Ragtime Reviews

[Dame Fanadette]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 6:18pm

I was listening to the the Forbidden Broadway Ragtime song who gave the show a scathing review? And how late did it open?

[EvelynNesbit1906]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 6:22pm

The New York Times wasn't especially kind.

[Dame Fanadette]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 6:32pm

And then it starting later than expected? I mean I saw the original production and I believed it just to be an amazing show. Saw Lion King the same week ans was extremely underwhelmed. I guess it's just one of those hotly debated subjects.

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 6:46pm

Well, not so hotly debated here. Among theatre fans, most agree that RAGTIME having won best book and score should also have won best musical. But "style" trumped "content" that year.

The reference in FB to "we opened late" was as I recall due to teh fact that Theatrical Impressario & crook (or are they one-in-the-same?) Garth Drabinsky was building the FORD 9now Hilton) theatre to house teh show and it wasn't ready until December 1998. LION KING opened in November and was already a hot ticket.

The reviews for RAGTIME were mostly favourable with several raves but the New York times was mixed to unfavourable. This after another Times writer had covered the Toronto premiere and given it a rave. The show went to LA before New York so teh New York opening was almost 2 years after Toronto and I think the New Yorkers were miffed that it took so long!

[sweetestsiren]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 6:56pm

I thought that there was a healthy mix of positive and negative reviews for Ragtime, wasn't there? Maybe more negative, but the show is a personal favorite of mine.

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 6:58pm

From the Ben Brantley review:

"Blessed with beauty, ambition, a smashing wardrobe and a social conscience, 'Ragtime' would seem to be the kind of musical that brings Broadway audiences to their knees in adoration. Then why does this $10 million show, which opened last night at the new Ford Center for the Performing Arts, feel so utterly resistible?

Sitting through this heavily publicized adaptation of E. L. Doctorow's 1975 novel about turn-of-the-century growing pains is like meeting someone on the basis of a promising lonely-hearts ad. It's not that your date doesn't match the adjectives from the glamorous self-description. But face to face, you discover there's just no chemistry.

There is much to admire in 'Ragtime,' from its images of hand-tinted daguerreotypes brought to exquisite life to the electric presence of its leading man, Brian Stokes Mitchell, as the black revolutionary Coalhouse Walker. But there is finally little to fall in love with."
http://theater2.nytimes.com/mem/theater/treview.html?res=9D00E0DD1238F93AA25752C0A96E958260

[Dame Fanadette]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 8:07pm

Ouch

[DottieD'Luscia]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 9:10pm

I always wondered whether or not it had to do with the venue it was in. Upon first viewing I was in the 3rd row and was completely mesmerized by it. Another time I sat up in the balcony and the show didn't seem to have quite the same effect (plus Marin Mazzie happened to be out that time). Don't get me wrong, Ragtime is one of my all-time favorite shows. I was very fortunate to have seen it's final performance almost six years ago.

[melissa errico fan]

Posted: 1/5/06 at 9:21pm

Dottie-

I totally agree. The Ford (Hilton) is a giant barn of a theatre, and it's very easy for a show to get lost there. I saw RAGTIME quite a few times (from many different locations), and got a feeling of real distance from the action when I was in the balcony, or even when I was a few rows back in the dress circle. When I had a good orchestra seat, I was rapt.

That theatre is awful.