantastic. All deserve the high praises we've read on the board. Norm Lewis is given a grand injustice by having his tremendous talent wasted. His one "song" (big air quotes) when he destroyed Ariel's lair is a dirge, and the quartet in Act II is sweet, but he seems shoehorned in to give him some stage time.
Sierra stuns with "Part of Your World", and Sherie tears up the stage in several showstoppers. Critics and audiences will adore them.
Sebastian needs jokes. He, if anyone, should have the zinging one-liners. Poor Tituss has to make him loveable, in a hideous costume no less, without given any way to make him so.
Cody Hanford was my Flounder, and was a delight.
I agree with one poster's comment that the mermaid costumes look like they have two pairs of fins -- one covering their legs, one protruding from their behinds. Perhaps this underwater kingdom is near a nuclear reactor.
On a good note, the transition from human world to depth of sea is magical. One feels as if really sinking into the fathoms below. The sequence when Ariel saves a drowning Eric is a stunner.
The big failure of this production is director Francesca Zambello. She's hands down a terrible choice for director. If this were an opera, this would be stunning. But Broadway musicals need to be a tad more literal then the abstractions she presents on stage. For instance, the underwater world in flanked by two gigantic columns that spin and open and fan out and hold creatures. Sure they look "nice," but what the hell are they? Seaweed? Rock formations? And there's a circular object high upstage that is - what? - sometimes a chandelier, usually just unnecessary decor. Ariel's secret treasure trove looks like a reject set piece from Seussical designed by Jonathan Adler.
Zambello also directs everything completely symmetrical. All songs are sung with actors planted firmly center stage. Musical staging consists of the actors walking (or wheeling) around the stage randomly. Every scene takes place directly center stage. The director obviously has zippo sense on how to use the stage, and one feels like there's a ton of empty, wasted space.
La Director also can't create stage business to save her life. The hilarous moment when Ariel combs her hair with a fork is tossed aside. We never get a sense of her trying to fit into the human world, like the film so marvelously illustrated.
The musical presumes 100% familiarity with the souce. If someone walked into this show and didn't know what THE LITTLE MERMAID was about, they'd watch in absolutle befuddlement. Flounder looks nothing like a fish, and it's never explained he is a fish. Flotsam and Jetsam are never explained to be eels, but look like green bits of stray seaweed. During "Under the Sea" and "Kiss the Girl" the various aquatic life is indecipherable, and look straight out of STARLIGHT EXPRESS as drawn by a Crayola crayons. What exactly is happening during the climactic madness of "Le Poissons" is beyond comprehension, despite the frenzy of bustling bodies about the stage.
Disney should have heeded the blasting the show got out of town. For while the material itself -- the songs and book -- are mostly in fine shape, it's the production itself -- the entire LOOK -- that stinks. One only wonders how a slightly more literal interpretation, by a director with experience in musical theatre and Broadway, could have instilled a sense of theatrical magic.
And one wonders whatever happened to the days when creators used the out-of-town tryouts and preview periods to really hone their pieces, ruthlessly making changes and cuts to create the best possible show. This season, both YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN and THE LITTLE MERMAID stubbornly stick by an imperfect vision throughout, both leading to grand disappointments.
If this review sounds unnecessarily bitter, it's due to Disney taking a one of their best films, and ruining it. Even CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG brought the film magically, successfully, to life a few seasons back. I'm seeing another MERMAID preview a few days before opening. Hopefully something will have improved.
THE LITTLE MERMAID seems to be getting fairly good notices on this board. Perhaps it's improved in the span of 2 weeks, but based on the dress rehearsal I sat through, the show is a muddled wreck.
I cherish the movie deeply blah blah blah like everyone else, but the only reason this show will run is off of deeply felt nostalgia for the film. The Ashmen/Menken songs, performed live, continue to shine for their brilliance. But the lackluster new songs, especially Scuttle's Grade C material, makes one sorely miss Ashman.
The character of Scuttle, so fun in the film, could actually be cut from the production entirely. Besides the costume resembling a ragamuffin bird patchworked together from junkyard scraps, the character does zippo for the plot, and one feels slightly embarrassed for Eddie Korbich, who bravely works his way through it. (The song "Human Things" absotootly needs to go.)
The whole cast, in fact, is uniformly fantastic. All deserve the high praises we've read on the board. Norm Lewis is given a grand injustice by having his tremendous talent wasted. His one "song" (big air quotes) when he destroyed Ariel's lair is a dirge, and the quartet in Act II is sweet, but he seems shoehorned in to give him some stage time.
Sierra stuns with "Part of Your World", and Sherie tears up the stage in several showstoppers. Critics and audiences will adore them.
Sebastian needs jokes. He, if anyone, should have the zinging one-liners. Poor Tituss has to make him loveable, in a hideous costume no less, without given any way to make him so.
Cody Hanford was my Flounder, and was a delight.
I agree with one poster's comment that the mermaid costumes look like they have two pairs of fins -- one covering their legs, one protruding from their behinds. Perhaps this underwater kingdom is near a nuclear reactor.
On a good note, the transition from human world to depth of sea is magical. One feels as if really sinking into the fathoms below. The sequence when Ariel saves a drowning Eric is a stunner.
The big failure of this production is director Francesca Zambello. She's hands down a terrible choice for director. If this were an opera, this would be stunning. But Broadway musicals need to be a tad more literal then the abstractions she presents on stage. For instance, the underwater world in flanked by two gigantic columns that spin and open and fan out and hold creatures. Sure they look "nice," but what the hell are they? Seaweed? Rock formations? And there's a circular object high upstage that is - what? - sometimes a chandelier, usually just unnecessary decor. Ariel's secret treasure trove looks like a reject set piece from Seussical designed by Jonathan Adler.
Zambello also directs everything completely symmetrical. All songs are sung with actors planted firmly center stage. Musical staging consists of the actors walking (or wheeling) around the stage randomly. Every scene takes place directly center stage. The director obviously has zippo sense on how to use the stage, and one feels like there's a ton of empty, wasted space.
La Director also can't create stage business to save her life. The hilarous moment when Ariel combs her hair with a fork is tossed aside. We never get a sense of her trying to fit into the human world, like the film so marvelously illustrated.
The musical presumes 100% familiarity with the souce. If someone walked into this show and didn't know what THE LITTLE MERMAID was about, they'd watch in absolutle befuddlement. Flounder looks nothing like a fish, and it's never explained he is a fish. Flotsam and Jetsam are never explained to be eels, but look like green bits of stray seaweed. During "Under the Sea" and "Kiss the Girl" the various aquatic life is indecipherable, and look straight out of STARLIGHT EXPRESS as drawn by a Crayola crayons. What exactly is happening during the climactic madness of "Le Poissons" is beyond comprehension, despite the frenzy of bustling bodies about the stage.
Disney should have heeded the blasting the show got out of town. For while the material itself -- the songs and book -- are mostly in fine shape, it's the production itself -- the entire LOOK -- that stinks. One only wonders how a slightly more literal interpretation, by a director with experience in musical theatre and Broadway, could have instilled a sense of theatrical magic.
And one wonders whatever happened to the days when creators used the out-of-town tryouts and preview periods to really hone their pieces, ruthlessly making changes and cuts to create the best possible show. This season, both YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN and THE LITTLE MERMAID stubbornly stick by an imperfect vision throughout, both leading to grand disappointments.
If this review sounds unnecessarily bitter, it's due to Disney taking a one of their best films, and ruining it. Even CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG brought the film magically, successfully, to life a few seasons back. I'm seeing another MERMAID preview a few days before opening. Hopefully something will have improved.
Updated On: 11/13/07 at 01:20 AM
