WEST SIDE STORY reviews: opened Feb 20 2020 — Page 9

Considering the protests are the TOP story on CNN right now (right next to Corona and Melania), I would say whatever they are doing is pretty effective. This is now an international news story. What a beautiful thing.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/07/us/west-side-story-metoo-protest/index.html

briansb said: "Mixed on the show, leaning towards more liking it than disliking it. Saw it the other night, full cast was there. Standouts were Issac and Yesenia as Anita. Both stood out to me a lot more than the rest of the cast, although the ensemble was mostly strong as a whole. One criticism I can’t understand that I’ve read is that the dancing is weak. I thought the dancing (the actual dancing, not the choreography) was some of the strongest I’ve seen on broadway in recent times. The video projections didn’t bother me much either — maybe one or two times when it clashed with the action on the stage I thought it detracted. But I enjoyed the ambiance it gave for the most part, especially the shots of the streets and the montage before the climax. I did love the arrangements of the songs and music too.

I do think the direction of it was a bit muddled, and I say this as a major fan of Van Hove. I see the vision, but I don’t think he achieved the tight, crescendoing pace he set out for. I didn’t feel the tension/dread that he said he wanted to achieve, nor were the “heightened stakes” there for me. The choreography needed more variety as well; there seemed to be little evolution to the movement and repertoire of dance in a show where the emotion of the dance is so integral.

Overall, it’s worth seeing but I wouldn’t go again. Can’t wait to get my hands on the cast recording though!"

I was there last night as well and would echo Briansb's observation. Overall I felt that the play was more in service to the director's vision and not the other way around. All too often I found the cast wandering a huge bare stage amid bright lighting trying to hold the focus. The evening was often quite arresting but I found the cast had to work too hard to justify both the set design and the director's lack of support for the performances. 

Since there's so little footage from this show available, I'm hoping the mods allow this, or at least leave it up for a bit before they take it down.

That moment at the end when Maria comes onstage and slowly gets closer to Tony... brilliantly realized. 

I love the street thug vibe they gave to his movements. Sorry I missed this. 

There must be a Tonys curse on the role of Tony or something. To this day, no production of West Side Story has ever had the role of Tony nominated for a Tony and I remember thinking at the 4th preview that this was gonna be the year, but alas 

Isaac's Tony was absolutely thrilling, as was pretty much everything about this production. It's an absolute shame how it all turned out. Everything really clicked.

Isaac Powell should've played Tony in Steven Spielberg's recent film adaptation. While I understand that Disney/Fox probably wanted them to cast an actor who general audiences were already familiar with, I still found Ansel Elgort's performance to be so emotionally plain a lot of the time. I agree with others that he was easily the weak link of the cast.