Posted: 3/22/18 at 12:40pm
I must admit that the only person I surprisingly wasn't crazy about was Norbert Leo Butz. Maybe it's because Stanley Holloway is just so amazing and incomparable as Doolittle but I didn't find Butz nearly as charming or funny, and his inability to dance made "With a Little Bit of Luck" and "Get Me to the Church on Time" not quite the showstoppers they are designed to be.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 12:56pm
poisonivy2 said: "I must admit that the only person I surprisingly wasn't crazy about was Norbert Leo Butz. Maybe it's because Stanley Holloway is just so amazing and incomparable as Doolittle but I didn't find Butz nearly as charming or funny, and his inability to dance made "With a Little Bit of Luck" and "Get Me to the Church on Time" not quite the showstoppers they are designed to be."
Same. I'm surprised that most here really loved him and are talking Tonys. I didnt find him very likeable from the start, therefore making the goodbye scene between him and Eliza have little affect on me. As for "Get Me to the Church on Time," I knew what the goal of the number was and the audience was loving it, but something about it still felt flat. I felt no connection between him and anyone else on that stage. Granted, I was sitting off to the side and didn't get the full effect, but I was more drawn in by the ensemble members than him.
Updated On: 3/22/18 at 12:56 PM
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:04pm
Just listened to the production from a recording someone posted and WOW it sounds amazing. I am blown away by Lauren Ambrose's voice...and my god, this orchestra sounds fantastic! Very excited to see the show in May.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:09pm
I was charmed by Norbert's performance and found his stage movements a perfect expression of his character who is, after all, stewed to the gills.
With reference to Lauren Ambrose's posture--I did notice the 'hunched' quality that was mentioned earlier, but it seems to me her posture improves along with her diction. She begins with sloppy posture, is erect--but teetering and uncertain--in the Ascot scene and is regal and confident as a queen (or a nobly-born Hungarian) by the time of the Ambassador's ball. I'd be curious to hear if people feel that there is more going on than this kind of logical evolution to her stance.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:17pm
Makes complete sense. Posture is a strong non-verbal communicator. Just look around! Good for them for using this.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:19pm
Acrtually her posture when singing does not improve. In "Show Me" and "Without You" she still has that bent knee, hunched over posture. When I mentioned it to Bart Sher he said that they've been working on her improving the posture. It's very specific to when she sings.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:28pm
INteresting observation. If you're right, they really do need a vocal coach to evaluate.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:30pm
The inconsistency people seem to be making about Lauren's voice may be directly attributed to her posture. Good posture or alignment usually aides singing and it sounds like her posture probably isn't good so I can imagine that's why there is some interesting things going on. I struggle with posture sometimes when I sing and it's usually because I'm trying to control the sound too much. I don't know if that's what Lauren's doing but its a guess.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:36pm
I actually noticed that during last night's show though I don't think it happened as much as I expected. I think it's Ambrose inexperience in singing live and in-character showing and I suspect it will get better as she has more performances under her belt. If there was another thing I can pick out with Ambrose that I think she can improve on is that it's clear she's not a seasoned Broadway performer at times when she sings because she sort of goes into "singer mode" as opposed to singing in character and expressing the nuance in the lyrics and music at times. There are certain times where it looks like she's performing to an audience rather than interacting with the other characters. I think those things didn't detract from her performance too much and I think her positives really outweigh those negatives but if she can really work on that, her performance would be seriously amazing and one of the most spoken about performances of the season.
It's understand the difficulty though because for an actress who is not a seasoned live singer and isn't a professional singer who's been doing this all of her life in professional settings, Eliza Doolittle is pretty near impossible and it's already a very difficult role for seasoned performers.
Updated On: 3/22/18 at 01:36 PM
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:48pm
broadwayboy223 said: "The inconsistency people seem to be making about Lauren's voice may be directly attributed to her posture. Good posture or alignment usually aides singing and it sounds like her posture probably isn't good so I can imagine that's why there is some interesting things going on. I struggle with posture sometimes when I sing and it's usually because I'm trying to control the sound too much. I don't know if that's what Lauren's doing but its a guess."
I noticed that in the moments when she did NOT have bad posture ("I Could Have Danced All Night"
her voice rang out in a much freer, more beautiful way. However in the moments when her voice struggled the most she had poor posture. "The Rain in Spain" is an area where I thought her voice struggled unexpectedly. "Show Me" was another song. I actually noticed that Lauren is more of a pure soprano than I expected -- the higher she went, the freer her voice was. She struggled when the song was more centrally located notes-wise.
I also noticed that Lauren sometimes doesn't transition as seamlessly from dialogue to song as a more seasoned musical theater performer would. As I said, these are early previews and they are ironing out the kinks.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:49pm
About Lauren Ambrose -
She is also a trained opera singer who studied voice and opera at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute.
Ambrose is the lead singer of "Lauren Ambrose and the Leisure Class", a ragtime dixieland jazz band formed in 2009. They have performed several times at Joe's Pub and charity events.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:51pm
poisonivy2 said: "broadwayboy223 said: "The inconsistency people seem to be making about Lauren's voice may be directly attributed to her posture. Good posture or alignment usually aides singing and it sounds like her posture probably isn't good so I can imagine that's why there is some interesting things going on. I struggle with posture sometimes when I sing and it's usually because I'm trying to control the sound too much. I don't know if that's what Lauren's doing but its a guess."
I noticed that in the moments when she did NOT have bad posture ("I Could Have Danced All Night" her voice rang out in a much freer, more beautiful way. However in the moments when her voice struggled the most she had poor posture. "The Rain in Spain" is an area where I thought her voice struggled unexpectedly. "Show Me" was another song. I actually noticed that Lauren is more of a pure soprano than I expected -- the higher she went, the freer her voice was. She struggled when the song was more centrally located notes-wise.
I also noticed that Lauren sometimes doesn't transition as seamlessly from dialogue to song as a more seasoned musical theater performer would. As I said, these are early previews and they are ironing out the kinks."
There you go! That makes complete sense to me. Hopefully, she gets used to a better posture because I bet singing will feel much easier to her and sound as free and easy as it sounds to us (the audience) when she uses more of it.
Updated On: 3/22/18 at 01:51 PM
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:57pm
In You Did It, did they include the line "'Her blood', he said, 'is bluer than the Danube is or ever was...'," and about Eliza being Hungarian as the first Hungarian Rhapsody?
Posted: 3/22/18 at 1:57pm
A Director said: "About Lauren Ambrose -
She is also a trained operasinger who studied voice and opera at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute.
Ambrose is the lead singer of "Lauren Ambrose and the Leisure Class", a ragtime dixieland jazz band formed in 2009. They have performed several times at Joe's Pub and charity events.
"
It cracks me up that people keep bringing this up. There is indeed a difference between studying classical music, getting classical training and becoming an "opera singer". Unless she performed in opera's in opera houses she is most certainly NOT an opera singer. It sounds like to me she had some great classical voice training.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:11pm
A Director said: "About Lauren Ambrose -
She is also a trained operasinger who studied voice and opera at the Boston University Tanglewood Institute.
Ambrose is the lead singer of "Lauren Ambrose and the Leisure Class", a ragtime dixieland jazz band formed in 2009. They have performed several times at Joe's Pub and charity events."
I know Ambrose has a great pedigree and isn't a total beginner performing live, but Ambrose doesn't have a career typical of somebody who has trained and studied voice and opera at a prestigious institute nor does she perform with the Leisure Class as a career. She seems to do it sporadically. I think she has IT and can definitely handle the score, I just think like everything, she just needs a bit more experience to really iron everything out to be absolutely exceptional in merging the singing and book scenes and bringing out the character all the way through in a way great musical theatre actors can do because it does require a special set of skills to integrate song, dance, line delivery, and acting into one cohesive whole. Eliza is a difficult role for anybody even the most experienced Broadway performers so she it's not surprising that she needs to perform more to really hit her stride.
However, I do think her acting style and not being a "musical theatre animal" actually brings great new things to the role that one would not expect and she doesn't fall into some acting traps that we can some times see since she is not from the same background as other candidates for Eliza.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:12pm
Ah! That explains it! Thanks for the insight, PoisonIvy...I don't know the show well enough to pinpoint what went wrong, but I was pretty positive she doesn't say "Help!" out of the blue.
Updated On: 3/22/18 at 02:12 PM
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:13pm
For what it's worth, she nailed the line in the evening performance and I, and the audience, really had a lot of laughs from her during the Ascot scene.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:50pm
I am very proud of the fact that Bartlett Sher has taken a big risk with casting Lauren and Harry in the lead roles, and after hearing the very positive notices during these first two weeks of previews of the two of them, I'm glad that Colin Firth didn't get the role of Higgins as it was rumored. Other than Dame Diana Rigg, there is no major name in this entire cast.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:51pm
DivaDiana said: "Ah! That explains it! Thanks for the insight, PoisonIvy...I don't know the show well enough to pinpoint what went wrong, but I was pretty positive she doesn't say "Help!" out of the blue."
When she yelled "help" I could hear Diana Rigg cueing her with "diptheria the year before." And so she said the diptheria line but then Freddy sort of missed the "small talk" cue and then the whole hat pin/somebody pinched it/done her in part of the monologue was gone. A shame because she had been getting huge laughs for her affected speaking in the Ascot scene.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:53pm
I haven't seen the show yet but to anyone who has seen it, do you think that Jordan Donica has the chance to get nominated for best featured actor?
Posted: 3/22/18 at 2:57pm
The thrill of live theater. I don't think anyone missed a syllable on the first night of previews. Her Ascot scene was perfect.
I was lucky enough to go back on Saturday night when a friend had an extra ticket and there were two missed lines--Prof Higgins dropped a line in "Why Can't a Woman..." and *something* else that I can't recall at the moment.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 3:03pm
Posted: 3/22/18 at 3:09pm
bwayemma said: "I haven't seen the show yet but to anyone who has seen it,do you think thatJordan Donica has the chance to get nominated for best featured actor?"
Probably not because Freddy does not tend to be an award-nominated role (but then before Ruthie Ann Miles who thought Lady Thiang would be a Tony-winning role?), but I honestly liked him a lot more than Norbert. As I said in my review, I loved that way Donica played the scene where Eliza returns to Covent Gardent after "Show Me". His rendition on "On the Street Where You Live" was absolutely glorious.
Updated On: 3/22/18 at 03:09 PM
Posted: 3/22/18 at 4:25pm
New to the broadwayworld chat boards so not sure how to post in general my thoughts on the show:
This is a solid miss for me.
Problems are many-fold:
1. The pacing (including song tempos) is agonizingly slow.
Shaw wrote his dialogue to be delivered like lightning.
The show could be at least 20 mins shorter if things were delivered with energy and urgency.
2. Eliza has an odd and somewhat distracting habit of looking at the floor during her solos.
Like a tick. Down, up, down, up.
3. Eliza seems confused throughout. Not the live wire we expect.
She appears dazed. Where is the spunk that defines her?
She walks out on Higgins at the end (as Shaw wrote it originally in Pygmalion -- but there is no indication that she has the gumption to do this anywhere prior)
4. The revolving set is quite fetching -- 3 sets on one disc -- but then, suddenly it gets overused by 500%.
Many of the songs are staged to move thru ALL THREE sets at several points.
5. Another example of the set blocking the show instead of the director is the use of the lovely spiral staircase up to the library.
Folks go up there FOR NO REASON whatsoever. And back down, and back up and down and up and HOLY COW it's annoying and totally unmotivated.
6. Speaking of unmotivated: Due to the thrust stage, the characters wander from point to point with no motive whatsoever, CONSTANTLY.
It is very nearly hilarious watching them try to justify the constant movement in order to make sure their backs are not turned to one section of the house for more than two lines.
7. I really wish this show was worth recommending. But. It. Just. Isn't.
8. Norbert Leo Butz is a bright spot, but it's like a flashlight in the desert, he can only light up so much of the landscape.
9. This is like MFL on quaaludes.
Posted: 3/22/18 at 4:43pm
