TOMMY TUNE's "TURN OF THE CENTURY"- Page 4

[lovesclassics]

Posted: 10/6/08 at 5:05pm

This wait is killing me, you know this?




Talkin' Broadway Review

[Paul W. Thompson]

Posted: 10/6/08 at 5:41pm

LOL

[lovesclassics]

Posted: 10/9/08 at 1:19am

The last of the Chicago papers to review (I assume). Pretty consistent with the rest of the pack. Book needs work with a capital W, music and design are grand, and Rachel York...well, it's getting predictable. She shines (like the top of the Chrysler Building?).

Daily Herald Review

[chinkie azn jai]

Posted: 10/12/08 at 8:21pm

I saw today's matinee, and I agree with most of the published reviews. The book needs a lot of work. I was overhearing Jeff Daniels at the stage door say that the creators are working hard on it. I thought Jeff Daniels was very miscast in this. His singing is decent though. This show really is a crowd pleaser because the audience was very enthusiastic throughout. With some more work, this show could probably do well on Broadway.

[lovesclassics]

Posted: 10/16/08 at 9:52am

Looks like they're moving forward. Glad to see they're taking their time, though. Sounds like they want to get this right. Wonder what other city they are considering for a tryout?
TOTC Aiming for Broadway

[lovesclassics]

Posted: 10/28/08 at 9:45am

Ok, so I saw Turn of the Century on Sunday (Oct. 26). The show itself was a major disappointment. As virtually everyone has said, the book is weak and the song selections could be much better. There didn't seem to be any changes made since the opening as far as I could tell from the reviews.

Rachel York was fabulous and made the show seem better than it was. She brought wonderful depth to her role and musical numbers, more than was written. And her vocal versatility is beyond compare. I heard someone in the lobby say "angelic." Yup.

I thought Jeff Daniels was ok, but his part is very poorly written. He's a total cad until the very end, so you can't see what Dixie would ever see in him. His role just wasn't nuanced at all.

There was a great deal of silliness that went nowhere. I'm afraid I agree with the more negative reviews. This show needs lots and lots of work before it could ever be ready for Broadway. I mean major surgery. A big shift in focus in the plot, song selections and character development. Rachel deserves much better material.

I didn't hate it. I was just bored and unmoved except whenever Rachel was in the spotlight. I wonder if her back gets tired from carrying all these shows. First Camelot, now this. She's pretty incredible.

[Paul W. Thompson]

Posted: 10/28/08 at 10:07am

I was waiting for your comments! Thanks for this.

Yes, the rumor is that the writers are working on it a lot, but that they didn't put in any of the changes during the Chicago run, which of course is nearly over. My guess is that they will play somewhere else next summer, and try for NY in the fall, but that's just a hunch. We know they were thinking to go straight to Broadway, but first the reviews hit, and then Wall Street sank.

There is just so much potential here that you want so badly for them to get it right. It's just not there right now.

But Rachel York is a goddess, the Julia Roberts of the American Musical Theater.
Updated On: 10/28/08 at 10:07 AM

[lovesclassics]

Posted: 10/28/08 at 11:30am

Totally agree with your sentinment. Would love this to work. I hope they take their time with it to get it right. Also hope they are paying attention to all the thoughtful reviews. I think they were very constructive, for the most part, especially yours, Paul.

I so want Julia - I mean Rachel - to win that long-overdue Tony.

[tgrabon2]

Posted: 10/28/08 at 11:38am

I saw it on Tuesday, Oct. 14th. Poor Rachel York stuck in the middle of a mess. It mentioned in the Playbill that it took 3 years...or was it 6 years to get this on stage and they came up with CRAP. Jeff Daniels is great on film. At the center of a musical he's this gaping hole. The book is horrible. Example: York & Daniels' characters "write" Annie Get Your Gun which she is to star in. Before the curtain goes up she gets cold feet. She feels it's unfair to steal from Irving Berlin. The show is cancelled. OK....hmmmmmmm. What about all the chorus and actors that were to be in the production. One of them could have gone on to claim that they wrote Annie Get Your Gun. It's absurd. The set reminded me of Wicked with the giant clock around the stage. Rachel York's character dreams of rising up through the stage floor in a red gown. She does and it's Freddy Wittop's original costume design and headdress for Carol Channing in Hello Dolly. W.T.F. ? Jeff Daniel's character reminisces later about Miss York and the red dress and doesn't even mention that it was from Hello Dolly. We left the theatre disappointed and exasperated. The Goodman's record of musicals has been mostly misses: `Riverview: A Melodrama with Music (great sets but boring), Perlie (a great set), Pal Joey (I loved Carlin Glynn but the show left me cold), The Visit (flawless). I have to put Turn of the Century in the miss category. A huge miss.

[Paul W. Thompson]

Posted: 10/28/08 at 1:30pm

Thanks for the props, lc!

For those who didn't see my BWW review..........

https://www.broadwayworld.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=33568&preview=on

[lakezurich]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 7:00pm

Saw the show tonight. And I must say it was very good. Is the show without flaws? No, but good none the less. The negatives can definitely be fixed though, before the show hits New York.

Some of the negatives:

- I feel like there wasn't enough of a shock when they realized that they had been transported back in time.

- I also feel like the number where Harry makes fun of Billy kind-of comes out of nowhere.

- I also think some of the transitions were not very smooth.

- I feel like there wasn't enough chemistry between Billy and Dixie's characters throughout the show to justify her comming back to Billy at the end of the show.

Positives:

- Rachel York! That girl can sing her ass off!

- Jeff Daniels. Who thought that man had such a good voice? Certainly not me.

- The lighting and the minimalistic set.

[pc1145N2]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 7:20pm

Saw the same show as Lake Zurich and with the exception of Rachel York, I thought the show was a mess.

I can't imagine that this will ever make it to Broadway....let alone succeed.

Thankfully, I got the tickets at HOT TIX and didn't waste my money on full priced tickets.

Rachel York deserves better than this.

[lakezurich]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 7:34pm

Me and my friend paid $10.00 for last night's show. We originally put our names into the drawing for Wicked, and when we didn't win we decided to go see if they had any more tickets for the show. The box office guy said they did and that they were $30.00 each, and then said he could give them to us for $15.00 each, and then went lower again and said he could give them to us for $10.00 each. We definitely felt like we got a good deal.

[lakezurich]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 7:45pm

If you want to see some pics I uploaded them onto my Facebook

My Facebook Album

Updated On: 11/2/08 at 07:45 PM

[commasplice]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 8:09pm

Saw the matinee today and must agree that it was a hot mess. It wasn't as awful as I was afraid it would be, but it was still bad. Rachel was radiant, though. I'm working on composing some thoughts for a friend; I'll post 'em here too when I'm done.

I got to talk to Rachel for a few minutes at the stage door (which I was beyond excited about - what a lovely woman), and she said that they're working on making major changes to the show and aiming for a run in another city in the future (right now, it looks like it will be Boston). She didn't know when that would be, though, or if she would be involved.

[lakezurich]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 8:23pm

That's good news, because the show does have a lot of potential.

[commasplice]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 8:45pm

I agree -- I think that with some major overhaul (first and foremost: REWRITE THE BOOK!!), it could be a successful show. (And I hope Rachel's free when they do it in Boston, because despite all of the problems, she was wonderful. But I'm a longtime Rachel fan, so I'm also biased.)

[lakezurich]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 8:49pm

Lol! She was Amazing... I wonder what Broadway Theatre could house this show? Some parts of the set (especially the runway that went out past the orchestra) seemed like they could only be used in the Goodman... but then again I haven't been into a lot of Broadway theatres.

[chinkie azn jai]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 10:45pm

I'm pretty sure the set can fit into almost any small to mid-size theatre because the set is so simple.

[lakezurich]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 10:53pm

I must say though I did like the use of the (for lack of a better term) "stock ticker."

[Patash]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 11:36pm

Back early in this thread I said, "Am I the only one who never knew Jeff Daniels was a musical talent? "

Then I saw the show. Now I realize that I had been right all along and it was other people -- including the producers of this show who were wrong in their assessment of his musical talent.

About 30 or 40 minutes into the show I was thinking, "this is so clever and so great" -- about the time of the big medley including the girl in the velvet swing singing "Moon River". But then they just didn't seem to know where to go with it. We had no reason to really care about their personal relationship and the play turned more and more to that. How did they end up returning to the present by the way? Did they tell us, or did I just not care at that point?

I agree with several others. A whole lot of potential, but it needs some major work.

[commasplice]

Posted: 11/2/08 at 11:46pm

Patash, I agree that that musical montage was the high point of the show. It was creative and clever, but they couldn't capture that feeling again for the rest of the show.

I'm pretty sure that Billy and Dixie stayed in the past -- from the speech he was giving to his son at the end of the show, it sounded like after Dixie gave birth they settled down and gave up the whole stealing-everyone-else's-music thing (without ever answering the question of, were there any repercussions for their song thefts? Because, for example, when you take "Summertime" away from the Gershwins and as a result out of Porgy and Bess, it's not going to be unaffected. The end also raised the question of, "What about their knowledge of historical events?" for me. What happens when something like the Great Depression rolls around? Are they going to try to help themselves so they aren't damaged by it the way so many other people were, or are they just going to roll with it? This is the problem with time travel stories, I think. Too many loose ends. And the explanation for the way they went back in time in the first place was nonexistent. Yeah, rip in the fabric of time, blah blah blah, but HOW? And WHY?).

[EDIT: Apparently I am very very wrong. Whoops. But the response stays up anyway.] Updated On: 11/3/08 at 11:46 PM

[lovesclassics]

Posted: 11/3/08 at 11:20am

Hey, commasplice,

Glad to hear your report. Billy and Dixie DID come back to the present. It was signalled by the clock chiming, the Victorian ensemble "disappearing" in the background and the 1999 partygoers returning downstage on the ramp. It was also implied in Dixie's reprise of "Where or When" in which she wore the same dress as during the prologue.

The loose ends of the time travel conceit didn't bother me, since it's a fantasy. We can infer that everything they changed in the past will be healed once they return to their own time. What did bother me was how easily they accepted their situation and that they didn't struggle more to fit in. I really liked the way the time/style differences were handled in the Alexander's number. I wish there had been more of that kind of humor throughout the show. I also think Billy and Dixie should have been working hard to keep their time travel a secret. Comic situations could have been developed as a result - where they make up a funny story about who they are and where they come from, what inspires them to "write" the songs, etc.

It will be interesting to see what happens with this.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 11/3/08 at 11:28am

I finally saw the show over the weekend and I pretty much echo the sentiments of everyone else. I felt like I was watching a workshop, basically. The set was ok and the lighting was gorgeous. York definitely carries the show and rises above the material. Daniels was fine, but is trapped in a terribly written part. The ensemble had some fine moments, but the "supporting" characters were obviously humanoid shoehorns in order to assemble some sort of plot framework in which to insert musical numbers.

**SPOILERS**

As for the book...WTF? The story is nonsensical, the plot is not so much full of holes, but bottomless pits of unmotivated actions and unanswered questions. I was hoping to see how they react to the time travel (which occurs without explanation) and how they would adjust to life in a completely different age. They solve their conundrum in about 5 minutes and the audience is whisked through the fruits of their success. Nothing about the social customs and values of the era is revealed. For example: were they living together unmarried? Where did they get enough currency to survive initially? Considering their incredibly brief history together (didn't they just have a one-nighter?), how did just the issue of her pregnancy and his self-centered behavior blossom into a lifelong romance? Or maybe it was the fact that their successful collaboration (for a couple of months or so) entirely based on deception brought them to a level of "courtship". I have no idea. And I wasn't sure how the focus of the villainous plot to expose the couple as frauds only led to only Billy's demise. And the ending was very unclear. It appeared that they inexplicably returned to the present as indicated by the lighting and costumes of ensemble members, yet the fact that they already changed the history of music from the era is completely ignored.

There were some nice Tune touches that definitely made the show fun to watch, such as the Floradora girls singing a surprisingly contemporary tune, but the choreography was woefully pedestrian. Nevertheless, the show was an obvious crowd-pleaser. The full theatre was laughing, applauding and even cheering throughout the show. I heard many people leaving the theatre discussing how much they loved it. And my parents, who immediately admitted that the book was underdeveloped and ridiculous, were delighted. And pretty much everyone agreed that York and the recognizable tunes were the sole reasons for the positive audience response. For a "jukebox musical", this show makes Mamma Mia look like My Fair Lady.

[commasplice]

Posted: 11/3/08 at 12:09pm

They did make it back to the presence? Oh, crap. I missed that completely. I thought the reappearance of the partygoers from 1999/2000 was part of Billy remembering the whole thing. Thanks for clarifying, lc.

I adore the song "Where or When" (and Rachel sounded fabulous singing it), but the way it was used to bookend the show was pointless. There's no real connection to the rest of the show -- we never see Rachel in that gorgeous dress again, and there's no sense of time given (and the idea that it occurs in some sort of timeless place is a cop-out). I'd rather see them implement a bit more useful exposition in its place.

I agree about how easily they adjusted to the new time -- the "Alexander's" number was did that well, but after that, it was all too easy, and they lost some potential opportunities for comedy.

Another problem with the show is that the timeline is extremely cramped, and that becomes especially evident when Dixie's pregnancy is introduced. Billy and Dixie hook up about a week before New Year's. After arriving in 1900, a character makes a comment that Billy and Dixie have had something like 30 hit songs in their first four weeks there. Then they decide to put on a book show, and I assume that there had to be at least another month in there for writing it down (and who the hell remembers the entire libretto to Annie Get Your Gun anyway?), casting, rehearsal, etc, probably more. After opening night, Dixie disappears for four weeks, and when she returns, she breaks the news to Billy. By then, she's at least three months pregnant ("at least" because I don't think we know the timeline of AGYG -- if they said something, I didn't catch it -- so it could be more). I can forgive that she's not yet showing, because some women aren't visibly pregnant at that point, but it's the end of March or later. Dixie is then overdressed (beautiful as that outfit is), and it seems improbable that the weather could sustain that much cold and snow and ice (well, ice that's strong enough to skate on -- the "Any Place I Hang My Hat/Willow, Weep for Me" scene was actually one of my favorite bits of staging. I thought the "ice skating" ballet was lovely.). After that we pretty much fast-forward to September, the end.

I also thought the "It's (date) at (residence), where rent is (amount per month)" bit was just plain narrative laziness. Show, don't tell. (And the rent information, while interesting for contrast, really isn't necessary information. I don't feel I would be any worse off in terms of knowledge if they cut it.).

Matt, I went in thinking that they had been together for a while but had recently parted, so I was taken by surprise by the whole "they just met and had a one-night-stand" thing. As a result, I didn't feel like they had enough of an emotional connection for the audience to want them together, and that became more and more problematic as the show went on, because the writers kept shoving that plot to the forefront. The only good thing about it was that it gave Rachel an original song to sing, and she sang the crap out of it. I think it would make more sense if Billy and Dixie had more of a history together, and it would make the relationship/interaction onstage more interesting to watch as well.
Updated On: 11/3/08 at 12:09 PM