Mack & Mabel City Center Encores! — Page 2

Saw it last night. Not a perfect show at all, but certainly entertaining with a great score. Biggest problem is the book, especially how Mabel falls for Mack instantly, which I didn't understand at all. Perhaps if Mack was cast differently and radiated "star" it would make a difference. Alexandra's acting was remarkable as always. Enjoyed seeing Ben Fankhauser back on stage, even if he played a Newsie again for a brief moment haha. Hope to see him on Broadway again soon.

"Mack" really needed to be cast with a Star. Sills sang the role amazingly -- but I never bought him as being romantically interested in Mabel. James Naughton would have been perfect in the role. Peter Gallagher might also work.

I was there last night and thought that Alexandra Socha and Lili Cooper were both absolutely fantastic.

I had more problems with Douglas Sills who I thought was nearly unintelligible for chunks of the show. The book does not help this but I also thought he did not have chemistry with Alexnadra Sohca.

I never understood how these two characters fell in love as another poster mentioned. However for whatever issues with the story I had, the score is just glorious. It sounded lovely with the Encores orchestra though I will say the OBC I listened to has such a brass presence I wish they had beefed up the brass more for this. Still the Entr'acte was an absolute highlight.

I'm very glad to have seen it and there were some fantastic moments (Socha's "Wherever He Ain't, "When Mabel Comes Into the Room", and Lili Cooper's "Tap Your Troubles Away".

Losing Jerry and Carol in less than a year is asking too much of this aging Dollypop.

Lovely sentiment expressed from the heart. As my late mother, not an educated woman, used to say, “How sad that people have to grow old.”

All the more so when you have entered that unfortunate group.

I didn't have a bad time seeing the show but I didn't have a great time either. I enjoyed it the most when I tried to stop thinking of it as a coherent, compelling book musical and tried to think of it as a concert that happened to have some dialogue to string together the songs and fantastic dancing. I could get way too into it but even though it was performed exceptionally well, I don't think the book works. After seeing it, I have this whole idea of how to rewrite the book to more closely reflect the real lives of Mack and Mabel and use the songs in ways that would work better to tell the story. Right now there are all these great songs but they don't fit well with the story they're meant to support. Mack and Mabel are reduced to shallow, one-dimensional echoes of characters in other, better shows that are fighting against the plot they've been shoved into. There's Oscar and Lily from On the Twentieth Century, Annie and Frank from Annie Get Your Gun, every version of A Star is Born, etc. but the characterizations don't ring true in this plot. Knowing the details of their real lives explains some of why this doesn't work.

I'm still glad I saw it though. The performances were fantastic vocally. The acting from the leads was fine but I felt like it suffered because the book doesn't make much sense so it's hard to mine much pathos from it. Lilli Cooper was a surprisingly standout. I didn't expect her character to have those big moments. And I have yet to be disappointed by Rob Berman.

This production is pretty close to the original book. There have been many small revisions, but anyone who saw the original in '74 (as I did) would probably be hard-put to identify them. Some of the narration is new, and a few telling individual lines have been added. They all add up to a modest attempt to improve the believability of the romance, but they'e not earth-shattering. The Keystone Kop ballet was in the original but cut before Broadway, restored for the production at Paper Mill Playhouse.

The "overture" from the cast album has always been the entr'acte in the actual show. Gower Champion, who directed and choreographed the original, had a thing against overtures. Among his shows, Bye, Bye Birdie, Carnival, Dolly, Mack & Mabel and 42nd Street all lack proper overtures. Not sure about the others.

I agree about the lack of chemistry between the leads.



Here, Sills comes across too light. Not gay but not "heavy". I would have liked a sterner presence. Howard McGillin? Raul Esparza?



And she has the 2 best songs in the show but Socha didn't impress IMHO. Needed a gutsier delivery.



I actually kept interested in the plot. And those songs! Every one solid and several classics. And those orchestrations!!! Lush, full, exciting, dramatic, surprising.



Thought the Director, Josh Rhodes, did a fine job organizing everything. Just didn't think he "got" the Keystone Cops number. Maybe he never watched their schtick. Tap Your Troubles Away was fine.



As for the casting of some key supporting roles....nuff said...

Really enjoyed this. It’s by far Jerry Herman’s best score. However I definitely see why it didn’t keep. Act 2 is a mess dramatically. The darkness of the story is interrupted with all these jolly production numbers. When Mabel Comes In the Room, the Keystone Cops number, and Tap Your Troubles Away seemed like a different musical than the central story of Mack and Mabel.

i didn’t think Socha and Sills had much chemistry. Socha had stronger chemistry with Michael Berresse (Desmond a Taylor) and Ben Fankhouser (Frank). Mack and Mabel never seemed like more than a business relationship.


however the score was so strong, by far the best Jerry Herman ever wrote and both Sills and Socha delivered muisicaly. Production also was less half baked than the usual Encores! I could listen to the songs over and over again.

Encores operates under a special Equity agreement.

Pashacar said: "Matt Rogers said: "I was at the invited dress and I'm sorry but I really did not care for this at all.

This is the first production of the musicalhave seen, although I am familiar with it.

Thre orchestra is fantastic, as should be expected, and the Jerry Herman songs are wonderful, but for a show called Mack and Mabel, there is zero chemistry between the actors playing Mack and Mabel.

I don't know if the character of Mack is supposed to come off as almost an anti-hero, but he does in this production and is pretty unlikeable. Mabel barely registered for me.

The staging is just very messy.

Overall, i just didn't care about these characters as portrayed by these actors and there was an amateur feel to the whole thing that I don't usually get from Encores stagings.

Maybe it will gel in future performances. I hope it does and wish them well."

Oh boy, it'sa bummer to hear all that. This is known for having the worst book of a musical in history, and I think some of the issues you discuss with Mack and the two leads' chemistry are part ofwhat's earned it that reputation, but it sounds like there's more amiss here than just that."

Having seen the original production, I would have to ask what you expected? It was a monumental failure, despite the great score. The show was cold as ice, the book was terrible, the solid direction and choreography didn't matter because the entire audience was stultifyingly bored because of the rotten book and unsympathetic male lead in particular. IMO this was one where they never should have attempted a semi-full staging, because the book was going to make it a non-starter. They should have just performed a concert, perhaps with a narrator, maybe even covering why the show failed so miserably.

Jarethan said:

Having seen the original production, I would have to ask what you expected? It was a monumental failure, despite the great score. The show was cold as ice, the book was terrible, the solid direction and choreography didn't matter because the entire audience was stultifyingly bored because of the rotten book and unsympathetic male lead in particular. IMO this was one where they never should have attempted a semi-full staging, because the book was going to make it a non-starter. They should have just performed a concert, perhaps with a narrator, maybe even covering why the show failed so miserably.

"

Well ... isn't the point of Encores! to revive musicals that have worthy scores but for one reason or another are not viable as long-term B'way runs? A lot of musicals have great scores and very problematic books -- Merrily We Roll Along is one. I'm still really glad I got to see the songs of Mack and Mabel in context in a staged production, even though I could see why this closed so quickly -- Act 2 in particular falls apart dramatically as one dance number after another clashes with the actual dark, depressing storyline.

What's changed is the contract -- which, like all other theatrical contracts, is re-negotiated every few years. This is hardly the first Encores in which the actors didn't carry books. There is a note in the Playbill saying that it is a concert production in which the actors "may" be carrying books".