The Wizard of Oz: NEW SONG- Red Shoes Blues- Page 5

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 2:52pm

And theatre'fan' comes off as arrogant...

Classy

[D2]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 4:17pm

TF4, when there are people on this board as knowledgeable as PJ and Besty, who choose to share their knowledge and are very classy gentlemen, only an arrogant, patronizing little ****would choose to view them as patronizing.

[gvendo2005]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 4:42pm

Webber has some good points and some bad points. Mainly bad points.

BAD POINTS
1. The new material. Cut it. It serves no purpose other than to beat a dead horse. Let's not belabor the points already established elsewhere in the script and score.
2. Cutting material. Come on. No-brainer here. If you cut "King of the Forest," you better give your Cowardly Lion something to compensate, if not in material then in his weekly wage packet. That's where the Lion earns his bread and his reviews. If you cut "The Jitterbug," there goes a big mood lifter at one of the darkest points of the second act, something that would be better Witch material than...
3. ...this pile of ****. Whoever decided not to tell ALW that his and Rice's style would not mesh well with Arlen/Harburg/Stothart clearly needs to be fired from RUG, as quickly as possible. In fact, the more "no" men/women that can be hired at that company, the better.
4. Okay, I get that Michael Crawford is a star, but that doesn't count for much when you gave him a glorified bit part. How about just letting him double up in several roles a la Frank Morgan in the film rather than writing new songs for him? If you need to strictly follow the RSC convention to do so, you could always make him Uncle Henry (who traditionally doubles the gatekeeper in the stage version) as well, though I don't know how good they'd be with the quick change into Marvel's outfit.

GOOD POINTS (and he really didn't have any, so I was scraping the barrel here)
1. The first act closer kinda would be more dramatic if intermission came after the "bring me the broomstick" scene. Intermission coming after "The Merry Old Land of Oz" was really rooted in other stagings of the RSC version, sending the audience out to the lobby singing along in true panto fashion. If you try to turn it into "theater" like Webber did, this is technically a good idea.

[TheatreFan4]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 5:53pm

D2, where in this post is any knowledge?

"Oh, TheatreFan. I feel so sorry for you. That couple who brought you up after your parents abandoned you must have been terribly, terribly cruel."

Sounds like he's just being a dick.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 6:14pm

No.

It's just you.

[Kad]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 6:18pm

...Best's post and accompanying link was quite informative. And he's right: whether you like The Wizard of Oz, you have give it credit. Very few films- hell, very few things in general- achieve the beloved nature of the Wizard of Oz, all around the world. It crosses cultural barriers, gender barriers, sexual preference barriers, age barriers. It's probably one of the few films from the 30s nearly everyone can claim to have seen. It's definitely one of the few musicals of the time era that people can hum most of the score of. And that's for a reason.
Who cares if the plot is simplistic? It is- so what? It's a damn tight formula and Oz wrings the most out of it.

I also think it's foolish to paint "children's literature" with a "oh, it's for kids" brush. There's some damn fine works of literature geared for children out there- stuff that contains just as much literary device as any adult novel. There's a reason stories like Oz and Alice in Wonderland are beloved by all ages and people constantly go to see revivals and remakes.

[Scarywarhol]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 6:20pm

I think if you go onto a Broadway message board and say that The Wizard of Oz is boring and just a kid's story (and therefore not something worthwhile), you kind of have to take what's coming to you...

I mean. It's just part of the deal.

[Jonwo]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 7:40pm

The Wizard of Oz is a missed oppurtunity, they should have done what Cameron Mackintosh and Disney did with Mary Poppins where they kept most of the iconic songs but with a book that had elements from both the books and the film.

[fingerlakessinger]

Posted: 3/5/11 at 8:00pm

I think "The Wizard of Oz" (Both book and '39 movie) are some of the finest examples of story telling. Look how many times the story has been adapted into a different form or lent itself to some fantastic hits (ala WICKED)
I think those reasons alone show how fantastic the root material is. As many pointed out, something about the land of Oz is just ground breaking. I personally think it's because of the sheer simplicity of it's core message "there's no place like home."
The movie is something you can NOT mess with...you can honor it and maybe look at it a different way (again..Wicked) but you just cant mess with the sheer elegance of the movie. And to be honest, to say it is just a "children's bedtime story" is quite offensive. The music/story reaches way beyond that.
I really do want to see this production however. While "Red Shoes Blues" is no where near as good as the original OZ score...it has a very funky, twisted, almost maniac undertone to it...which I like...I find the Witch in this version to be both funny, yet I think Waddingham does bring something almost scary to her. It's a very different take on the character. I have not heard the other new songs though (anyone have them please message me haha) but personally...I think reaching the amount of heart the movie reached is almost impossible, so I'm going to take this new take with face value.

[JasonM12480]

Posted: 3/6/11 at 9:36am

My biggest problem is that it's not actually a blues at all...certainly a composer of his background and training knows how to write an actual "blues" number. You can't call something "the blues" if it doesn't sound like "the blues." I mean...hello. LOL

[PalJoey]

Posted: 3/6/11 at 10:03am

I thought of that too, Jason, but Sondheim uses the word "blues" in "The God-Why-Don't-You-Love-Me Blues," aka "Buddy's Blue."

Many songwriters have called lament songs that are not in traditional blues form "The [Fill-in-the-Blank] Blues," but usually it's done with humor.

[Phantom of London]

Posted: 3/6/11 at 5:10pm

Even though you didn't like the song most of you,I am glad you appreciated Hannah Waddingham talents, she is one of the top musical actress in the West End at the moment, along with Ruthie Henshall who some of you might of seen in 'Chicago' and Maria Friedman who starred on Broadway with 'The Woman in White' but missed many performances due to breast cancer. In the meantime I hope Hannah will make it to Broadway, so you can enjoy her in the flesh.

Hannah Waddingham was excellent as Desiree with the recent Menier Chocolate revival of 'A Little Night Music' and the Witch in the Regent Park open air revival of 'Into The Woods'.

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 3/6/11 at 5:18pm

Well, we did get to see her in Spamalot, if I recall correctly.. and yes, she is a very talented woman. I look forward to the release of the Regent Park Into the Woods on DVD!

I am loving this thread...