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#26

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/14/11 at 12:22pm

I also love the Pet Shop Boys penned Closer to Heaven (even though I think Jonathan Harvey's book is very lacking) which got scathing reviews in the British press but it's hrd to judge because most of the reviews focused on the tacky production, which I never saw, ands made a huge point about gay sex and drugs not being appropriate to West End theatre...

I did see that show and yes, the production looked pretty cheap and tacky. But the book was just dreary and filled with completely unlikeable characters. Frances Barber as Billie Trix and two or three songs were the only things that kept me in my seat. The high point of the evening was meeting Sandra Bernhard and her girlfriend who were also attending. The song "Positive Role Model" was a better reflection of my opinion towards the writers. I think the only worse musical I saw in London was Boyband, but I went with ulterior motives in mind.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
#29

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/14/11 at 8:24pm

Though it certainly wasn't perfect, I absolutely LOVED "The People In The Picture" - my own family background and the fact that Donna Murphy is my favorite actress might have influenced my judgement, of course.

Another vote for "Women On The Verge of A Nervous Breakdown" - I really, really liked it.
"Years from now, when you talk about this - And you will - Be kind. "
#30

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/14/11 at 8:58pm

Matt I appreciate your opnion. I've only een a poor bootleg, but the book seemed pretty atrocious--I still think the entire score is very strong and one of the few pop composer scores using a current pop/dance song but with smart musical theatre lyrics--but anything appealing or fleshed out about the characters is in the songs, not Harvey's book, which is cliched, borderline mean spirited, and also extremely quick and thin (Harvey true to his reputation blamed everyone involved except himself for it...) Not sure as to your last comment--do you mean you wish the show had portrayed better role models?
#31

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/14/11 at 9:00pm

I said Bonnie and Clyde earlier, but ill ad some more.

- Bonnie and Clyde
- Catch Me If You Can (I love that show and I think it closed too early!)
- Not really HATED by the critics, but i love the current revival of How to Succeed.
- Godspell
- I "liked" not "LOVED" Women on the Verge...
- Enjoyed Wonderland; but it's far from my favorite show.
#32

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 7:58am

THE ADDAMS FAMILY

ASPECTS OF LOVE
"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES--- "THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS
#33

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 12:17pm

Top and foremost- Taboo. Loved the show, the cast, Rosie...all of it!
Secondly, hated by critics, and people on here- Wicked. It's just the friendship aspect that gets me everytime.
#34

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 1:25pm

Dating myself, but I have never gotten over the reception The Kentucky Cycle received here in New York -- the work won the Pulitzer (along with several other awards), and received widespread acclaim in Seattle, LA, and DC.

Frank Rich, who was the paper of record's theater critic at the time, gave it a mixed-to-negative review ... and he was kinder than some. It closed in just under a month.
"You, sir, are a moron." (PlayItAgain)
#35

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 1:51pm

Not sure as to your last comment--do you mean you wish the show had portrayed better role models?

Yes. It seemed that they were desperately trying to drum up sympathy for these "misguided" characters, but I could never shake the feeling that they weren't victims of society or circumstance, but of their own choices and complacency. The finale petulantly demands a positive role model, yet none of the characters were willing to step up to the task outlined in the lyrics. By that point, it was too little too late and it sounded more like a hollow sentiment. The sort of ambitious plans you make to become a better person when you're stoned on the couch munching your way to the bottom of a bag of Cheetos.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
#37

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 2:26pm

The Addams Family
Chess
The Woman in White
Mary Poppins
Memphis
Young Frankenstein
Aspects of Love
9-5
A Catered Affair
Legally Blonde
Beauty and the Beast
The Pirate Queen
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
Bombay Dreams
#38

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 2:50pm

Forgot to mention that I thoroughly enjoyed The People in the Picture.

Also, I don't remember how it was critically received, but the Ragtime revival was the most wonderful thing I've ever seen.
I know you. I know you. I know you.
#40

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 4:03pm

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Bombay Dreams! Absolutely!

Though I remember the critics actually being pretty kind to Bombay Dreams.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
#41

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 4:37pm

Let's see in 1970 something the critics trashed Chicago.

It went on to become a classic.

I like a Michael Rupert musical called Mail where a man came home and his mail came to life. Very interesting very unusual. The critics killed it.'

My parents and I saw a preview. We thought it would be a big fat hit.

Recently:
Memphis (which went on to win a Tony Award)
Bonnie and Clyde.
9 to 5 (this surprised me that I liked it)
Toxic Avenger (was genius but Ben Brantley made caca on it.)
PRiscilla Queen of the Desert
Wicked
#42

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 5:16pm

I remember Mail was playing the Music Box theatre during my first visit to NYC in 1988. I was always curious about it, so I eventually bought the script. Weird. I felt like Michael Rupert simply didn't know what to do outside the gimmick of singing mail. Oddly enough, Brian Stokes Mitchell won a Theatre World Award for this forgotten show.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
#43

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 5:59pm

A while back I read all the reviews I could find of the 1975 Chicago and I wouldn't say they trashed it, though the response was absolutely mixed (and the score was largely called subpar pastiche that no one would ever remember or sing). But I guess all of this is relative to what critics, etc.But I suppose if we're counting Wicked as a critically hated show, than the original Chicago (as well as Pippin, etc) counts here. But I mean then I'd have to add Kiss of the Spider Woman as well.

(I always thought Road Show got decent reviews? And I think the Ragtime revival got good press)

Mister Matt that criticism does make sense--I admit after knowing the score so well for so long, I was shocked at how poor the libretto was. And it's always easy to blame the book, but Jonathan Harvey did in this case take a play that was just meant to have existing club music and asked the Pet Shop Boys to write a score -- and I do think in the songs PSB raise everything in terms of characterization far beyond what Harvey writes. But I'e had the sme basic problem with virtually every play by the overated Harvey (he lucked out with his first hit, Beautiful Thing) I mean even the song For All Of Us does try to lead to the Positive Role Model ending in a way the script never does, being too busy with caricatures and "shocking" one liners.

So maybe for me it goes into the "scores we love for shows that critics hated" ctegory more, but I stand by my love for much of the score It's too bad that the fun 10 minutre opening number--which is the highlight of the show--was only released as a bonus to PSBoys club members, for the CD the producer decided on a pointless 3 minute edit).

But your points make sense.



#44

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 7:58pm

goldenboy and Mister Matt, I knew the director of Mail and I love Michael Rupert, so I saw the show several times out here at the Pasadena Playhouse.

I never understood why I was supposed to care about this guy who was insisting he wanted to be left alone. I mean, if receiving mail is such a burden for you, there are trash cans to help with the problem.

****

Eric, I loved many things about the original Chicago and saw it many times. But it was a lot to take, at the time, and Fosse seemed incapable of making a subtle choice whenever it was possible to beat the audience over the head. Obviously, it's a brilliant score and the performances were amazing, but I actually thought it was little better when Chita Rivera was out--she was TOO good in a very distressing role.

But I also think we as a society caught up with the play's cynicism by the time of the revival. And I wonder whether the concert-like presentation doesn't give the piece a slightly lighter touch.
#45

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/15/11 at 10:27pm

I need to learn more about this Mail show--I'd never heard of it before... And it actually was about a guy who is accosted by mail, that sings and he doesn't want?

By that point in his career I think Fosse maybe was unable to make a subtle choice (funny as one of the strengths of his *choreography* is sublety, even if that's been ripped off so much since that it may no longer seem it). I've never fully bought the concept that in post OJ culture audiences are more willing to accept the story, though enough people have said that that I probably am in the wrong.

But I do think the concert staging does change perceptions a lot. Yes, the original version was a full on vaudeville pastiche--with each number representing a take on some standard vaudeville routine, and I know many bemoan that the revival isn't (I do, in a way, and I miss some of the cut stuff), but presenting it as almost a dinner cabaret entertainment as it is now does make it a LOT easier for an audience to handle--and yet I still feel it works much better than the film which keeps some of the vaudeville element but feels too safe for me.

Still, I wish more footage (and even decent photos) of the original production existed.

From the major reviews I've read though--NYT, etc--all of them hated the music and also hated how LOUD it was which must have been at a time when Broadway shows were starting to get louder and louder (or maybe that's a Fosse thing too--the reviews of Pippin had the same complaint and hated the music even more, and while it's not a great score like Chicago is, I do think the music of Pippin has, the Fosse stuff aside, proven itself as quite charming over the yerars--not that I want to give Schwartz a bigger ego or anything)
#46

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/16/11 at 2:38am

I didn't remember the complaints about loudness, Eric, but I suspect that was a function of the age of critics. I was 21 or so and compared to rock concerts and discos, even the loudest Broadway musicals weren't all THAT loud!

It's not anything I can prove, but I think the "OJ Theory" has a lot of merit. In 1975, reporters Woodward and Bernstein had just brought down a corrupt president! People knew that guilty people were sometimes acquitted, but I think most of us still thought the court system was basically just and competent. Being told the media AND the court system were all corrupt was a bitter pill to swallow. As impressed as I was the first time I saw it, I wondered how people so cynical could summon the energy and will to create a musical comedy.

By late 1996, we had all been through OJ, licked our wounds and survived. We were better able to laugh at our own obsession with celebrity and we were far less trusting of the media.

What strikes me most now is that I could sit in a theater and watch a show with Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, Jerry Orbach, Mary McCarty and Barney Martin! Yes, I knew they were great, but I sort of took the cast for granted, not realizing I would probably never see its like again.

***

(I completely agree with you about PIPPIN. Not as good as CHICAGO, but a better score than most critics realized.)

***

MAIL (how quaint: not a concept that could be revived today I wouldn't think) was about a guy who was clinically depressed and wanted the outside world to leave him alone in his apartment. Instead, he was plagued by a girlfriend, other friends and other people in the form of his mail, which came to life and sang.

The problem wasn't the concept (or the staging of it), IMO, but the premise. It was akin to the many "alienated white straight men have it so tough" movies and I'm not a fan. Some of my best friends are white straight men, but if they want to hide, drink themselves to death, stop shaving, whatever, I just don't know why I should care.

(If you want to check out a Michael Rupert show, THREE GUYS NAKED FROM THE WAIST DOWN was better, I thought.)

Updated On: 12/16/11 at 02:38 AM

#50

Shows You Loved, But Hated By The Critics?

Posted: 12/30/11 at 12:27am

gcontini2, Passing Strange was the best reviewed musical of that season.
Listen, I don't take my clothes off for anyone, even if it is "artistic". - JANICE

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