Saycon Sengbloh to replace Eden Espinosa? — Page 3

"The current tour Elphaba, Julia Murney, does not perform at matinees, (about 3 a week on tour). Her understudy, Maria Eberline, and her standby, Victoria Matlock, appear to be sharing the matinee performances evenly. Maria is good enough to go to Broadway- I would even venture to say she's better than Eden Espinosa. However, I think that the reason they keep her as understudy instead of standby is because the ensemble sounds much better with her voice in it."

A couple notes here. I've seen all three Elphaba's on the tour. My students communicate with a few different people in the show and keep track of who goes on when and such. I'm not sure the exact count, but since Julia and Victoria joined the tour last march Victoria has performed over 40 times as Elphaba, and Maria around 15. I do not believe that means they are "splitting" the role. As stated in other forums, this is simply rumored wishful thinking. Standby's and understudies are in different pay grades, and, in this case, different leagues.

As for Maria and Broadway; after seeing her performance, I understand why she's in the ensemble. She may very well make the ensemble sound better as some performers flourish in a group situation, but as a lead, as a soloist, she is entirely inadequate. I refuse to sink to inconsiderate and hurtful terms on these forums but comparisons to Eden, Julia or Victoria are unfair to these fine performers. These three are excellent principle players, not ensemble women, and frankly I'm disappointed the producers continue to put Maria on with a standby sitting backstage.

I am certainly a fan now of Miss Matlock, and would love to see her as the full time Elphaba on tour or on Broadway. Selfishly, I do hope its the tour so I might see the show in my hometown again. I know many other patrons who are in agreement! Thanks for reading.

As I said before, Stephen Schwartz really does not like Saycon Sengbloh, which is one of the reasons I really doubt she will take over for Eden, now I have no inside knowledge and I am not pretending to, but I know that they have always disagreed. And if they wanted her to take over wouldn’t they have given her the show after Shoshana left? I have never seen Saycon, so I really don’t know about her talent or ability, but she has also apparently said she is leaving the show. So I don’t get how people on this board can think she would take over. I think the producers feel that she is a fine standby, but not good enough to play it full time and there is NOTHING wrong with that.

Updated On: 8/13/06 at 03:19 PM

The sentence saying Saycon would replace Eden is off of wikipedia now.

So...Saycon probably is not replacing Eden...

Yeah, I know. It is just that wikipedia has been pretty good with the Wicked Broadway replacement cast history, and I was very surprised when I saw that Saycon was replacing Eden. But they took it down, and I was almost positive that Saycon was leaving, so I assume she still is.

Thanks.

Well, Wikipedia isn't really a reliable source. But I wouldn't be surprised, since I don't think Gasteyer has anything better going on than the opportunity to star in a Broadway show

I'm pretty sure they broke up. I think I witnessed a fight they were having over the phone while I was waiting for Sebastian....

alliez92092 - do tell more....

admanrich - how does it effect you who the cast is made up of? At least it gives people jobs.

Hahahaha, I just heard him screaming, "This isn't fair! You do this to me all the time, and I put so much work into our relationship!" or something along those lines.

OMG someone needs to check Wikipedia to really see who is replacing Eden..... i almost died!

well, now if he is opposite Kate it will give him more insentive to get together with Elphaba.

That would be amazing.