Pal Joey is now African American! And a gay character added to the plot....

[Joviedamian]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 2:01pm

http://www.playbill.com/news/article/180968-Peter-Schneider-Patrick-Pacheco-Michael-Reno-Will-Debut-Re-Envisioned-Pal-Joey-With-Interracial-and-Gay-Themes



Updated On: 8/9/13 at 02:01 PM

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 2:04pm

He is African-American and gay characters? How many does he play?

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 2:07pm

Congrats on the race change, PJ! Here's to a whole new you!

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 2:11pm

Everybody always sad he has a lot of soul.

[suestorm]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 2:12pm

""Everybody always sad he has a lot of soul""

Im not sad, Im glad he has a lot of soul.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 2:27pm

The Methodolgy of The Worst Troll of The Last Eight Months:

"How do you like me now?"
"Less."
"How do you like me now?"
"Less."
"How do you like me now?"
"Even less."
"How do you like me now?"
"Much less."
"How do you like me now?"
"Less than I even thought possible."
"How do you like me now?"
(silence)
"How do you like me now?"
(silence)
"How do you like me now?"
(silence)
"I win!"

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 3:35pm

Why do they keep reworking Pal Joey? There's nothing wrong with the show. The only thing wrong is that they keep casting completely uninteresting and non charismatic leading men for the role.

[Tom5]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 4:51pm

Since they'll be adding numbers from other shows I guess the producers don't really believe that Pal Joey has a great score. (With that attitude they shouldn't have touched it to begin with) On the other hand, if anyone wants to see a Richard Rodgers Revue...

[Joviedamian]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 5:29pm

Curious to know if any ideas came from Terrence McNally at one point....

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 6:25pm

[PatrickDennis92]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 7:07pm

I think it's interesting when creative people rework a show, despite whether or not it's "better"-- this is a creative enterprise, and as such, creative people can certainly interpret and change other creative people's work. Not that this is exactly the same, but the heart of it is the same-- remember when Sondheim wrote that nasty letter about Porgy and Bess-- I was completely shocked. Here was one of the most brilliant creative people in the business, now or ever, who has repeatedly used other people's work as inspiration for his own, who couldn't see that finished works in musical theatre could still serve as source material for adapted musical work. It's really no different than adapting from a novel or film.

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 7:23pm

I wonder if people will do this 50-60 years from now ... throw out the book to Wicked or Dreamgirls or A Chorus Line, and completely rework it. Adding other songs from the composer's canon.

Dreamgirls will be adapted as the actual Supremes' story. The names and circumstances will all be changed. They will add What I Did For Love from the "Hamlisch catalog of songs." Deena will sing The Way We Were as her 11 o'clock number. (Why Hamlisch songs? Because they can.)

Wicked will now be darker, but will also include Corner of the Sky for Elphaba to sing. Madame Morrible will tackle No Time At All, and they will add Over the Rainbow for Dorothy to sing, right before the end of the show.

Updated On: 8/9/13 at 07:23 PM

[darquegk]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 7:42pm

In some ways, this is horrible. IN some ways, this is wonderful. That level of no-rules tampering after some statute of limitations wears off can produce forgettable failures or thrilling successes. But what's important is that no one will remember the failures.

[Joviedamian]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 7:53pm

best12bars, funny you mentioned that about changing and adding songs from the canon, etc....I once did a production of FAME (though not on the same level as a lot of the shows you talked about), but, literally in the script between scenes it said "Add your song of choice here". So the director did. He looked at songs that are free for public use and can be used in production and used it. Imagine if every script came like that!

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 7:58pm

Having unfortunately done the stage version of Fame in Jr High, replacing much of the music could only be a good thing... (Although I can't really think of many public domain songs they could fit into the show...)

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 8:09pm

This doesn't seem so heretical to me.

PAL JOEY has some of Rodgers & Hart's best songs ("Bewitched...", "I Could Write a Book", "Zip"), it also has its share of dross ("Happy Hunting Horn" and "Plant You Now, Dig You Later". Even "Take Him" is no "Marry the Man Today".)

And making the club characters multiracial and multisexual is mere verisimilitude: what O'Hara and Hart might have written if they dared in the 1940s.

As long as they keep the funniest couplet in American musical theater history:

"Zip! I was reading Schopenhauer last night,
Zip! I decided Schopenhauer was right."

[Demitri2]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 8:19pm

PAL JOEY was done with Lena Horne as Vera and Clifton Davis as Joey at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles back in the seventies. Linda was also played by a black actress. The reviews were negative and its plans for bringing Horne back to Broadway were scuttled. The show was awful. Which makes me ask, "Has anyone ever seen an enjoyable production of this show?

[darquegk]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 8:52pm

Pal Joey is a different animal than Cabaret, where each production version has "gelled" and been reproduced, while existing simultaneously. There is NO really "canonical" version of Pal Joey. As far as I know, from assembling a compendium of the Rodgers, Hart and Hammerstein ouvres earlier this summer, almost every major production uses a new script and a new song stack.

[EricMontreal22]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 9:05pm

I was wondering how many past revisions there had been--aside from the recent major one from Greenberg I believe. I suppose if there's no official version (or versions, as you say Darque?) it's a bit more like Show Boat, then--though Show Boat seems to go over well in whatever version with most audiences, unlike PJ...

[darquegk]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 9:13pm

I think it's a case that Pal Joey is simply not a masterpiece. Is it a good show, and an influential one? Definitely. But it's not a GREAT show. And unless some really brilliant revision comes along, it's always going to be a C-list musical by an A-list team. Rather like Flower Drum Song or Allegro or even Merrily We Roll Along, all of which have variant versions, all of which are respected shows, none of which are really in the Canon of Great Shows despite their pedigree.

[Ed_Mottershead]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 9:18pm

No, no, no, no, no.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 9:39pm

The "solutions" to all the problems with "Pal Joey: The Musical" are to be found in the original John O'Hara short stories.

[Bettyboy72]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 9:47pm

I loved the revival with Risch, Channing and Plimpton. Saw it three times. I didn't have the problems others did with Risch. I was captivated from beginning to end.

[darquegk]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 10:21pm

You know, PalJoey is probably right- going back to the book for inspiration would make a stronger adaptation of the musical at this point. But no one seems to want to, or at least no one has yet.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/9/13 at 10:32pm

Count me another Matthew Risch fan.