The Wild Party Opens This Week — Page 4

I only know this show via Cast Recording, but I thought "Queenie Was a Blonde" and "Out of the Blue" were the most interesting part of the show (not as good as "Queenie Wazza Blonde" / "Marie Is Tricky" / "Wild Party", but still) and I am absolutely devastated that I will never hear Sutton's "Out of the Blue"!

I simply wish this cast could do the Broadway version - let them soar (and get Joshua Henry back!)

Twenty

I use the term "naughty version" instead of bootleg and it works fine.

I saw the Crazy Mandy version and loved it. Never saw this version but have the CD. I have to admit that like many CD's I own, I have never listened to it. I intend to rectify that error over the weekend .

So disappointing that How Did we Come To This is cut. Such a great song. Whoever was encouraging these strange cuts should feel ashamed.

Is this supposed to be going to Broadway?

Dear God, that ridiculous new song at the end for Queenie is NOT what that show needed.

It seems fairly clear to me the real motivation behind getting rid of "Out Of The Blue" and "How Did We Come To This?" was to placate Sutton Foster's voice. She sounds great in the show, by most accounts, but she dropped out of a benefit as recently as last week because of bronchitis that's plagued her for almost a month. Immediately before that, she canceled a string of concert appearances for the same reason. You're telling me it's a creatively-motivated coincidence two of her character's huge numbers have been cut in the wake of all that, with one of them conveniently replaced by an introspective ballad? I don't buy it.

Lippa wrote Queenie around the very specific parameters of Julia Murney's voice, so the vocal demands of the role are exceptional for anyone, let alone someone recovering from a vocal impairment (especially someone like Foster who doesn't typically sing this way to begin with.)

Updated On: 7/16/15 at 11:20 PM

When I say the kind of singing in the show is not Sutton's forte, I primarily refer to the consistently intense vocal stamina required. She has a terrific high belt, to be sure, but most shows she's done have really only had one big number where she's had to sing that way ("Gimme Gimme" in Thoroughly Modern Millie, "Astonishing" in Little Women, "Show Off" in The Drowsy Chaperone, etc.)

As originally written, Queenie has song after song after song that are all like that. "Out Of The Blue," "Raise The Roof," "Maybe I Like It This Way," and "How Did We Come To This?" are all full-fledged eleven o'clock numbers in their own right. That's something she's never had to navigate before.

Updated On: 7/16/15 at 11:38 PM

I don't doubt that Lippa changed the opening to further differentiate from the LaChiusa version (although, the horn opening was one of my favorite parts of this score, and one of the only era-appropriate sections.)

Why on earth would you play a motif from the score that no longer remains part of the show? Curiouser and curiouser...

Once again, why could they not have done the LaChiusa version?

Whizzer, I take back what I said! I saw the show tonight, and I was just perplexed.

There's no way the changes were made for Foster. No composer is going to rearrange an entire show for Foster. The tickets were already sold, etc. If she had dropped out, we'd all still have been there.

The changes made no sense. The ending is terrible. The beginning is terrible. It's based off an epic poem which has the opening line "Queenie was a blonde." So to not have that open the show is just stupid.

Having listened to the original recording for years, I was interested to hear the book and see the show as a whole. I was surprised at how sung-through it was. And at some of the recitative I didn't know existed. (Maybe it didn't exist prior to this?)

Overall I was disappointed. The story is not engaging. I have no clue why Black wants Queenie or why Burrs is ****-faced drunk or why Kate want Burrs. It's all very surface. The direction felt very static - Let's cross to center stage and talk.

The main 4 performances were all a little scattered. On paper, I was sooooooo excited to hear Pasquale sing "What is it About Her?" But he just didn't have the insanity I wanted. He didn't delve into craziness like I wanted. Sure, he was trying for it, but I wasn't convinced that this was just an erratic person. Foster was indeed miscast, but given it's Encores I'm glad she was playing outside of her type. Her voice just didn't suite the music. It needed a big voice to suit everyone else, and she's a musical comedy girl. The Kate, I thought, was pretty great. I was into her. Black..... My only thing with him is: let me get to know the melody first before you riff around the melody. And then in the sections where he didn't riff like crazy he was just uninteresting.

The choreography was pretty okay. There were some moments - like "Life of the Party" - where it felt very out of place.

Overall, I just don't think it's a great show. It's some great songs, but in the context of the show they just aren't so great.

Totally. And I think, as someone who invested $25, that I'm not mad I went by any means. It's an awesome cast with some glorious vocals. But, I think, nowadays with Encores, it's like "Will this transfer?" And this one is just a dud in that regard. I feel bad for Lippa because he's been successful, but not. And this is just another nail in the coffin. Some terrible, terrible revisions were made to an otherwise incredible score. This might have reawaken the regional rights. But not now.