THE GREAT GATSBY Opening Night Critics’ Reviews

[jacobsnchz14]

Posted: 4/24/24 at 8:59pm

Transport yourself to the opulent world of the 1920s as one of the greatest American novels hits the greatest American stage. Starring Jeremy Jordan (Newsies) as the eccentric and mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby and Eva Noblezada (Hadestown) as the enigmatic Daisy Buchanan, THE GREAT GATSBY arrives on Broadway after a record-shattering, sold-out run at Paper Mill Playhouse. Directed by Marc Bruni (Beautiful: The Carole King Musical), this story of extravagance and longing features choreography by Dominique Kelley (So You Think You Can Dance), a book by Kait Kerrigan (The Mad Ones) and a jazz- and pop-influenced original score by Jason Howland (Little Women) and Nathan Tysen(Paradise Square).

The musical opens on Thursday, April 25, 2024 at the Broadway Theatre. 

 

[chrishuyen]

Posted: 4/24/24 at 11:26pm

Very curious to see how reviews will be, I'm expecting mostly mixed/negative (with praise for scenic elements) but I think there will be at least a couple positive notices.

[yyys]

Posted: 4/24/24 at 11:27pm

probably mixed to negative - majority of the songs suck. 

Updated On: 4/24/24 at 11:27 PM

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 4/24/24 at 11:30pm

I went to the matinee today and noticed Jeremy seems to be doing an accent now? But not a consistent one and it’s kind of odd. British one minute, then something else then nothing. I don’t think I’d ever noticed him doing anything like that before in the show. 

[Leaf Coneybear]

Posted: 4/24/24 at 11:33pm

Jordan Catalano said: "I went to the matinee today and noticed Jeremy seems to be doing an accent now? But not a consistent one and it’s kind of odd. British one minute, then something else then nothing. I don’t think I’d ever noticed him doing anything like that before in the show."

Oh god...If I see this am I going to get flashbacks to Colton Ryan in "NYNY"? Because I can't handle that again.

[Dylan Smith4]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 4:34am

Yeah, critics are gonna trash this tonight. It makes me feel bad for the cast. They're talented as ever but they are dealing with material that is just not good.

[kidmanboy]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 6:48am

Jordan Catalano said: "I went to the matinee today and noticed Jeremy seems to be doing an accent now? But not a consistent one and it’s kind of odd. British one minute, then something else then nothing. I don’t think I’d ever noticed him doing anything like that before in the show."

They ADDED that!? I was shocked that it hadn’t been cut in previews - I’m even more shocked that it was a deliberate addition! 
All of the actors in this show, as talented as they may be, seemed to be acting in different shows when I saw it last week. The tone was extremely inconsistent and some of the affectations like Jeremy Jordan’s accent and Sara Chase’s lisp/accent really took me out of the show. 

[TimeToDither]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 8:05am

Transport yourself to the shiny, shiny, shiny world of the 1920s as one of the greatest American novels completely loses any of its literary interest, social commentary, and reduces every character to a caricature of their past self.

Can’t wait to see what the reviews are but don’t expect them to be great …

[Springtime]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 8:53pm

Reviews are out at 10pm. 

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 9:44pm

The Daily Beast, at the end of its Mother Play review (this is the whole review:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/jessica-lange-is-thrilling-even-if-mother-play-on-broadway-isnt

"It is perhaps fitting that The Great Gatsby (Broadway Theatre, booking to Nov. 24) is the final opening of a crowded Tony Awards season. The cutoff date for nominations is tonight, they will be announced Tuesday, and Gatsby wants to end a packed and chaotic set of openings with a bang. This is a bombastic, ridiculous, big, loud, and glamorous show. It rewrites Fitzgerald's characters, it throws everything at the audience—it’s green lights flash-time at intermission!—and yet, despite feeling downcast by its flat first act, in the second it goes for full-on spectacle, even as it mangles Fitzgerald's poetic writing. Ah well, there are two banging songs and dance numbers instead! It is not a great musical, but by the end resistance seems futile—and its cars are the best this critic has ever seen on stage."

Updated On: 4/25/24 at 09:44 PM

[Kad]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 9:45pm

A not-so-subtle dig at Back to the Future at the end of that.

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 9:56pm

NY Stage Review

THE GREAT GATSBY: ALL THAT GLITTERS, BUT SHORT ON DEPTH

By Sandy MacDonald

★★★☆☆ All the fixings – including some snazzy sets and standout stars – don't suffice to hoist this musical into the top rank.

https://nystagereview.com/2024/04/25/the-great-gatsby-all-that-glitters-but-short-on-depth/

 

THE GREAT GATSBY: FITZGERALD’S ROARING ’20S CLASSIC MUSICALIZED AS A LOUD WHIMPER

By David Finkle

★★☆☆☆ Bookwriter Kait Kerrigan, composer Jason Howard, lyricist Nathan Tyson director Marc Bruni caught with their talents down

https://nystagereview.com/2024/04/25/the-great-gatsby-fitzgeralds-roaring-20s-classic-musicalized-as-a-loud-whimper/

"This musical take on The Great Gatsby presents Jay Gatsby and Daisy Fay Buchanan as a sympathetic couple caught in unfortunate Jazz Age circumstances. In other words, the transfiguration of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is, sorry to report, a travesty."

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:02pm

Laura Collins-Hughes for NYT is mixed.

Review: A New ‘Great Gatsby’ Leads With Comedy and Romance

This musical adaptation, now on Broadway, is a lot of Jazz Age fun. But it forgot that Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel endures because it is a tragedy.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/25/theater/the-great-gatsby-review-noblezada-jordan.html

"

Even with flawless tech, the projections have a hyper-vividness reminiscent of video games. If that’s a deliberate attempt to question the solidity of all the sumptuousness — like the sozzled party guest in Fitzgerald’s novel who, wandering into Gatsby’s library, is astonished to find that the books are real — the aesthetic is nonetheless jarring, particularly for a show set a century ago.

...

But this “Great Gatsby,” which is not terribly bothered, either, with the moral shadings of its title character’s rise and fall, is principally interested in a good time. When Nick utters the novel’s sober final line, about “boats against the current,” the words have no heft. An ensemble of dancers is upstaging him anyway, wanting to give the audience one last moment at the party."

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:03pm

Chicago Tribune:

Review: New ‘Gatsby’ musical on Broadway has Jazz Age excess but none of the yearning

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2024/04/25/review-new-gatsby-musical-on-broadway-has-jazz-age-excess-but-none-of-the-yearning/

"That said, this new musical, as penned by Kait Kerrigan with music composed by Jason Howland and lyrics by Nathan Tysen, makes you feel very little, except for when Howland’s lush melodies reach their climaxes and, even then, the feelings that flow are more admiration for Howland’s compositional art and craft than the kind of emotion that transfers into an embrace of story.

And even though it’s a massive show, director Marc Bruni’s production, which also stars Eva Noblezada as Daisy and Noah J. Ricketts as Nick Carraway, doesn’t really convey the sense of flapper age decadence that created an adjective, “Gatsby-esque,” which instantly conveys its meaning. This isn’t a sensual show; no one pulses with sexual desire, notwithstanding the huge bed that rolls on stage at one point. (As does an automobile.)"

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:05pm

Holdren for Vulture is largely negative, with one bright spot:

Can You Teach an Old Sport New Tricks? The Great Gatsby on Broadway

https://www.vulture.com/article/theater-review-great-gatsby-musical-broadway.html

"Perhaps that’s part of why Zdrojeski’s Tom Buchanan stands out in this production like, to quote Daisy, “an absolute rose” among plastic flowers. He does very little of the show’s demonstrative singing, and when he does break out in a withering dismissal of Gatsby in the shared having-it-all-out number “Made to Last,” he sings as an extension of his acting. The performance remains specific and fierce, sent toward a living target and not toward some fuzzy space above the balcony. The character might be despicable (“If I wondered whether Tom’s an asshole,” Nick sings to us in a wide detour from Fitzgerald, “Tom’s an asshole”), but Zdrojeski is turning in a mesmerizing performance — menacing, vain, subtle when it needs to be, its contours defined by precisely the right kind of insidious class snobbery. For a tall, distinctive actor, he transforms remarkably: In Heroes of the Fourth Turning, he was a cringing disaster, eaten from the inside out with doubt and lust. In this season’s Jonah, he was sweet and self-effacing, a nerdy type who ended up having real compassion and integrity. Here, he’s a kind of cruel Jimmy Stewart — lanky and unconventionally charismatic, with vowels that belong to another time and a core of childish selfishness beneath all that alpha disdain.

It’s not that the rest of the cast isn’t showing up. They’re just all in a vapid musical-shaped-musical while Zdrojeski is in The Great Gatsby."

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:06pm

Variety:

‘The Great Gatsby’ Review: Broadway Musical Has Glamour but Little Grit

https://variety.com/2024/legit/reviews/the-great-gatsby-review-broadway-musical-jeremy-jordan-1235981841/

"In this first Broadway version, the creatives have committed wholeheartedly to the spectacle of the story, but forgot the substance.

In doing so, they’ve made a devilish bargain, trading the novel’s soul for flashy visuals — and it almost even works. The design team here has pulled out all the stops and achieved something nearly unprecedented in terms of scale and quality. The parties are undeniably flashy, bordering on overstimulating to the senses. An ensemble two or three times the size (easy for film, impossible for Broadway) would’ve filled out the stage more effectively; that said, Dominique Kelley’s lively choreography mostly covers this up. "

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:08pm

2 stars from The Guardian. Praises cast, little else.

The Great Gatsby review – a literary classic becomes a Broadway dud

The Broadway Theatre, New York

F Scott Fitzgerald’s novel makes an underwhelming transfer to the stage in a bombastic yet misfiring new production

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2024/apr/25/great-gatsby-broadway-review

"The production splashes in excess, but of the Las Vegas residency kind. Golden-lacquered set pieces and a dizzying projection screen recreate the Gatsby mansion (and a bevy of other locations). The “nouveau riche” mansion isn’t as opulent or lush as one might imagine, feeling closer in spirit to a mega-church."
 

Updated On: 4/25/24 at 10:08 PM

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:09pm

C+ from Entertainment Weekly:

The Great Gatsby review: A glitzy take on F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel that values spectacle over substance

Eva Noblezada and Jeremy Jordan delight as Daisy Buchanan and Jay Gatsby, star-crossed lovers who spark up a secret romance years after they first met.

https://ew.com/the-great-gatsby-review-musical-broadway-8637932

"Despite having a heavily-dissected novel to rely upon, The Great Gatsby’s book, written by Kait Kerrigan, doesn’t seem to know what it wants to be. Its tone swings wildly back and forth between a dramatic, straight-laced romance between Gatsby and Daisy one moment, and then a wacky comedy peppered with overly raunchy punchlines about testicles, orgies, and characters having loud, bed-squeaking sex behind a wall the next. It eventually finds its footing in the second act as it explores some of the book’s larger themes, but the significant delay causes the musical’s biggest gut-punches to fall flat because most of its characters — aside from Daisy — still remain underdeveloped sketches of themselves. "

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:10pm

Slant is a mostly positive

The Great Gatsby Review: A Musical Take on a Classic Gets a Miraculous Broadway Makeover

This Great Gatsby is an engaging, tautly rendered, and visually dazzling ride.

https://www.slantmagazine.com/theater/the-great-gatsby-review-broadway-musical/

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:13pm

3 stars/recommended from TimeOut, but seems rather mixed.

https://www.timeout.com/newyork/theater/the-great-gatsby-musical-broadway-review-jeremy-jordan-eva-noblezada

"The Great Gatsby often sounds great, too. Its lead actors, Jeremy Jordan as the self-made millionaire Jay Gatsby and Eva Noblezada as his dream girl, Daisy Buchanan, have deluxe voices, and the score gives them plenty to sing. Jason Howland’s music dips into period pastiche for the group numbers—there are lots of them, set to caffeinated choreography by Dominique Kelley—but favors Miss Saigon levels of sweeping pop emotionality for the main lovers; the old-fashioned craft of Nathan Tysen’s lyrics sits comfortably, sometimes even cleverly, on the melodies. "

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:16pm

Clickable link for the above the site won't let me edit: https://www.timeout.com/newyork/theater/the-great-gatsby-musical-broadway-review-jeremy-jordan-eva-noblezada

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:17pm

Washington Post:

Your English teacher would hate this ‘Great Gatsby’

A new Broadway musical is all about Jay Gatsby’s decadence

https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/theater/2024/04/25/great-gatsby-musical-broadway-review/

"Directed by Marc Bruni with the broadness of a 10-lane highway, “The Great Gatsby” is a grand, crowd-pleasing spectacle: Tourists, Jazz Age enthusiasts and fans of its vocal-powerhouse stars Eva Noblezada and Jeremy Jordan are already lining up outside the stage door. And there is something to be said for a splashy night out, even if it casts off the author’s intended message.

...

This revisionary attempt to turn “The Great Gatsby” into a clown car of passionate entanglements skids off the road when calamity is meant to strike. The second-act twists play out with the frenzy of a nighttime soap by Aaron Spelling, without any of the campy self-awareness. There is no ghastly reckoning with the follies of hedonism, just a rapid succession of abrupt ends."

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:18pm

Theatrely is mixed to positive:

Big Ol’ Fashioned Broadway Fun At THE GREAT GATSBY — Review

https://www.theatrely.com/post/big-ol-fashioned-broadway-fun-at-the-great-gatsby-review

"This Gatsby comes to Broadway rather quickly following a run at Millburn’s Paper Mill Playhouse last fall. Here at the Broadway Theatre the show is tighter and fixes certain weaknesses that were in the original book. Where the musical still stands on unsteady ground is in the overall tone of the piece. Jeremy Jordan’s Gatsby is too often comically cartoonish jumping over fences and throwing tea cakes off stage that one finds it hard to believe he is secretly running a high stakes covert bootlegging operation with his partner Meyer Wolfsheim (the always fun Eric Anderson.) Different dialects fill the stage that range from fabricated turn of the century Mid-Atlantic tones to friends discussing the latest backstage gossip at Glass House Tavern after a show. The discordant mood we feel from one scene to the next often varies and differs to a great array, yet I found myself not particularly bothered by this. Why? This show is FUN. One wildly entertaining night at the theatre with a score that will be stuck in my head for years to come. (hums: where’s the party and can you take me there refrain over and over)"

[MemorableUserName]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 10:25pm

The Wrap is a pan:

‘The Great Gatsby’ Broadway Review: Tap Dance, You Sinning Bootleggers, Tap Dance!

Maybe it’s time to call a moratorium on turning F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel into movies and musicals

https://www.thewrap.com/the-great-gatsby-broadway-review/

"Jay Gatsby lives in West Egg. Daisy Buchanan lives in East Egg. And the new musical about them that opened Thursday at the Broadway Theatre lays a big egg.

...

Jordan presents a truly bizarre Gatsby. Granted, his tap dancing is an odd spectacle. There’s also the mid-Atlantic accent that Jordan uses to suggest the character’s patrician aspirations. As the show progresses, he moves farther and farther east. Near the end, Gatsby’s mansion on Long island has been transformed into Bela Lugosi’s castle in Transylvania. And with his strange way of speaking, why does this Gatsby have a country twang when he sings?"

[EDSOSLO858]

Posted: 4/25/24 at 11:07pm

DTLI Consensus: The penultimate musical entry of the 2023-24 Broadway season is all style, little substance. 

5 mixed (including the NYT), 3 negative, 1 positive.

https://didtheylikeit.com/shows/the-great-gatsby/