Sally Bowles Portrayals - Page 2

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 8:32pm

Jane Horrocks is actually a very talented singer, known largely for having starred in the film 'Little Voice'. She made the choice to scream her way through the abortion-metaphor-heavy-Life is a cabaret at the Donmar Warehouse, perhaps a little too brash, but altogether thrilling.

Yes, she is, as anyone who has seen LITTLE VOICE can attest. But personally I have no interest in letting my ears bleed for two hours in the name of petty realism.

Sally Bowles is much more interesting when portrayed by someone like Liza Minnelli: she's a very talented singer who's stuck in a dump because of her own actions, not a simple curse of fate like being tone deaf. (Yes, I get the poignance of a talentless Sally waiting for her "big break", but that moves me for about 3 minutes.)

If we're going to extend the Prince/Mendes dictum about Sally's lousy singing, then shouldn't the four solos in FOLLIES' Loveland sequence also be sung badly? After all, Ben, Phyllis, Sally and Buddy aren't really Follies stars; they are ordinary people pretending to put on a show. Does anyone want to hear "Losing My Mind" screamed like bad Brecht/Weill?

And what about Pal Joey? Small time at best. Anybody want to see a PAL JOEY where Joey can't sing or dance?

We could go on and on in this vein. Hell, even FUNNY GIRL has songs that Fannie Brice could not have sung if her life depended on it!

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 8:58pm

"I'd have loved to have seen Jennifer Jason Leigh's Sally. She played a similar character in Georgia and was brilliant."

There's clips of her performance on yt. I also wanted to see some footage of Joely Fisher. I've heard she was quite solid in the role.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:01pm

I have a couple examples of Joely Fisher on benefit albums. I'm sure she made a fine Sally; she certainly has the musical chops.

Updated On: 6/25/13 at 09:01 PM

[Musicaldudepeter]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:05pm

Maybe for the film version one interpretation could be that Liza's Sally is all in her head and that this Sally THINKS she's a fantastic singer but the reality is that she's not; but we are living the performance through her viewpoint and psyche.

[theeatah]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:06pm

"shouldn't the four solos in FOLLIES' Loveland sequence also be sung badly?"

Wait... so Alexis Smith's singing in 'Follies' wasn't a character choice?

In all seriousness, I would like a well sung (in convential terms) Sally this time around, especially if this production gets recorded. However, I sincerely hope they don't go for a Disney/contemporary MT mezzo/soprano-type. I'd like someone in the classic Sally mould voice-wise, i.e. a darker, smokey sound.
Maybe This Time

[GavestonPS]

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

Maybe for the film version one interpretation could be that Liza's Sally is all in her head and that this Sally THINKS she's a fantastic singer but the reality is that she's not; but we are living the performance through her viewpoint and psyche.

I can see that. But to me, Liza-as-Sally is too flighty and too convinced that she is worthless to put together the career her talent deserves. She sings in a third-rate dive, waiting to be discovered (by a producer or her father), and sleeps with anyone who claims to have any sort of show business connection.

It's as if her ideas of "making it" all come from Hollywood B-movies. And why is she in Berlin rather than London, New York, LA or even Paris? She's there for the decadence, not because Weimar Germany offered such wonderful career opportunities. If anything, she's too busy rebelling against her absent father to engineer a vocation.

That's a choice. And choices are always more interesting than innate disabilities.

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:16pm

In regards to the Follies sequence, aren't the characters in that moment in a sort of dream land? They themselves are not putting on a show in real life and real time, so I don't get the comparison there.

That being said, I think Sally can really be played by anyone who can at least carry a tune. While it's interesting if she's not really a singer, having a great voice doesn't take away from the sadness of the character in my mind. She's still a wreck, even if she can sing well. And what matters is if the actress can play that, not if her voice is perfect or not.

[E.Davis]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:17pm

^Sort of a Ironweed take on Sally.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:22pm

I saw Joely Fisher, Mr. Midwest. She was marvelous. I still liked Natasha better, but Fisher was no slouch in the role.

Updated On: 6/25/13 at 09:22 PM

[fashionguru_23]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 9:58pm

Trish Lindström played Sally in the Stratford Festival's production here in Canada a few years ago, and it was something amazing!

To me, her Sally was "pushing through" the first little while until she fell in love with Clifford. Then, she became this strong, powerful woman by the end of "Cabaret", and then have than all fall apart by the end of the show. Kind of seemed like her Sally was a metaphor for Germany after WWI through until after WWII.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 10:01pm

In regards to the Follies sequence, aren't the characters in that moment in a sort of dream land? They themselves are not putting on a show in real life and real time, so I don't get the comparison there.

Yes, of course. It's not a perfect analogy. (Pal Joey was better.)

But my point was the literalism of the Prince/Mendes view, which to me misses the point of musical theater.

[darquegk]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 10:23pm

To be fair, I think that the Price/Mendes production wasn't literalism at all, but brutalism. Things were designed to be uglier and rougher than they were, not "as they were."

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 6/25/13 at 11:03pm

^^^^ I'm sure you're right, darq, and I'm probably wrong to conflate Prince's and Mendes' views. I was merely addressing the literalism of Prince's oft-quoted remark that if Sally had any talent, she wouldn't be stuck in that dive.

I guess I just don't want to hear 2 hours of Kander and Ebb (or anybody else) sung badly.

[orangeskittles]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 1:22am

If you want a Broadway leading lady with an amazing singing voice, find me one who can do dramatic acting while singing without turning into a musical theatre ham.

[jimmycurry01]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 3:45am

I think the film Sally is an entirely different beast than stage Sally. Liza makes a fantastic Sally, but it is such a different conception of the character, and a very different conception of the material.
On stage I want an untrained sounding voice. Not a bad voice, just untrained. I think it lends to the stage production a bit better.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 10:16am

I agree, Jimmycurry. Or at least I think both conceptions can work brilliantly (not sure I'd go so far as to say it could never succeed on stage with a polished, trained Sally) - although perhaps I'm putting words in your mouth).

[gossipguy215]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 3:25pm

By "Cabaret" Sally has left reality and descended into her dream world (that is how Hal described the original production). By that logic, Sally should be able to belt out with talent and training as what we are seeing is no longer real.

[nealb1]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 5:20pm

Natasha Richardson was brilliant, stunning, staggering and tragic! A perfect performance all the way around.

[Someone in a Tree2]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 6:11pm

^ this. We who saw her were incredibly lucky to experience that performance. A transformative match of role and actor.

[theeatah]

Posted: 6/26/13 at 8:27pm

These two are my pick for Sally and Cliff.
Cabaret: 2014 Broadway Revival

[missthemountains]

Posted: 4/22/18 at 11:34pm

Just saw a mind blowing, awesome college production of Cabaret and it made me think about this. Is it true that Hal Prince cast Jill Haworth because she was not a strong singer? She sounds pitchy to me and I can only determine that's because it was intentional.

I guess I'm really split on it. In theory I'm not against Sally being played by a "bad singer", but it's hard, because I believe that the songs help tell the story in this case and it seems wrong to me that "Maybe This Time" be sung by a bad singer. I mean, I guess it depends--what is "bad" exactly? Cuz I think it's one thing for Sally to be pitchy, another for her to be straight up Florence Foster Jenkins status.

Has there ever been a production where it's a specific choice that when Sally sings in the club its noticeably "bad" and the songs that serve as plot devices in the story she sings "well"? I only saw it onstage for the first time last night, since the movie so I'm not well versed in either Broadway/high profile productions outside of clips from Youtube, which again, rarely show the whole thing.

[JBradshaw]

Posted: 4/23/18 at 12:52am

anyone see katie finneran as Sally? how was she?

[muscle23ftl]

Posted: 4/23/18 at 2:25am

For anyone to compare Natasha Richardson's performance to Liza's, it's a huge insult. Liza is legendary for playing that role so well, the fact that she is an amazing singer and dancer made it even better. She is not supposed to be untalented, no one would give a spot to anyone at a cabaret show if she had no talent. 

[Loopin’theloop]

Posted: 4/23/18 at 3:53am

muscle23ftl said: "For anyone to compare Natasha Richardson's performance to Liza's, it's a huge insult. Liza is legendary for playing that role so well, the fact that she is an amazing singer and dancer made it even better. She is not supposed to be untalented, no one would give a spot to anyone at a cabaret show if she had no talent."

You haven’t seen many low rent night club acts then...

[MadsonMelo]

Posted: 4/23/18 at 6:54am

It doesn't make sense to compare Liza with anyone else.


I know that Minelli's performance is perfection and legendary, also the most accessible one but both Fosse and Kander/Ebb re-wrote the role especifically for her because she was Liza Minelli.


That's the reason her Sally is different, as the movie itself its far different from the stage production, because it's basically a ''new version'' of Bowles.


The stage productions stays the same, you don't have to be a great singer, actually you can be bad. I believe both Williams and Stone talked about this when played the roles. Richardson, Horrocks, well, you can be bad. It's almost like Roxie.


Of course some productions can be influenced by the movie version, but its ''not right'' to do it so.