THE CHER SHOW Reviews

[LimelightMike]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 1:28am

[mar6411]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 7:13pm

Bump 

[iwuldwf]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:13pm

This is a general opening night thing, not a review, but Jarrod Spector (Sonny) just took to Twitter mid-show to call out Kanye West for being on his phone in the audience.  https://twitter.com/jarrodspector/status/1069753066033987584

[lifeisinyou]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:16pm

Pretty positive review from the Hollywood Reporter..

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/cher-show-theater-1165871?utm_source=twitter&utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:21pm

Variety is negative. "Despite an icon with attitude, an armful of pop tunes and a can-do cast, the script never quite finds a satisfying style — or a genuine heart — as a winning stage musical."

https://variety.com/2018/legit/reviews/cher-show-review-broadway-1203072647/

The Wrap leans negative, with a rave for Block. "The jokes are lame, segues between scenes are blunt or nonexistent, and a general lack of inventiveness pervades the entire enterprise...the real star...is Block, who may be the best impersonator the Broadway stage has seen in recent memory. She even manages to exude genuine maternal warmth in her sage advice to the two younger Chers without ever losing any sass or swagger."

https://www.thewrap.com/the-cher-show-broadway-review-but-the-real-star-is-stephanie-j-block/

Updated On: 12/3/18 at 08:21 PM

[Bwayfan292]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:22pm

The kayne west stans defending him saying Jarrod shouldn’t be tweeting during the show, and that he needs to stop telling black people what they can and can’t do makes me wanna punch them in their throat.

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:25pm

Deadline is mixed to negative. "Believing in life after love turns out to be a surer bet than pinning your hopes on jukebox musicals, no matter how fabulous the subject. The Cher Show...might not disappoint anyone likely to applaud a Bob Mackie-designed Oscar gown, but neither does it do any boundary-pushing. So very un-Cher"

https://deadline.com/2018/12/the-cher-show-broadway-review-powerhouse-performances-skimpy-story-1202512841/

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:41pm

Based on buzz here, I expected reviews to be closer to the Hollywood Reporter’s. Will be interesting to see what New York Times has to say.

Regarding Kanye, good for Jarrod. That behavior should be called out. As much as I love Madonna (and I do), it bothers me when she can’t stay off her iPad during Hamilton or her iPhone during a screening of 12 Years a Slave. He’s been invited to opening night of a show based on the life of an entertainer. You think that might lead him to give it the modicum of respect it takes to heed the warnings about cell phones before Act 1 begins. I guess not...

[Kad]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:45pm

I’d be shocked if the gentlemen at the Times were positive, based on dismissive comments they’ve made before this even started performances.

Updated On: 12/3/18 at 08:45 PM

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:47pm

Kad said: "I’d be shocked if the gentlemen at the Times were positive, based on dismissivecomments they’ve made before this even started performances."

Ooh, do spill the tea. 

[LuPita2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:51pm

 He’s been invited to opening night of a show based on the life of an entertainer. You think that might lead him to give it the modicum of respect it takes to heed the warnings about cell phones before Act 1 begins. I guess not...

More like, his trashy wife dragged him there and he thinks he can do whatever the hell he wants.  It's weird, he wants people to pay attention to his garbage performances all around the world, yet, he cannot give these Broadway performers the same respect.  He's the worst but I think everyone already knew that.  

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 8:55pm

TimeOut is mixed, giving 3 of 5 stars. "Like Cher herself, the musical has the virtue of never seeming to take itself too seriously: It’s a delivery system for fabulousness, right up to its Mamma Mia!–like finale, and as such it succeeds. It falls a bit shy, but it’s strong enough."

https://www.timeout.com/newyork/theater/the-cher-show

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:00pm

I actually appreciate a sizable portion of his musical output and I think it is obvious that he is either very good at acting mentally ill for attention or more likely he does in fact have a mental illness (my guess is Bipolar Disorder) for which he sometimes resists treatment. But this...sounds like him just being a douche. But then I sat next to a woman and her significant other three rows from the stage at The Iceman Cometh and after she realized it was going to be a long play, she started “discreetly” sliding her phone out of her clutch purse in her lap to text. So this behavior is definitely not limited to self-involved celebrities.

[MadsonMelo]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:01pm

The deadline review lost me when they are complaining about history accuracy, I mean, damn it

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:10pm

The Guardian is mixed, giving 3 of 5 stars. "Broadway musical is a mixed bag of pop excess...A jukebox ode to the megastar contains some dazzling numbers but suffers from some clumsy storytelling"

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2018/dec/03/cher-show-review-broadway-musical-is-a-mixed-bag-of-pop-excess

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:12pm

The Stage (UK) is mixed, giving 3 of 5 stars. "It’s basically a tribute show performed by talented impersonators, with as many cringe-worthy moments as funny ones."

https://www.thestage.co.uk/reviews/2018/cher-show-review-neil-simon-theatre-new-york/

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:14pm

Chicago Tribune is definitely mixed but leans positive:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/theater/sc-ent-cher-show-broadway-review-1204-story,amp.html

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:14pm

Entertainment Weekly is mixed, giving it a B grade. "The Cher Show feels less like storytelling than like the pop goddess staging her therapy sessions. Other times it seems like her Wikipedia page set to music. What it rarely achieves is becoming a fully realized evening of theater. But it is, in the tradition of the American jukebox musical, a fair simulation."

https://ew.com/theater-reviews/2018/12/03/the-cher-show-broadway-review/?utm_term=70EE0362-F768-11E8-8046-64A34744363C

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:17pm

amNY is mixed to negative, giving 2.5 of 4 stars. "Before the show turned into a clunky, schmaltzy mess in Act II, I was rather enjoying the show for what it is, which says a lot about Cher’s mass appeal, the talent at work in 'The Cher Show' and just how low this audience member's expectations have sunk when it comes to the jukebox musical subgenre."

https://www.amny.com/entertainment/the-cher-show-review-1.24188351

Charles Isherwood over at BroadwayNews is mixed. "...it rarely escapes the draggy forces of gravity that weigh down so many bio-musicals: the murky formlessness of any life, and the challenge of weaving a star’s songbook into its events. And yet for Cher-lovers...the musical provides plenty of glitter-festooned, quasi-campy diversions."

https://broadway.news/2018/12/03/review-the-cher-show-offers-a-bumpy-ride-through-an-icons-career/

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:19pm

The Stage is mixed but ends with “The Cher Show attempts to deliver a message of female empowerment, despite the fact that the narrative is centred around her relationships with men. Still it succeeds as a story of one woman’s persistence and survival.”

https://www.thestage.co.uk/reviews/2018/cher-show-review-neil-simon-theatre-new-york/

 

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:21pm

Sara Holdren for Vulture is passionately negative. "Nice try, but not today, sparkly satan. The Cher Show is not good. It’s extravagantly, almost triumphantly not good. It’s such a garish, obvious pastiche, such an unabashedly soulless explosion of wigs and trite memoir wisdom, that somewhere in the midst of its overinflated two and a half hours—probably during one of its dips into stodgy, life-lesson-y sentiment between showstoppers—you start to wonder: Is this gusher of shamelessness the only thing that could have happened here?"

https://www.vulture.com/2018/12/theater-review-how-over-the-top-should-the-cher-show-be.html

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:28pm

Jesse Green is in for The New York Times—negative. "Except for the dozens of eye-popping outfits Mr. Mackie gorgeously recreates for the occasion, it’s all gesture, no craft: dramatically threadbare and surprisingly unrevealing."

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/03/theater/review-in-the-cher-show-i-got-you-babe-and-you-and-you.html?partner=IFTTT

[imklepcyk]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:29pm

Damn

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:31pm

Worth noting that despite all the negative reviews for the show itself, Stephanie J. Block pretty much got universal love for her performance. From Green's review:

"It’s only with Star — the 'bad-ass,' mature Cher — that we get a character who rewards our attention. She also rewards the efforts of the fine singing actress Stephanie J. Block; once Ms. Block takes over it feels as if Star has swallowed Babe and Lady whole. Not only does she ace Cher’s vocal inflections and physical mannerisms, including the half-mast eyes, the arm akimbo and the dancing-from-the-hair-up hauteur, but she somehow integrates them into a portrait of a woman at odds with the very dream that sustained her."

[Miles2Go2]

Posted: 12/3/18 at 9:35pm

Now it remains to be seen if this a critic-proof juggernaut like Pretty Woman or if its box office starts to gradually lessen like Summer. At least this has Block’s performance.