Spiderman Preview Thread! — Page 44

i have a friend at the show tonight, and he said natalie mendoza is back tonight.

update: 9:30pm: the first act is exactly the same.

Updated On: 12/15/10 at 08:41 PM

Fingerlakes, I have to agree with you, Wicked even though people like to bash it. does have a story-line that tugs at peoples emotions. I took my Housekeeper and her husband as a gift. During Defying Gravity they both stood up and cheered spontaneously. It was then I realized why WICKED has been selling out. It wasn't because of the faults I have seen but because of the story and pathos the general audience member sees.

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Updated On: 12/16/10 at 11:03 PM

SNAFU, I think you put what I was trying to say into the perfect words. WICKED is far from being perfect, but it just has that "it" factor.

Does anyone know what major changes have occured during previews?

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http://twitter.com/cardamond/status/15259244706140160
"B4 the show we were told a new ending was going in tonight. Too bad it still makes absolutely no sense. Also, today is Julie Taymor's bday."

Can someone describe the new ending? Is there any added spectacle to Act 2?

Baily, personally I don't care what you are. If I remember I suggested you were Julie at one point in time too. I find you kind of annoying . That's MHO though.

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Updated On: 12/16/10 at 01:25 AM

I was pretty numb at the first preview by this point, but what you described sounds new to me.. I don't remember a big web at the end.

Was there a final fight, or confrontation? Did you feel like the ending worked?

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And I find you annoying as well. I guess we are even.

These were posted about last night's performance:

http://twitter.com/WhiskeyFrisky/status/15269341540917249
Just saw #spiderman the musical. What a piece of ****!

http://twitter.com/DJGY/status/15235639901429761
Interval report @Spiderman: awesome mid-air battle scenes over orchestra, great forced-perspective set design, book & score need an overhaul

So no major stops in Spiderman tonight. It was overall a mixed bag. Great visuals. Everything else needs work.

http://twitter.com/cardamond
Going back to see Julie Taymore's Arachnophobia musical (aka Spiderman) for the second time tonight. What are the chances it's improved?

B4 the show we were told a new ending was going in tonight. Too bad it still makes absolutely no sense. Also, today is Julie Taymor's bday.

Overheard at Spiderman: "The effects are too amazing to comprehend. Like the Grand Canyon." "What is this crap? I want to see f-ing Spidey."

http://talkinbroadway.com/allthatchat/d.php?id=1929954
Posted by: DeGeorge 09:34 am EST 12/16/10

SpiderMan last night (aka StinkerMan)
$65 million does not a good show make. Wow, is this a clunker. It is so NOT entertaining. Not funny, not dramatic ... just very presentational. Not spectacular enough to make you forget the material is dreadful. The flying gets old after the first few sequences. (I found Sandy Duncan as Peter Pan flying over the audience and Mary Poppins ascending to the rafters more thrilling more thrilling than any of the flying in Spiderman.) The book is a mess, the music completely forgettable. Nothing special about the performances. There is no emotion in this show. It just is "there". Its as if Taymor and company thought they could dupe the audience with huge sets and spectacle, but last night they didn't buy into it. Very tepid applause, and in this age of obligatory standing ovations, there was none last night. A few scattered people here and there stood, but they were few and far between. The bulk of the audience remained seated and politely applauded. It clearly was not a crowd pleaser last night.

This was my friend's take on the ending. Pretty much the same as above, and dumber than before:

"At the end of the show, when Arachne confronts Peter, she has captured MJ and has her hanging in a spiderweb, which apparently has a lot of technical problems and took forever to make it onto the stage. Now instead of Peter just talking to Arachne, Peter is fighting Arachne while crawling around the web. It's apparently really awkward to watch. They sort of float around on it and choke each other until Peter tells Arachne that he'll be with her if she lets MJ go. Arachne responds that she doesn't want Peter anymore because he's still human, and she lets them both go. She then asks Peter to kill her so she can finally be at peace. Then she flies up into the 'sky' on the same rope that she came down on in the beginning of the first act."

the ending scene is a blur to me because it was so anti-climactic, but I think Arachne and Peter just 'talked' and then she let MJ and Peter go and she went up into the sky.

Arachne needs to be cut entirely. ADMIT IT, JULIE.

yeah, in addition to them needing an entirely new second act. And, um, they could write a new number to replace the dumb shoes number if, you know, their composers were on this CONTINENT. Personally, I think Julie should demand Bono come back and fix this sh*tshow of a score he created. He demanded that she direct, so I don't think it's out of bounds for her to make this demand.

I don't even think Bono needs to be here to write the song. Just phone it in or email it. We all know in history many iconic showtunes have been written overnight or put in in a single day.

I think Julie should demand Bono come back and fix this sh*tshow of a score he created. He demanded that she direct, so I don't think it's out of bounds for her to make this demand.

*L* Yeah, don't think that's going to happen. U2 is currently on tour in Australia. If you think Spidey is expensive at $1 million a week, the U2 tour costs 5 times that.

Now, of course, despite that cost, U2 is still very profitable, which may not be true for Spiderman. In either case, I don't think you're going to see Bono working on the score until the tour is over.

Besides, the book is what needs the most work, not the score. There are, what, 15 songs in this? I'd say 5 are unremarkable, 5 are OK, and 5 are exceptional.