On The Twentieth Century Previews — Page 14

Saw it last night. Peter Gallagher was back, and you couldn't tell he was sick for the last few weeks. The good and bad:

Good:

1) Cast is top-notch. From the porters to the others on the train, everyone was in stellar voice and over-the-top dramatic. Andy Karl milks it.

2) The comedy was zany and fun.

3) The costumes. I mean, William Ivey Long is a legend for a reason.

4) The sets were gorgeous.

The not-so-good:

1) I'm just not a fan of those songs. They serve their purpose, but they don't leave me whistling their tune or wanting to go home and add them to my iTunes library.

2) Letitia Primrose seemed off her game. Don't know how she normally is, but she seemed to be struggling a bit with the speed of the show and her lines.

For me, the songs are the thing I focus most on, so I thought the show was good, but not great. The show is in the same vein as On the Town (bright, madcap, etc.), but I find On the Town to be much more enjoyable, and those songs have stuck with me. Just my two cents.

"Letitia Primrose seemed off her game. Don't know how she normally is, but she seemed to be struggling a bit with the speed of the show and her lines."

Mary Louise Wilson, Lord love her, is 83 years old. Imogene Coca was, by comparison, 69 when the original production opened. At that time of life, 14 years makes an enormous difference in stamina, particularly in a role that requires a certain amount of running, one very big and wordy solo, and two group numbers. Reports from original cast members are that the much-younger Coca had great difficulty with memory and physicality back in 1978.

Bless Wilson for trying, but it's going to be brutal on the ol' gal.

Anyone going to the Drama League's Up Close with ANDY KARL on Monday??

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Saw this for the second time in eight days on Sunday. (That was not the original plan.)

I've been looking forward to this new production since I first read about it. Give KC a return to theater in a role that fitted her great talents. Rediscover a big and original "madcap" musical that had been up in the attic for decades. And it looked like all this was coming to pass when I read the early reviews here and saw the show for the first time Saturday a week ago.

I went to see it again stone cold sober and free of the distraction of having a first row center seat that put you in such close proximity to the actors.

And I was disappointed. I couldn't even work up the enthusiasm of the sell out audience.

Why? Was I just having a bad day? Were my expectations too high to be met? I tentatively settled on the score as the primary reason.

The songs taken together are not that strong. I find myself agreeing with Kad pretty closely that I think the score itself is a lot of fun. That being said, I'm not sure it's a SUCCESSFUL score. The story is a fast-paced farce and the score doesn't further that idea very often.

This production is at its absolute best when it is moving at a fast pace with the book and the score working together. Scene where Lily is first approached about returning to Oscar with the song "Never." Scene where Oscar first accuses Lily of selling out to Hollywood with "I've Got It All." Letitia's coming out song "Repent." (I thought Mary Louise Wilson was really on her game on Sunday, delivering her lines with good comic timing and covering lot of ground on the stage. The audience was with her.) Letitia's downfall with "She's a Nut," a long but lively number. All good.

On the other hand, songs that I consider dullards that could never stand on their own, such as "Our Private World," "Because of Her," a bad eleven o'clock number with either set of lyrics, and a couple of others from the second act just stop the action dead in its tracks while you wait for the song to be over.

I couldn't even get excited about the "Babette" production number even though it seems to be colorful and well done. Perhaps I'm partial to big numbers based on good songs like Mame and Anything Goes. Yeah, that's weak reasoning.

I couldn't see much difference with Oscar played by Moye or Gallagher. Peter may have been more demonstrative. I'll leave that question for others.

So I'm still not happy that I found flaws seeing 20th Century for the second time. The audience seemed very pleased with it and gave it about a seven eighths standing ovation, although half of the people did not get on their feet until Kristin took her bow. I guess that this is a good thing for the show. Even if the reviews aren't great, good reviews plus Cheno should sell a lot of seats.

The post-show talkback with the cast wasn't as good as the first one either. Neither Kristin nor Peter showed. There was more discussion about how physically and vocally difficult the production was on the cast. The most interesting part of this exchange to me was the presence of KC's understudy Mamie Parris. Very attractive, very well-spoken, maybe ten years younger than Kristin, but seeming to lack any of the little zaniness that Madeline and Kristin carried around with them. To me she seemed more like a Human Resources Director of a small tech company. It would be interesting to see her play the role, and I'm sure that she'll have her chances.

The two songs couldn't be anymore different, not just in style but in substance, too. They serve completely different purposes and both accomplish what they set out to do.

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I haven't seen the production yet but I'm quite curious as to what Mamie Parris would do with Lily. She was an excellent Mother in Ragtime, and I heard very good things about her in Wicked as well when she did the tour. Obviously On the Twentieth Century is very different from both of those shows but she seems to be a very versatile actress and singer.

Some minor comedic gesture additions, Mrs. Primrose gives a sticker to an audience member, and the curtain is now lit red instead of blue.

Babette was one of the highlights for me when I saw the show last weekend.

PerfectlyMarvelous, I thought the same thing about Mamie. When I watched the show, I couldn't help but think the role of Lily is not an easy one to cover. Kristen made the comedy look very easy.

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Is it still opening tonight? Because I saw on twitter that it still is and I thought it was postponed until Sunday.

^Kind of like what happened with Bridges last year?

Peter Gallagher was out again? When are they going to admit they made a mistake in casting and that he can't handle the part?

Backing up a moment, I was fascinated to read the post that said Coca had trouble with the role at age 69. Memory problems, etc., that were presumably determined to be age related. That's two years older than Hillary Clinton. We hardly see 69-year-olds as out-to-pasture time geriatric now (for the record, verbal acuity is now believed to peak at 68.) But perception is everything, and admittedly, in the 1970s, 69 was a helluva lot older. Today, many first blush boomers are in their late 60s. Maybe that's why Letitia was cast with an 83-year-old, if the creative team feel the part is best served by someone who's dottiness is age-related. I would prefer a mere religious fanatic, age inconsequential.

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Seeing it next week. I'm surprised by people who don't think it's a good score!!! I play it all the time. I think it's a great score but that's my humble opinion. It's also based on a sort of "operetta" style score and it's totally successful with that aspect.