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#53

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/22/08 at 11:12pm

Yes! Mambo Kings! Thanks for the reminder. Yeah, I remember the reviews for the out of town tryouts being really good and people on this board raving about the choreography and music. I was really really intreged by the whole concept but it never came. Closed during the out of town tryouts if I recall correctly.
Happy...Everything! Kaye Thompson
#55

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/22/08 at 11:43pm

Some of these I don't really consider to be "Anticipated"...Glory Days? I think more people were thinking HOW/WHY it got here rather than a WHEN.

And Carrie? That's ALWAYS tossed around, and I don't really remember too big of a buzz around it. Infact I think most people believed it would flop, just not as miserably as it did.
#57

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 12:57am

The Pirate Queen (I had heard buzz since the day after Stephanie left the Wicked tour, and that whole Comcast thing).
"Oh look at the time, three more intelligent plays just closed and THE ADDAMS FAMILY made another million dollars" -Jackie Hoffman, Broadway.com Audience Awards
#59

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 1:48am

Jon is right. STEEL PIER is the first one that came to my mind as being HIGHLY anticipated and touted. The excited buzz began months in advance. I don't remember any other show ever having that kind of anticipatory excitement and flopping so badly. In fact, there aren't that many shows that have had that kind of anticipatory excitement period.
Brian had sex, with a really dumb girl, now he's taking his friend Stewie, to get some ice cream, in his car.
#63

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 10:45am

"I've never considered Whistle Down the Wind and Woman In White to be failures. "

Why not? Whistle Down the Wind was the end of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "successes" on Broadway (with the exception of Aspects of Love), he tried it out in America because of the story was based here, it didn't & still hasn't made it to Broadway. And a 10 month tour (which a small minority thought would come to Broadway) failed, miserably and closed early.
It's been seen in London I think 2 or 3 times now, but for the most part it's been seen as a "filler" for Lloyd Webber's theatres.

And The Woman in White didn't flop all too bad in England, but here it did. Andrew Lloyd Webber's "big return" to Broadway after 11 years (Sunset Blvd.) and "his best score in years"/"since Phantom" and closed after 4 months! Actually I don't see why it closed then, I really don't think that Sonia Friedman (and I think that this production was her "Broadway debut") knew about the slow winter months on Broadway...the show wasn't doing that terrible.
#64

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 11:08am

MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG was certainly very highly anticipated as the follow up show from Sondheim and Prince after their acclaimed SWEENEY TODD. The producers negotiated use of the Alvin Theatre (Where the Sondheim-Furth-Prince COMPANY opened 11 years earlier), which necessitated movie the hit show ANNIE out. ANNIE was still running at the Uris when MWRA closed.

The following season another Prince show; A DOLL'S LIFE was generating lots of pre-season buzz. But a disastrous try-out in L.A. was cut short and the show came to New York where it opened and closed in less than a week. RCA cancelled plans for a cast album, though Bruce Yeko's Original Cast label did eventually issue it.

Then there was CHESS, a multi-million dollar show that had already been a hit in London but arrived on Broadway in the spring of 1988 with a thud. It was conspicuously absent from the nominations for the season’s Best Musical and Best score, receiving only 2 noms for the performances of David Carroll and Judy Kuhn. Shortly after the Tony awards CHESS posted a closing notice.

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

#66

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 3:17pm

what about seussical? I remember everyone getting so hyped up about it, then I remember it closing before I could go see it.

I was also younger then though.
Electricity sparks inside of me. And I'm free, I'm free! - Billy Elliot the Musical
#69

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 8:59pm

I second 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

With the collaboration of Bernstein and Alan Jay Lerner, a huge cast and being THE Bicentennial artistic event of 1976 it was supposed to be huge.

It even previewed in DC and Philadelphia, to highlight its historic significance.

It ran a week.

#70

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 9:11pm

'The Red Shoes' at the Gershwin
A young actress with Noel coward after a dreadful opening night performance said to him 'Well, i knew my lines backwards this morning!'' Noels fast reply was ''Yes dear, and thats exactly how you said them tonight'!'
#71

re: Much Anticipated Musicals That Crashed & Burned - Big Time

Posted: 6/23/08 at 9:48pm

Side Show - another show biz musical by the composer of Dreamgirls. Two upcoming stars: Alice Ripley and Emily Skinner. It had all the makings of a hit. It opened in mid-October and posted closing notice by the end of the year.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.

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