THE QUEEN OF VERSAILLES To Close December 21, 2025 — Page 16

It’s the first and only show he has created, developed and directed from the beginning. Telling. Cant hide behind much. One does not direct, and especially produce as well, something they do not believe in.

Lindsay Ferrentino also has a bunch of mess on her Instagram story and posts today. Subtly blaming others, sexism etc for the downfall while never admitting this show was not good creatively - across the board. She defines what “ community” is and isn’t etc. Ultimately this has nothing to do with anything other than story told poorly coupled with bad book and direction. And a lot of the music too.

these people just don’t get it and are trying to save their butts. They'll eventually probably blame each other in coming weeks / years as well, via tell-all books/articles etc.

Updated On: 12/21/25 at 07:54 PM

corninthesky said: "I mean can you all take your victory lap now?

It is no secret I liked the show (and obviously am in the small, small minority on that), but do we have to keep dancing on the grave?

I feel like this entire thread proves the entire point of Arden’s post (as well as others on the cast/creative team)."

They were telling the story of a delusional woman's insistence on building a house and it didn't work and then the production echoed the story they were tryiny to tell. It's when directors and creatives keep insisting they're creating the next important Broadway piece and when it's not greeted as such they act profoundly defensive as you are also doing here. They have to justify in their minds that this wasn't a waste of time for them and doesn't reflect on their abilities.

Exactly. There is no "grave dancing", "hate" etc. TheaterFan4 put itv very well. And NO, this thread absolutely does not prove anything Mr. Arden says in his post. His post is incorrect.

It stuck twice in the Best Director category. Island and Parade were well respected and loved musicals that had not been seen by NYC theater audiences in 25+ years. Audiences were waiting to applaud.

Maybe Happy Ending was developed for many many years by other people then the super expensive production happened with financially elevated production on the backs of others.

This is their first solely new show directed and produced from idea with writers. It is interesting...

binau said: "Of course it’s super cringe when artists try to blame anyone except themselves for their own failures, but I do think it’s a bit revisionist for people to suddenly claim Michael Arden is a bad director. Between once on this island, parade, maybe happy ending etc. lightning doesn’t strike 3 times. Everyone has their failures and not all directors can produce new work but that doesn’t make them bad.

Also, no way did QoV get hatred it was just met with poor word of mouth. Billy Porter in cabaret was a much better example of ‘hatred’ in my opinion."

Exactly. It’s almost as if people forget that some of the biggest names in theatre history have some legendary flops under their belt (Harold Prince in most of the 1980s is a good example). Sometimes you just can’t sculpt a vase out of pile of horse crap; doesn’t mean you have no talent in sculpting.

The Billy Porter situation is a tricky one. It started off as negative word of mouth (deservedly; it was a painful performance), but Billy is never not one to back down from a pissing contest and so he and his collection of auntie wigs did the talk show circuit and proceeded to elaborate on and defend his interpretation of the role, which was woefully out of place in a production that already had a set concept. Granted, Frecknall allowed it in the West End and had to have doubled down to agree to letting him do Broadway.

Billy is very outspoken and people tend to not respond well to him because he often seems like he would rather get in an argument he can try to win as opposed to having a meaningful dialogue, and so that arrogance tends to be what people respond to. We are aware that his long career has been more miss than hit, but he tends to strike as having a bit of a long unhealed emotional issue from many years of being overlooked by the industry.

I went to the closing performance because I was just too curious. I basically felt it jumped the shark about a third of the way through when it started focusing on the daughter and the cousin. I basically thought most of their scenes could have been cut. And the actress who played the daughter was not very good. Their trajectories could have been summed up without much scene work. I felt like there might have been a shorter off Broadway musical in their somewhere making fun of excess and vanity. Putting all the scene work downstage with the construction behind looked very cluttered and the actors moved like chess pieces. And it made the staging look amateurish. Kristin was bogged down a little by the whole thing but she sang well and Murray was good.
But by the by…..the real Queen of Versailles was there letting everyone take pictures of her in the lobby after the show! Who knew!

I've loved many of Arden's productions despite his sour grapes as an actor in the past, and would not have thought him a risk in developing new work until I read that he thought something complex and challenging was happening here and that the criticism for this musical was clickbait-driven or unfair. This meal, which I paid for, which was so entirely without flavor that the only thing you could taste was how stale and rotten it was. It's closing because it didn't work or really challenge or surprise thematically for a moment, and it didn't even entertain while not working.

Directors with ten times his career had legendary flops. I guess who knows how some of them would've done with social media.

Updated On: 12/22/25 at 08:37 AM

UWS10023 said: "I went to the closing performance because I was just too curious. I basically feltit jumped the shark about a third of the way through when it started focusing on the daughter and the cousin. I basically thought most of their scenes could have been cut. And the actress who played the daughter was not very good. Their trajectories could have been summed up without much scene work. I felt like there might have been a shorter off Broadway musical in their somewhere making fun of excess and vanity. Putting all the scene work downstage with the construction behind looked very cluttered and the actors movedlike chess pieces. And it made the staging look amateurish. Kristin was bogged down a little by the whole thing but she sangwell and Murray was good.
But by the by…..the real Queen of Versailles was there letting everyone take pictures of her in the lobby after the show! Who knew!"

This is an insane take to not think that Nina White and Kristin Chenoweth didn’t deliver in an otherwise misguided/directed musical?! Also shoutout to Isabelle Keating working double time between Jackie’s mom as well as the rest of the tireless chorus.

If there is any award other than set design this show should be nominated, it’s for supporting actress for Nina White.

Although the show isn’t going to win any major awards for score, there are some memorable songs and moments I’m glad that made it to stage.

abcd12 said: "…an “insane take”???

The night I went (in previews), I found White grating and Chenoweth close to comatose."

I almost forgot Melody Butiu who stood out in supporting and had some really touching moments.

• The show needed work and was misguided - 100% could not agree more.
• Maybe Sherie Renee Scott embodied it differently and it may have lasted longer?
• They probably could have rendered the entire historical references to Versailles to one (1) number and given us an overture instead. This would have saved the chorus the headache of costume changes since it didn’t really advance the narrative.

Either way, I thought there were some great performances (and also cringey moments) where the actors delivered with the material they had to work with.

Updated On: 12/22/25 at 11:36 AM