Rent on the Broadway documentary — Page 2

I think they put enough Sondheim in, just my opinion . And they showed just a snippet of you know who from the Chicago movie. That is right.......Renee Zellwegar. SIKE!!!! Oh, Catherine, Catherine, Catherine....shake your bon bon.

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watching it now... I am HIGHLY enjoying!

What do you people want? There is no way that everything could have been covered. If they had added more of this, someone else would just say it was too much of that etc. etc. etc. I for one am happy to at least know that a good Documentary has been done and there some things in it that a lot of people, who think that Broadway began with RENT, can learn.

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never seen the show, but the concept album is GORGEOUS.

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I'm very nervous to watch it now.

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"Thankfully no Daphne Rubin-Vega"

Why in the world are you THANKFUL for that?? that comment seemed kind of uncalled for.

But WOW, it was seriosuly so emotional to see and HEAR Jonathan on tv. The man had such a great personality and was so alive...I have a cassette of Jon singing a few early versions of RENT songs, but, on tv it sounded a lot clearer and it just gave me goosebumps. No, Jonathan wasn't the best singer, but you could fee land hear how much passion he put into his writing. I REALLY need to buy the DVD now so I can see more of that segment!!

I'm glad they didn't spend an hour just talking about Phantom and Le Miz. I think because the series was about the AMERICAN musical, and those shows are British, they just didn't fee lthe need to talk about them that much?

I love the series, but feel they should have done more in finding archival footage. For example, I have seen old 8mm home movies of Barbra in Funny Girl on stage, why not use that instead of footage from the movie? The same with Damn Yankees. It seemed at some points they cut the documentary to fit what footage they had. For example, no archival of Channing in Dolly except for an anniversary show (Tony's perhaps) yet they devote screen time to Mary Martin in Viet Nam, seemingly because they had film of it.

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This program was trying to show the evolution of the Broadway Musical. The "Wicked" sequence was to show how big budgeted musicals have become and the draw of them due to the story and the spectacle. Even though "Avenue Q" won the Tony, it is NOT a spectacle show, nor a family type show that everyone can see and appreciate. I really enjoyed this whole program and can't wait to buy the DVD. It saddens me that everyone on here talks about the present day stuff, but nobody has posted an appreciation of the roots of the broadway musical and the way this program covered the real history of it. I was incredibly pleased with the whole package and hope that more people enjoying today's broadway watched it to gain an appreciation of what has happened to broadway and what has changed over the years. It also makes me sad that during the 40s and 50s close to 70 or 80 musicals were opening in one season. I don't think we have had that many musicals open in the last 15 years on broadway. How sad money and cost can make something diminish so much. I miss the old broadway too!

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I'm surprised no one has mentioned how Gawd awful Menzel sounded on the documentary. This is the voice you all worship and want the other girls to emulate? And don't tell me she was nervous a' la the Tony's, this was B-roll. I agree that it was a glaring omission to not include Dreamgirls but I figure they thought they had done "enough" on Bennett.

I did really enjoy the Rent segment. I just thought maybe they would mention the cast, but they didn't.
I was really dissappointed that there wasn't more on Les Miz.
But oh my, I loved the Chicago segment. It was the highlight for me.

Actorgaedu, quite a bit of very interesting responses to the earlier shows was posted on the Off Topic Board, so you might want to check there. And you're right that the documentary was built around what footage was available - that's really all they can do. Even with the talking heads material they can only show the people they were able to get, talking about whatever it is they want to talk about. I doubt if bootlegged footage was an option.

Another thing... Why so much on the lion king! i mean its great the way they restored the theater (i'd love to see pics of it before they fixed it, if anyone knows where to get those) but why is the show such a big deal. I personally dont like the show AT ALL. I think Beauty and the Beast was a much bigger deal, and Better show, so why did they make such a big deal out of sucky lion king?

I adore Cabaret and love Joel Grey, but I'm a bit terrified of clips of him as the Emcee. I don't know why exactly, maybe it is his facial expressions, but he scares the crap out of me.


I wanted to see a bit more Hairspray stuff, though I loved seeing clips from ACL and Cabaret.