We saw it Wednesday and came out of it thinking that Justin Guarini was by far the best part of the show (except for the too-short moments when Jennifer Simard was on stage). While the overall story was better than I expected, some of the execution just fell apart a bit. Briga Heelan I'd heard issues about from both this board and other friends but I thought she was adequate in the first act, and it wasn't really until Stronger that I really felt they needed a better singer (especially when Lorna Courtney is belting her heart out on that song in essentially the same context). Aisha Jackson on the other hand, was quite good whenever she was on, and I'm glad she's getting more exposure.
I'm not sure if it's Heelan's problem or the book, but I never found Cinderella that interesting as a main character to follow. It feels like because she wants something more than the typical princess mold, we're expected to just like her for that reason alone, but she doesn't really have any other personality traits and she's not as fun/funny as the other princesses in the book club.
I don't know if the Madrids have directed an actual book musical before, but it felt like they should've gotten an actual theater director (or co-director) with a bit more experience shaping a show. The best moments are when the story is told through song and has movement involved (Work Bitch, Circus, Toxic, etc.), but everything else falls a bit flat. I really love the choreography for some of the numbers but it seems like they don't trust the main princesses to dance and just give them hand choreography, while the "second tier" princesses get the main dance tracks (and then there's Justin Guarini who seems to be the only person that does both).
The set had great moments (when are they going to sell that glass ball with the quill as a Christmas ornament or jewelry, because that was GORGEOUS), but for a lot of the show it didn't seem like they knew how to use the space, which left it feeling rather empty and stark. The costumes too were walking a thin line between looking cheap and being intentionally kitsch, though I did like Cinderella's ball gown and some of the other more period style costumes (Ariel's wig looked like it was taken directly from Sierra Boggess's costume during her run as Ariel).
If this show had been in early previews, I'd say it would still have a shot at getting to be a solid musical, and while I'm glad they've been tweaking things, I'm not sure that they'll be able to get to a point where the show flows better by the time it opens. I thought & Juliet had better song integration into the plot, as well as a better grasp on how to just make the show campy and fun, but this show seemed almost bogged down by its premise of bringing feminism to Disney princesses (I almost rolled my eyes when they mentioned women being shrill and hysterical just because it seemed like a knee-jerk reaction for the audience to groan at it), and while I liked the resolution and the meta-narrative, it just didn't seem to really fix all that much (like Cinderella's relationship with the Prince). I do think it tells a better story than Bad Cinderella, but I felt I enjoyed Bad Cinderella more in terms of visuals and staging.
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