Steel Pier

[fossemoves]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 1:35pm

What went wrong? I find the show lovely...well, okay, I find the score lovely. The book needs a bit of work. This show had so much potential.

But seriously, what went wrong?

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 1:37pm

No no no! This is our HAPPY time!! No Steel Pier talk when Curtains is about to open!!

[WithoutATrace]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 1:39pm

I didn't see it live, but I adore the score. "Running in Place" is such a great showcase for Ziemba. I also love "Willing to Ride," "Everybody's Girl," and "Somebody Older."

From what I heard, the book had a lot of problems and Ziemba couldn't really carry the show...maybe others who saw it live could give their input.

...and the score to Steel Pier is a million times better than the score to Curtains, IMO.
Updated On: 3/16/07 at 01:39 PM

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 1:44pm

"Ziemba couldn't really carry the show..."

Bullsh*t. She was one of the few aspects that worked.

[WithoutATrace]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 1:45pm

Glad to hear it, Rath. Like I said, I didn't see it live and was going by what others told me.

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 1:56pm

I saw the show twice. Loved everything about it and Stroman once again surpassed herself with her sensational choreography. Wow!

I feel it didn't find an audience. Marketing on the show was lackluster (almost non-existant).

[CurtainPullDowner]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:01pm

My problem was the book.
The score, cast, set and choreography (Stro's best, so far) were outstanding.
Following Ziemba's character's story was messy, and i felt she was too strong, (not her fault), If this had been done when Liza was younger I could see her in the role with a better more focused book.
The fact that no one actually "won" the marathon bothered me a lot.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:02pm

Interesting statement about Liza, CPD, as this was written with the intention of making Ziemba into Kander and Ebb's next "Liza."

[Ourtime992]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:08pm

the whole dead guy thing was a punch in the gut that destroyed the feeling of the whole show

[Hanna from Hamburg]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:08pm

The book did have issues, but I really loved the score and the show (in general). I disagree about the choreography being some of Strohman's strongest -- it was good, but not her best. I'd say Contact was probably her strongest and Crazy For You wasn't too shabby either. Ziemba was (IMO) the strongest female performance of the season. She gave EVERYTHING in Steel Pier and really took the audience on a journey. I can't remember seeing a show where I was pulling so strongly for a character to take that final step and change their life. Unfortunately, Chicago revival happened the same season and snapped up several of the awards that would have normally gone to other shows/performers. Add to that the turning of the tides in Titanic's favor and Steel Pier missed out on all of its awards and, ultimately, closed. Had it picked up a performance award or choreography, it might have lasted longer. IMO, it deserved best score and show over Titanic (which deserved scenic design and orchestrations).

Updated On: 3/16/07 at 02:08 PM

[Jon]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:18pm

The good: Ziemba, the score, the choreography (EXCEPT for the regrettable pole dance), the lighting.

The O.K.: the rest of the cast, the sets and costumes.

The kinda weak: (forgive me) Mr. Ebb's lyrics. How can a pier be "uproarious"?

The awful: the book, the direction.

[purpleprince101]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:19pm

i liked it.

[fossemoves]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:34pm

That's what I've been able to surmise from alot of the reviews and talks I've pieced together aswell. it was too 'brightly' directed. it is the depression after all there should be a venere of desperation and I don't really hear that in the character solos -

This show is on my list of shows I'd like to direct - it needs a darker and more mystical take I think, no? I mean alot of the ideas of this show lie in Magic and it seems too fairy tale-esque(Thanks to the book). It lacks a certain amount of dark desperation. IMO.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 2:36pm

It was dark and desperate all right.

[Hanna from Hamburg]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 3:07pm

And the dark desperation is what Karen brought SO WELL to her performance. That's why you rejoice when she leaves it all and steps out of the Steel Pier. Given what women of that era would do, it's not the choice that would normally have been made.

[CurtainPullDowner]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 3:09pm

Oh, I forgot about that pole dance, that was pretty bad.

But I loved the group dances.

[Jon]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 3:41pm

The final moment of the show, when Rita Racine finally decides to walk out on the marathon (thanks to the encouragement of the ghost) always felt like Karen Ziemba saying "I'm getting the hell out of this lousy show and finding a better one!"

The book was just too much like an episode of "Touched By An Angel".

And real dance marathons went on for three MONTHS, not thrre weeks!

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 3:58pm

I don't have much of a memory of the score (never bought the cast album -- little of it made much of an impression on me in the theater anyway -- and frankly I don't ever want to be reminded of the experience of sitting through it ever again), but I found the show to be both annoying and a numbing repetitive bore to sit through.

I can rarely remember being so utterly uninterested in a collection of characters as I was with those in this show -- I didn't care about ANYBODY up there. The choreography and staging were flat, redundant (by the end I felt as if I'd actually sat through a 60 day dance marathon) and pedestrian (Ziemba's big solo dance number looked like she was expending a whole lot of energy for zero impact -- it never took off and just sorta sat there). The cast was, by turns either bland and plastic (Harrison, McDonald, Wright) or over-the top and trying WAAAAY too hard to make an impression (Chenoweth grated on me and Monk seemed to be channeling Ethel Merman's louder, brassier, more annoying sister -- she chewed so much scenery during "Everybody's Girl" at one point I thought that she might swallow the mic whole; I've never seen someone work so hard to try to stop a show and fail so miserably -- at a certain point I just wanted her to stop and get off the stage, but the damn thing went on for another 3 interminable verses).

The whole mess somehow managed to almost put me to sleep AND give me a throbbing headache. HATE that show.

Updated On: 3/16/07 at 03:58 PM

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 4:01pm

Margo - I hated Everybody's Girl (not the performance, but the song, sorry, Mr. Ebb!), but every time I saw it (3 times), it DID stop the show - the rest of the audience went crazy while I just sat there stunned at the response.

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 4:51pm

I loved the show. I found it extremely moving and felt that Ziemba gave a remarkably fine performance.

Still, neither the writing nor the production was 100 percent there. And while I had no problem with the mystical side of it, clearly many people did and that may have have been an impossible hurdle for many audiences.

Btw, apart from the fact that the title song is not meant to be a song written with a high level of sophistication so it would make sense if a word was misused, the first meanings of uproarious are "in an uproar, tumultuous," or "noisy." Which would certainly describe the steel pier, where so much was always going on.
Updated On: 3/16/07 at 04:51 PM

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 4:56pm

I agree, nobody, with the use of "uproarious". I did not have a problem with it. The score was not one of the problems with this show.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 7:04pm

I enjoyed it as well

Too bad so many did not like it

[Jon]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 8:08pm

I got the feeling that "Everybody's Girl" was written more as a song that would have a long, healthy life in cabarets - and drag clubs in particular - than as a song that would really fit the show. There is no way she would have been allowed to sing those lyrics on a radio broadcast in real life.

About six months after the show closed, I was watching a PBS documentary about the history of the gay community in San Francisco. At one point they showed a bar in Chinatown that featured female impersonators, and sure enough, there was a Chinese drag queen singing "Everybody's Girl".

[OOTI2004]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 11:48pm

I'm sorry to ask, but what is the meaning of the title. I only know the basics of the show, and the title has always confused me.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 3/16/07 at 11:51pm

It refers to the Steel Pier on the boardwalk in Atlantic City, where the marathons were held.

I actually love watching Monk do Everybody's Girl on the Leading Ladies DVD - I think it's a top-of-the-line performance. I just don't like the song.