#1
Posted: 7/17/03 at 2:31am
In my opinion, YES, it does matter who plays Max & Leo in The Producers. While the show itself has the foundation to stand alone, clearly it seems there something much more special about seeing the show with performers in the Lead roles who the audience knows and relates such as Lane/Broderick or Alexander/Short, as opposed to Standlen/Stephenson.
In an article from the New York Times titled, "Producers: To Ape or Ignore You-Know-Who?", Bruce Weber tackles an analysis of The Producers original Broadway stars Lane/Broderick, current Broadway stars Standlen/Stephenson, and Los Angeles stars Alexander/Short.
July 15, 2003
"In Betrayed, the 11 o'clock number in The Producers, that rapscallion Max Bialystock sits in a jail cell. Abandoned by his partner, the accountant and erstwhile shrinking violet Leo Bloom, an embittered Max recapitulates the entire play. In fast-forward mode, he caricatures the voices and gestures of the characters and recounts most of the plot. It's a star turn for the actor playing Max, and the Broadway original, Nathan Lane, turned it into a dazzling tour de force, oddly poignant and exhaustingly funny.
One of the number's irrestible if obvious gags - this is Mel Brook's show, after all - is that it rewinds the plot includes the intermission, a few seconds when the music suddenly stops and Max sits down and waits impatiently before he jumps to hid feet and takes up where he left off.
In the much anticipated production of the show at the Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles, Jason Alexander is Max, and in "Betrayed" he adds a wrinkle. During the intermission silence he mimics audience members whispering among themselves.
"Yeah, yeah, he's good, he's good," Mr. Alexander says, "But he's no Nathan Lane."
It's a fine moment for Mr. Alexander who delivers the line with a measure of modesty and a measure of understandable irritation. He gets a big laugh, an appreciative laugh, winning the sympathy he's already earned with his hard-working performance, not to mention big points from a Left Coast audience. (Though he's a Broadway veteran, Mr. Alexander has, after all, become much better known for his work on television.)
But none of this erases that he is right. It is apparent that Mr. Lane's template for Max is the one element of the show that has not been effectively reproduced or replaced by any of the actors who have subsequently played the role. And this is especially pertinent because for the show to return to MEGAHIT STATUS on Broadway - last week it was just the fourth highest-grossing show, with Variety reporting that only 83.2% of the seats at the St. James Theatre were filled - it is likely that name-brand stars will have to take over. It's no secret that the producers of The Producers would like Alexander/Short to be the next Bialystock & Bloom in New York.
As half of the starry tandem above the title in Los Angeles - Mr. Short is the other half - Mr Alexander sings and dances with elan, and he attacks the antic vulgarity of Brooksian comedy with all the lack of subtlety it deserves. But he's outgunned by Mr. Short. And is you've seen Mr. Lane as Max, Mr. Alexander seems like a tag-along younger brother in comparison, puffing out his chest for artificial stature and working too hard to keep up. you miss Mr. Lane's naturally huge plaintiveness, his cartoon-beagle sad eyes, the woe is me warble in his voice, the outsize of self-pity he can so hilariously affect.
Mr. Alexander who excels at understated verbal comedy, may simply be miscast, he has all the moves and they're polished. But aswim in the overinflated slapstick that is Mr. Brook's gleeful preference, there's something askew in his performance.
Maybe it's that The Pantages Theatre is in California and not right across the street from where "The Producers" takes place; maybe it's that the Los Angeles audience doesn't get the references to Off Broadway, or that when an exhausted Max suggests a sexless role-play game to one of his randy little old ladies - "How about the Jewish princess and her husband?" - the jokes barely registers with the L.A. audience. In any case Mr. Alexander doesn't come across as either Jewish enough or New York-ish enough for bialystock, which is especially odd given that he was born Jay Scott Greenspan in Newark, and that Mr. Lane, who seemed, in the part, the quintessential Jew, is Irish Catholic.
This is not to ignore Mr. Lane's partner in crime, Matthew Broderick, whose performance as Bloom provided an equally daunting standard for his successors. Nor is it to assert that "The Producers" - whose Broadway original has been meticulously copied in large part by Mr. Brooks and the director and choreographer Susan Stroman for its Los Angeles incarnation -can't work witout Mr. Lane.
From the start the producers of The Producers plan has been to establish the show itself as a brand name, the primary draw, so that it wouldn't necessarily matter who the stars were. And if back-to-back visits to the current Broadway version and this new one prove anything, it's that The Producers does have an indestructible foundation.
Without the distracting sparks created by Lane/Broderick, this essential footprint is clearly discernible. But it also clear that is was enhanced by the original stars and that their absence has become a creative problem.
This is most evident in the show's opening scenes, which include two weak songs with especially thin melodies and which are rife with dreadful, ba-dum-bum jokes that pass for dialogue in the Mel Brooks universe. By sheer force of charisma and chemistry, Mr. Lane and Mr. Broderick carried the show through this rocky beginning, something that neither current pair accomplishes. But how to generate an equivalent combustion? Is it preferable to try and copy the Max and Leo of Lane/Broderick? Or to create them anew?
In New York on Broadway right now Lewis Standlen and Don Stephenson are embarked on copying Lane/Broderick and the result is that the show feels a bit bleached out. Mr. Standlen an old hand at musical comedy is an estimable clown, with a Groucho-like manner and mien. He seems to be purposely channeling Mr. Lane here and doing a pretty good job of it, but a copycat performance can't help being a fainter one.
Mr. Stephenson is also aping his predecessor, but his version of Mr. Broderick's Leo Bloom is entriely free of any realistically human qualities. In Mr. Stephensons hands, Bloom makes some of the same noises Mr. Broderick made and strikes some of the same poses, but he cranks up Bloom's hysteria and Bloom's painful shyness and insecurity to the level of an especially childish Saturday morning cartoon.
In Los Angeles, Alexander/Short are rather bravely forging their own paths. Watching the two of them, I found myself often reminded of the 1967 film "The Producers" and its stars, Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder.
Of this duo, Mr. Short is far more persuasive. A gifted slapstick comic, he gives Bloom all the physical elasticity he has brought to umpteen other roles on television and in the movies, and he has an idiosycratic vocal range in which to make the line deliveries his own. He also sings more powerfully than Mr. Broderick.
But most importantly, his Leo is genuinely grounded. It's a far-fetched reality, but his personality is unmistakably attached to the world as we know it, his neurotic pathology recognizable as human. And this is especially crucial because in the show's narrative, Leo is the one who has an arc of change, from mouse to amn. Max may have the climatic solo number, but he was, is and will be a lovable scalwag. Leo's is the fuller story, and Mr. Short brings that to the fore, which give the Los Angeles show a slight tilt, but enough to give it its own original skew.
The difference in the current Los Angeles and Broadway productions comes down to the two stars. It's also the difference between the current productions and the original. For the producers of The Producers that's an interesting and vexing problem"
In an article from the New York Times titled, "Producers: To Ape or Ignore You-Know-Who?", Bruce Weber tackles an analysis of The Producers original Broadway stars Lane/Broderick, current Broadway stars Standlen/Stephenson, and Los Angeles stars Alexander/Short.
July 15, 2003
"In Betrayed, the 11 o'clock number in The Producers, that rapscallion Max Bialystock sits in a jail cell. Abandoned by his partner, the accountant and erstwhile shrinking violet Leo Bloom, an embittered Max recapitulates the entire play. In fast-forward mode, he caricatures the voices and gestures of the characters and recounts most of the plot. It's a star turn for the actor playing Max, and the Broadway original, Nathan Lane, turned it into a dazzling tour de force, oddly poignant and exhaustingly funny.
One of the number's irrestible if obvious gags - this is Mel Brook's show, after all - is that it rewinds the plot includes the intermission, a few seconds when the music suddenly stops and Max sits down and waits impatiently before he jumps to hid feet and takes up where he left off.
In the much anticipated production of the show at the Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles, Jason Alexander is Max, and in "Betrayed" he adds a wrinkle. During the intermission silence he mimics audience members whispering among themselves.
"Yeah, yeah, he's good, he's good," Mr. Alexander says, "But he's no Nathan Lane."
It's a fine moment for Mr. Alexander who delivers the line with a measure of modesty and a measure of understandable irritation. He gets a big laugh, an appreciative laugh, winning the sympathy he's already earned with his hard-working performance, not to mention big points from a Left Coast audience. (Though he's a Broadway veteran, Mr. Alexander has, after all, become much better known for his work on television.)
But none of this erases that he is right. It is apparent that Mr. Lane's template for Max is the one element of the show that has not been effectively reproduced or replaced by any of the actors who have subsequently played the role. And this is especially pertinent because for the show to return to MEGAHIT STATUS on Broadway - last week it was just the fourth highest-grossing show, with Variety reporting that only 83.2% of the seats at the St. James Theatre were filled - it is likely that name-brand stars will have to take over. It's no secret that the producers of The Producers would like Alexander/Short to be the next Bialystock & Bloom in New York.
As half of the starry tandem above the title in Los Angeles - Mr. Short is the other half - Mr Alexander sings and dances with elan, and he attacks the antic vulgarity of Brooksian comedy with all the lack of subtlety it deserves. But he's outgunned by Mr. Short. And is you've seen Mr. Lane as Max, Mr. Alexander seems like a tag-along younger brother in comparison, puffing out his chest for artificial stature and working too hard to keep up. you miss Mr. Lane's naturally huge plaintiveness, his cartoon-beagle sad eyes, the woe is me warble in his voice, the outsize of self-pity he can so hilariously affect.
Mr. Alexander who excels at understated verbal comedy, may simply be miscast, he has all the moves and they're polished. But aswim in the overinflated slapstick that is Mr. Brook's gleeful preference, there's something askew in his performance.
Maybe it's that The Pantages Theatre is in California and not right across the street from where "The Producers" takes place; maybe it's that the Los Angeles audience doesn't get the references to Off Broadway, or that when an exhausted Max suggests a sexless role-play game to one of his randy little old ladies - "How about the Jewish princess and her husband?" - the jokes barely registers with the L.A. audience. In any case Mr. Alexander doesn't come across as either Jewish enough or New York-ish enough for bialystock, which is especially odd given that he was born Jay Scott Greenspan in Newark, and that Mr. Lane, who seemed, in the part, the quintessential Jew, is Irish Catholic.
This is not to ignore Mr. Lane's partner in crime, Matthew Broderick, whose performance as Bloom provided an equally daunting standard for his successors. Nor is it to assert that "The Producers" - whose Broadway original has been meticulously copied in large part by Mr. Brooks and the director and choreographer Susan Stroman for its Los Angeles incarnation -can't work witout Mr. Lane.
From the start the producers of The Producers plan has been to establish the show itself as a brand name, the primary draw, so that it wouldn't necessarily matter who the stars were. And if back-to-back visits to the current Broadway version and this new one prove anything, it's that The Producers does have an indestructible foundation.
Without the distracting sparks created by Lane/Broderick, this essential footprint is clearly discernible. But it also clear that is was enhanced by the original stars and that their absence has become a creative problem.
This is most evident in the show's opening scenes, which include two weak songs with especially thin melodies and which are rife with dreadful, ba-dum-bum jokes that pass for dialogue in the Mel Brooks universe. By sheer force of charisma and chemistry, Mr. Lane and Mr. Broderick carried the show through this rocky beginning, something that neither current pair accomplishes. But how to generate an equivalent combustion? Is it preferable to try and copy the Max and Leo of Lane/Broderick? Or to create them anew?
In New York on Broadway right now Lewis Standlen and Don Stephenson are embarked on copying Lane/Broderick and the result is that the show feels a bit bleached out. Mr. Standlen an old hand at musical comedy is an estimable clown, with a Groucho-like manner and mien. He seems to be purposely channeling Mr. Lane here and doing a pretty good job of it, but a copycat performance can't help being a fainter one.
Mr. Stephenson is also aping his predecessor, but his version of Mr. Broderick's Leo Bloom is entriely free of any realistically human qualities. In Mr. Stephensons hands, Bloom makes some of the same noises Mr. Broderick made and strikes some of the same poses, but he cranks up Bloom's hysteria and Bloom's painful shyness and insecurity to the level of an especially childish Saturday morning cartoon.
In Los Angeles, Alexander/Short are rather bravely forging their own paths. Watching the two of them, I found myself often reminded of the 1967 film "The Producers" and its stars, Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder.
Of this duo, Mr. Short is far more persuasive. A gifted slapstick comic, he gives Bloom all the physical elasticity he has brought to umpteen other roles on television and in the movies, and he has an idiosycratic vocal range in which to make the line deliveries his own. He also sings more powerfully than Mr. Broderick.
But most importantly, his Leo is genuinely grounded. It's a far-fetched reality, but his personality is unmistakably attached to the world as we know it, his neurotic pathology recognizable as human. And this is especially crucial because in the show's narrative, Leo is the one who has an arc of change, from mouse to amn. Max may have the climatic solo number, but he was, is and will be a lovable scalwag. Leo's is the fuller story, and Mr. Short brings that to the fore, which give the Los Angeles show a slight tilt, but enough to give it its own original skew.
The difference in the current Los Angeles and Broadway productions comes down to the two stars. It's also the difference between the current productions and the original. For the producers of The Producers that's an interesting and vexing problem"
My perfect day would begin at on the beach in Hana, Maui and end at a Broadway Musical.
Updated On: 7/17/03 at 02:31 AM
