"Side Show" Preview Thread — Page 4

"I'm going to be that guy.. Was there a window card available?"

Yes there was! The picture is the one of them facing backwards with the lights etc. this is also the marquee and playbill! There are shirts too

Now I'm gonna be that guy:

Dad anyone go to the stage door?

I loathed the original and am very hesitant to try again.
A TDF ticket however is enticing me.

Thoughts?

I cribbed this from the other bulletin board. Incredible photos! I love that the photographer just posed the actors in the back alley.





Wall Street Journal: Curiosities Shine in

Updated On: 10/29/14 at 04:47 PM

goldenboy: your use of the word LOATHE makes me think you should pass. Someone who loathes something and goes back may be a bit masochistic. But if you can keep an open mind to a new interpretation, take the ticket. I just think you may loathe the idea of the show and that will not change.

Updated On: 10/29/14 at 05:56 PM

From the sounds of it they're doing a lot of work to make us care about the two girls. I think we're inherently interested and want to know their story, but I think cutting the boy's backstory just lessens the overall story because now we just don't care? And the flashbacks sound silly.

I was in the front row last night and I pretty much loved it. Getting to the rush line at 8:30 put me in seat 109, which was perfect. The freaks are genuinely scary up that close.

The first act is by far the stronger half of the show. The new songs mostly serve to give backstory, but there has been a lot of work done to give us a stronger, more complicated sense of the characters we already know. It's most notable with Terry. He comes off more strongly as a villain in this version, which I thought was weakened by keeping Private Conversation. (I'm biased since I've always hated the song. It got one of the strongest ovations of the night.) I'd forgotten how sad the show is - I've never particularly liked Say Goodbye to the Freak/Side Show but it had me in tears last night. Daisy and Violet's new "performance" songs - Typical Girls Next Door and Ready to Play - are lots of fun. I was happy to see that a lot of the lyrics that bother me on the cast recording have been blessedly changed.

I'm also selfishly happy that Leave Me Alone isn't gone, even if We Share Everything got the axe. Act two is pretty love-ballad heavy but it doesn't become too monotonous thanks to One Plus One Equals Three. Good Lord, this song is doing a hell of a lot more work in this incarnation. Rather than being just an olio for Buddy it's been turned into a really horrifying exploitation of Violet's wedding night. It makes the humiliation Daisy feels a lot more palpable.

I don't care too much that Tunnel of Love is gone, at least partially. The melody has been given to a chorus of Texans anticipating the wedding. I'm not too sure it needs to stay, but I know it will. I know I'm being cynical but I just see it as a the composer keeping a fan favorite even if it doesn't work too well in this new (far superior) version.

Side note: As a "Freaks" fan I was absolutely delighted to see the entire cast of characters appear in the show's final moments. :)

And I didn't think the flashback was silly at all.

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I was there tonight and loved it too. While the original had wonderful moments, I think this version is a vast improvement in just about every area. The storytelling is much stronger and I think allows for a greater emotional impact, especially at "I Will Never Leave You."

Re: "Ready to Play," the number accomplishes something important that "We Share Everything" did not -- it signals the twins' sexual liberation. With the new flashback and the trial scene, a lot more is made of their near-imprisonment by Sir, the side show owner, and their efforts to win their freedom. As in Cabaret and other concept musicals, the song serves a dual purpose as a performance number and a key character moment, a kind of re-branding of themselves as women in control of their sexuality. In general I thought their sexuality was handled in a more sophisticated way (and along those lines I'm happy to see "Tunnel of Love" gone).

I also think Terry and Buddy are far more compelling characters than they were originally. Terry is now an outcast from the NY vaudeville scene, and is covering up how desperately he needs a break under a lot of bravado. His feelings for Daisy develop more gradually, and the new plot development (SPOILERISH) -- Terry tells the twins he can have them separated by doctors, which creates a big conflict between Daisy and Violet -- makes him much more active in his desire to hold on to his status as "normal." There's some nice tension between Terry and Buddy over Buddy's homosexuality, which is treated as an open secret by many of the characters, and then a great moment in the final group scene when Terry's fears finally get the better of him. I don't think he's portrayed as a villain, more as someone sitting on a lot of insecurity, and Ryan Silverman does a lovely job.

Buddy's struggle here is also moving, because in spite of the obvious obstacle to his and Violet's happiness in this version, his love for her is authentic, and Matthew Hydzik conveys that well in Act 2. With all of that in there, I don't miss "More Than We Bargained For," which had Buddy reporting events happening off-stage; the revisions allow us to spend more time watching the budding relationships develop among the four of them rather than hearing about it (one good example is a really charming brief sequence with the men getting the twins ready for their trial). Bland might have described Buddy and Terry in the original, but I think the characters really come into sharp focus here.

In terms of Tony eligiblity, it's a little unwise to rely too much on precedent because Tony history is extremely inconsistent, but in the past for Best Score, the percentage of new material (defined as "newly written for this Production") was done by time (ie, using a stopwatch), and a new lyric over old music counted as "new." So, I'm expecting Side Show will be eligible.

Last year, Howard Ashman and Tim Rice were Tony nominees for Best Score, although I don't think either of them wrote anything specifically for the stage musical of Aladdin. So, either the entire score of Aladdin was nominated once it passed the 50% mark, or they counted trunk songs and whatnot as "newly written for this Production."

I don't think Side Show will end up being nominated for Best Score, though, unless the competition in that category ends up being extremely weak. I think its prior nomination in that category will hurt it. I don't think any show has ended up getting nominated for Best Score or Best Book in 2 different years.

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I am so looking forward to seeing this tomorrow night. I'm going to do my best to watch it with an open mind and do my best not to compare it to the original. Which others have mentioned can be very difficult.
I am not sure how many of you know, but the same day as the first preview of Side Show they released the documentary of the sisters called "Bound by Flesh". I watched it last night. I highly recommend it. Watching this documentary my heart truly broke for these sisters. There was so much about their lives they could not possibly put into the musical. Some facts I did not know...if you're looking at the sisters Violet is actually on the left and Daisy the right. Not sure in this production, but the original had them opposite. Violet at one point married, but it was a publicity stunt. The guy was gay, but of course at that time it was all closeted. Daisy had a baby out of wedlock. It was a boy which she immediately put up for adoption. She eventually was the one who married Buddy who they met in vaudeville. They never consummated the marriage as he was gay too. Their goddaughter is interviewed in the documentary and she jokes that they seemed to be attracted to gay men. In the end they died penniless. The Hong Kong flu took their lives. They believe Daisy died 2 to 4 days before Violet when they found them on the floor in their room.

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I would have liked to have seen this .. but since the rush tickets are only for people under 30, I guess I won't.

The flashback sounds like a horrible idea.

And yeah they needed a new director. Someone with an outside eye.