London COMPANY Starring PATTI LuPONE! — Page 2

Wait, does this mean that Joanne will be bisexual or fluid in this production? She propositions Robert in the penultimate scene essentially. I know Sondheim approved of this gender-swapped COMPANY, but I am still not completely convinced it will work seamlessly.

I am super excited for this!!

Books are changed all the time with older musicals that have become terribly dated, as this one surely is.

Public User said: "Books are changed all the time with older musicals that have become terribly dated, as this one surely is."

IDK, I'm not so sure that I would call this show "dated." It's certainly not anymore dated than a show like South Pacific or Hair. They were modern at the time that they first premiered, but now they've kind of just become period pieces. I've always found the obsession to make Company "relevant" a bit odd to me. I mean, have you ever been to the upper east side? The yuppies aren't extinct yet.

raddersons said: "GeorgeandDot said: "Ihave to ask though, why not gender bend the whole cast? Wouldn't that work better?"

That's how I feel. It takes place in New York, and it'll be 2018... Really I think what this should be able to show is that sexual fluidity is just as complicated as being fixed in who you find attractive, if not more."

I find Sondheim allowing this and completely rubbishing a gay Bobby odd but on form for Sondheim.

After some technical difficulties I got a ticket, I get a feeling they were holding back tickets because the first 10 rows were gone by 10.30am.

"She offers up her husband"???

This sounds like one of the worst ideas ever.

After War Horse, Curious Incident, and Angels in America, I think Marianne Elliott is a genius. But this proposed production sounds like a trainwreck to me. (Not because of Patti.)

As if the gender-swapping wasn't enough to complicate matters, they are also making it "contemporary". How do you do that without throwing out 70% of the book and a good portion of the lyrics? Answering services, Sazerac slings, TIME magazine, the "scandalous" pot smoking (which was lame 40 years ago), etc., etc.

The problem isn't just with out-of-date references. It works the other way, too. How do you do a "contemporary" Company without including texting, social media, dating apps, etc. Do Bobbi and her married friends not own cellphones? (Well, maybe not Joanne... )

If they have to do that much rewriting/retooling, then it isn't Company any longer. I will be interested to hear how they tackle all these issues. But I'm going to pass on going to London to see it first hand.

The Pittsburgh Public production with Jim Stanek was set in the present, and the opening number's barrage of "Bobby, Bobby" prompts began as in person and moved to being representative of his cell phone getting blown up after Bobby's first verse. They played the pot scene not so much as scandalous as "parents trying to get away with something."

I was feeling rather nonplussed towards this production but I'm a whole lot more interested now.

Updated On: 9/22/17 at 05:34 PM

PepperedShepherd said: "...
If they have to do that much rewriting/retooling, then it isn't Company any longer. I will be interested to hear how they tackle all these issues. But I'm going to pass on going to London to see it first hand."

Indeed. Why doesn't that ringing telephone in the opening just go to voice mail?!

Speaking more to the theme of the show, in our culture when we see single man on the brink of middle age, we ask, "What's wrong with him? Why can't he grow up and settle down?"

But when we see a single woman on the brink of middle age, we ask "What's wrong with her? Why won't any man have her?"

Very different show. Nearly opposite subtext.

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On the other hand, LuPone is a great choice. She's the only one who seems to have noticed that "Ladies Who Lunch" is written to a Latin rhythm.

Ado Annie D'Ysquith said: "Wait, does this mean that Joanne will be bisexual or fluid in this production? She propositions Robert in the penultimate scene essentially. I know Sondheim approved of this gender-swapped COMPANY, but I am still not completely convinced it will work seamlessly."

Maybe not The brilliant way Patti played the scene with NPH didn't suggest to me a genuine sexual proposition. Rather a manipulative way of shaking Bobby up so that he could take a good close look at his vulnerability and need for intimate albeit imperfect company. To expose the casual sexual conquest she is proposing as not being what he wants at all in life, now that he's "not a kid anymore" - and as something jarringly incompatible with the genuine emotional intimacy he has with Joanne. To get him to focus on what he really needs and wants. That was "the big favor" she had done for him.

Of course that might not be the way she plays Joanne in this production. But who knows?

Are they cutting Someone is Waiting or has Sondheim completely rewritten it. I've been going through the lyrics trying to see if one could get away with interpreting it as if Bobbi wished SHE were a Jenny-ish Joanne, but that may stretch it a little too much.