"TheatreDiva90016 - another good reason to frequent these boards less."<<>>
“I hesitate to give this line of discussion the validation it so desperately craves by perpetuating it, but the light from logic is getting further and further away with your every successive post.” <<>>
-whatever2
Through "There's a world" with Mazzie/Kyle in Next to Normal. Mazzie is crying, and it feels so sad that she knows she might 'lose' her son. But then when he comes close (I think she reaches out for his face), her cries change to cries of happiness, and *SPOILER*, it was so plausible that there was nothing she could do but (attempt) suicide...
Bernadette Peters' Clowns.
"You can't overrate Bernadette Peters. She is such a genius. There's a moment in "Too Many Mornings" and Bernadette doing 'I wore green the last time' - It's a voice that is just already given up - it is so sorrowful. Tragic. You can see from that moment the show is going to be headed into such dark territory and it hinges on this tiny throwaway moment of the voice." - Ben Brantley (2022)
"Bernadette's whole, stunning performance [as Rose in Gypsy] galvanized the actors capable of letting loose with her. Bernadette's Rose did take its rightful place, but too late, and unseen by too many who should have seen it" Arthur Laurents (2009)
"Sondheim's own favorite star performances? [Bernadette] Peters in ''Sunday in the Park,'' Lansbury in ''Sweeney Todd'' and ''obviously, Ethel was thrilling in 'Gypsy.'' Nytimes, 2000
The last scene of SIDE MAN. Clifford gives a monologue to the audience while his father Gene, stands on the stage silhouetted playing the trumpet one last time. As Clifford finishes talking, the lights in the club they're in slowly come down, almost in a flicker as the trumpet gets louder and louder until they're both gone. That play was one of the most unforgettable theatrical experiences I've ever had.
The final scene in Hair (SPOILERS) when Claude is lying, dead, on the American flag in center stage with a single white spotlight on him. The rest of the cast runs through the aisles singing "Let The Sun Shine In" until they get out the back of the theater, and the song continues to play on the speakers until it fades out. CHILLS. I don't know if that's how they staged it in the original, but I thought this (the revival's) staging of that was perfect.
In the 2006 revival of Sweeney Todd, Michael Cerveris/Patti LuPone during "My Friends," it's a brilliant song that was staged brilliantly. When Michael screamed the last line "At last, my arm is complete again!" I got chills. It's the completion of Sweeney's transition into monomania and I LOVE it.
Scratch and claw for every day you're worth!
Make them drag you screaming from life, keep dreaming
You'll live forever here on earth.
End of Act I: When Cody (played by Evan Jonigkeit) comes into Sister Jamison's (Kathleen Turner) office with a bleeding arm and needle fragments stuck in. Once Sister Jamison applies the tourniquet to stop the bleeding, the drugs that Cody attempted to inject begin to course through his system, as he strips completely naked and, in a drug-induced mania, attempts to rape Sister Jamison.
Also, at the very end of HIGH, when Sister Jamison says one last prayer with Cody, and then she abandons him there in the alley, leaving him to die.
(HIGH was a life-changing piece of theatre for me...What I would give to see it again!)
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The finale of "A Tale of Two Cities," when Sydney Carton begins his final climb up the steps of the guillotine, and the music cuts (briefly) and the light flashes to Lucie, Charles & Little Lucie as he recites the final lines: "It's a far, far better thing I do...".
quizking, that is so sad . I wish I could have seen HIGH.
"You can't overrate Bernadette Peters. She is such a genius. There's a moment in "Too Many Mornings" and Bernadette doing 'I wore green the last time' - It's a voice that is just already given up - it is so sorrowful. Tragic. You can see from that moment the show is going to be headed into such dark territory and it hinges on this tiny throwaway moment of the voice." - Ben Brantley (2022)
"Bernadette's whole, stunning performance [as Rose in Gypsy] galvanized the actors capable of letting loose with her. Bernadette's Rose did take its rightful place, but too late, and unseen by too many who should have seen it" Arthur Laurents (2009)
"Sondheim's own favorite star performances? [Bernadette] Peters in ''Sunday in the Park,'' Lansbury in ''Sweeney Todd'' and ''obviously, Ethel was thrilling in 'Gypsy.'' Nytimes, 2000
Dr. Emma Brookner's monologue, delivered by Ellen Barkin.
The final ten minutes of JERUSALEM.
The Diana/Dr. Madden scene mentioned above from NEXT TO NORMAL.
The entirety of 'Joseph Smith American Moses' from THE BOOK OF MORMON.
"Oh look at the time, three more intelligent plays just closed and THE ADDAMS FAMILY made another million dollars" -Jackie Hoffman, Broadway.com Audience Awards
The original 1972 Broadway production of PIPPIN. I was only 7 years old but I still remember at the start of the show the beginning notes of "Magic to Do" starting and the curtain rising to tons of smoke on the dark stage then suddenly you see all those hands floating in beams of light coming up from the stage floor.
The final moments in SUNSET BLVD. as Norma walks to the front of the stage the scrim lowers behind her and as she sings the final "... I'll be ME!", a small flickering light begins on her face which grows and expands to fill the entire scrim behind her and its a grainy/fuzzy black and white image of her in her youth. At first it looks like a photograph but then the image slowly begins to move and then... the image of the young Norma Desmond smiles and then BLACKOUT! I remember jumping up in my seat the very first time I saw that. Wow!
It takes a lot of deep personal struggle to relate. I remind myself of Elphaba/ Glinda so it was really memorable for me. With time, you'll gain life experience and learn to appreciate the genious of the song.