What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?- Page 2
What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
jcdenton08
Chorus Member Joined: 9/19/08
#25re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/22/08 at 9:47am
My opinion, as a rule of thumb most DANCE-intensive shows go badly downhill after the first cast-change. This is due to original cast being choreographed and directed in by the original production team.. the second cast are then basically told to do what the first cast did, and so the quality depreciates with each week that passes, the steps get looser and looser before you end up a horrible Chicago-shaped mess 
Spamalot in London during previews and the first few months, compared to third cast in, the difference was huge. In the words somebody very senior related to the show, "it's gone down-hill a lot, oh well".
The sign of a quality show is the ability to be 'timeless'.. Phantom, and Les Mis in particular have lasted so long because of tourism and the quality of the piece as a whole commercially.
It also helps if, like Chicago or Blood Brothers, you can afford to run at 25% house Mon-Thurs and still be profitable.
#26re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/22/08 at 1:20pm
GREAT and interesting info. Thank you!!! 
"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES---
"THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS
#27re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/22/08 at 6:15pm
I urge all young Broadway superfans (and you know who you are!) to chat with older theatergoers, especially those who live in the Tri-State area. You will learn great insights. One of my favorite stories:
I was discussing "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" with an older upper east side couple, while leaving a performance by the complete original cast in January of 1986 (Buckley, Laine, Rose, McGillin, Murphy, etc.). The husband wasn't thrilled with the show, but the wife (and I) had enjoyed it very much.
When I asked him what musicals he had seen recently that he HAD enjoyed, he said (and this is a direct quote): "Now, 'My Fair Lady' with Rex Harrison and Julie Andrews, now that was a show!"
I had two reactions: (1) cut these people some slack, old man, it was perfectly enjoyable, and (2) omg, tell me EVERYTHING you remember about "My Fair Lady"!
Which, you realize, was 30 years before. So, you just never know what shows the person sitting beside you may have seen.
And, regarding "Cats," I think that is really the first example of a show's logo that did not include the title. Mackintosh, Dewynter's (sp?), et al. really changed the whole way that shows were marketed and merchandised with the "big four" British popera megamusicals of that era.
#28re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/22/08 at 7:27pm
I was very lucky to be able to ask my parents about the shows they'd seen (or in my Mom's case, shows that she had been in!).
Because of my grandfather's job in the movie biz, my dad was often a "first nighter," accompanying his parents to the opening nights of such shows as Oklahoma, Carousel, Streetcar, The King and I, Kiss Me Kate, West Side Story, and many others. He stopped going in the mid '60s, when our family moved to Kansas, where I grew up. My mom's first show that she saw on a trip with her Kansas friends to NYC was the OBC of Guys & Dolls! It was really great to hear "what it was like," from them. Or how my mom felt herself opening in a play on Broadway in 1957. Such great stories!
I saw my first Broadway show in the early 1980's. The OBCs of Cats, Dreamgirls, Torch Song Trilogy, Agnes of God, Forbidden Broadway... later on, in the mid '80s when I moved there and saw the original productions of Big River, La Cage, Drood and others... and now I'm the one being asked "what was it like?"
Someday, hopefully, you will too.
"Jaws is the Citizen Kane of movies."
blocked: logan2, Diamonds3, Hamilton22
Updated On: 9/22/08 at 07:27 PM
blocked: logan2, Diamonds3, Hamilton22
puppet
Stand-by Joined: 1/11/08
#29re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 12:49amgo to www.bluegobo.com and you can see clips of a lot of musicals going WAY back and get an idea of what they were like.
LePetiteFromage
Broadway Legend Joined: 1/19/08
#31re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 7:04amPaul, that reminds me of when I rushed Company and chatted with the older couple sitting next to me. they were telling me how they used to take their children to shows and get cheaper seats. they had seen Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand for something like $3 a ticket, and had seen the OBC of Pacific Overtures (which is one of my favorite Sondheim cast recordings). I was in awe.
When I see the phrase "the ____ estate", I imagine a vast mansion in the country full of monocled men and high-collared women receiving letters about productions across the country and doing spit-takes at whatever they contain.
-Kad
wickedrentq
Broadway Legend Joined: 11/6/04
#32re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 10:31am
A good book is one that was compiled by Frank Rich -- I think it was called something like "The Critic." It contains most (if not all, I can't quite remember), of his reviews, and his Sunday columns. So especially for some of the ones you asked about, you can see his reviews for Cats, Les Miz, Phantom, Sunday in the Park, Into the Woods, etc. A good read, and I believe he writes commentary on them every so often -- I remember before reading his Sunday review, it was somehow made clear that he was one of the only critics who loved it.
Also, just googling for reviews will help. A lot of times if you enter the write phrase, original Times reviews will come up.
"If there was a Mount Rushmore for Broadway scores, "West Side Story" would be front and center. It snaps, it crackles it pops! It surges with a roar, its energy and sheer life undiminished by the years" - NYPost reviewer Elisabeth Vincentelli
WOSQ
Broadway Legend Joined: 7/18/03
#33re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 10:57am
"Older" shows, whether plays or musicals, were not nearly so technically complicated. Scenery, costumes and lighting enhanced the show and weren't a show unto themselves. Shows could switch theatres relatively easily and quickly.
Example: My Fair Lady closed on a Saturday night at the Broadway and loaded out; I Can Get It For You Wholesale loaded out of the Shubert, moved to the Broadway and reopened Monday night; Stop The World, I Want To Get Off loaded in to the Shubert and began dress rehearsals to prepare for a Thursday opening (no previews in those days).
This was a very busy 48 hours for everybody, but was not unheard of, and keep in mind that the first two shows were very heavy scenically and every other way including large casts.
One of the reasons that Phantom has stayed at the Majestic is that it would be nearly impossible to move easily: the set, the complex lighting, the chandelier. (Another reason is that to get the show - which originally was looking at the Minskoff - the Shuberts had to promise that there would not be a stop clause, but that's another story.)
Lighting got complex with A Chorus Line in 1975. When the original tours went out a year later, the set and lights were double built and leapfrogged one another from city to city. Michael Bennett wanted the stage to hold no surprises for the cast and to make no adjustments. This continued for each touring company including the bus-and-truck.
"If my life weren't funny, it would just be true. And that would be unacceptable."
--Carrie Fisher
#34re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 12:41pm
In the 80's I saw a lot of shows both in London and NYC. I always felt much safer walking around the theater district in London than in NYC back then, but haven't felt that way about Broadway/Times Square for a while now. I loved how many more really well-known British actors I could see in plays and musicals in the West End without their casting being seen as such a big deal. With both musicals and plays, I always felt more a sense of both discovery and intimacy with West End shows. When I saw a show both in the West End and on Broadway (in either order) I was always impressed with how much bigger everything seemed on Broadway.
I saw the RSC's Les Miserables at the Barbican before it moved to the West End and Blood Brothers before it came to Broadway. With both shows, it's the original London productions that stick with me. So much of both Broadway and the West End seem to be about technology and spectacle these days. I can enjoy that as a theatregoer while I'm there, but the spectacle doesn't stick with me as long. A great performance, on the other hand, is still a great performance no matter how much anything else onstage changes. I feel lucky to have seen Patti Lupone in Les Miserables, Anything Goes, Sunset Boulevard, and Gypsy over way too many years and just wish I could have seen her in Evita.
#35re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 2:56pm
For you youngsters, it was like seeing the Cirque shows of my day----i was amazed people could turn triples, sing high C's, and fly on trapezes. Plus ACT, really inhabit, something like a cat. Now that kind of thing is common nature in lots of shows, so maybe the spectacle has to keep getting bigger.
Thank you, TwoStep! I think the youngsters, who love to automatically bash any show that had a long run, forget that shows could possibly have had an impact when they originally opened that simply is not possible 10+ years later when innovation, trends and styles have already progressed into a new era. I saw Cats at the New London as well and it was simply breathtaking.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
TxTwoStep
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/24/03
#36re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 5:15pm
to add to WICKEDRENTQ's point, you can try "Ghostlight: A Memoir" by Frank Rich, where in his biographical account of growing up, he recalls the shows he saw trying "out of town" in DC.
He is also part of EVERYTHING WAS POSSIBLE, as he not only wrote the foreword, but is mentioned on the chapter where Chapin covers the out of town reviews of FOLLIES...one of which was the Harvard Crimson (student newspaper) one, written by then undergrad Rich. i won't spoil the outcome of that fateful review, but let's just say i read GHOSTLIGHT hoping he'd end with it (though he didn't, the memoir ended just as he left for college...making me hope he'd put out a continuation volume eventually). It's an amazing story, particularly in hindsight. Well worth some research.
Thanks for the kind words, MATT. The London/Brit shows i saw remain high in my memory and regard.
Will: They don't give out awards for helping people be gay... unless you count the Tonys.
"I guarantee that we'll have tough
times. I guarantee that at some point
one or both of us will want to get out.
But I also guarantee that if I don't
ask you to be mine, I'll regret it for
the rest of my life..."
Mamie
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/26/04
#37re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 8:48pm
It’s September 2, 1924 and we’re going to the opening night of the new musical “Rose Marie” at the new Imperial Theatre. You’re wearing your new “Judith Anderson” gown, based on a gown worn by the famous actress on the London stage and afterwards it’s dinner and dancing at the Palais d’Or, at Broadway and 48th Street.
…….
It’s September 15, 1932 and it’s finally here – the opening night of “Flying Colors” starring Clifton Webb and Patsy Kelly. We still can’t decide on the post-show entertainment. It’ll either be Ozzie Nelson and his Columbia Broadcasting Orchestra at the Hotel Paramount or Cab Calloway at the Cotton Club!
……..
October 7, 1943 is finally here and we’re off to see that wonderful Broadway sensation Mary Martin with Kenny Baker and John Boles in “One Touch of Venus”! That new gown from Bergdorf Goodman will look FABULOUS, especially when you take it out dining and dancing later. But where to go? Frank Sinatra’s at The Waldorf Astoria, Benny Goodman at the New Yorker, and Hildegard is at the Persian Room. Decisions, decisions…
……
October 12, 1950 and it’s Ethel Merman opening in “Call Me Madam”! Dressing has become so casual now. No more tuxedos and gowns – now it’s cocktail dresses and dark suits. But the evening still isn’t complete without a visit to the Starlight Roof at the Waldorf for dancing the rumba to the music of Xavier Cougat and his orchestra, and featuring singer Abbe Lane.
…………….
It’s August 15, 1960 and it’s STILL Ethel Merman – this time starring in “Gypsy”! Even the cocktail dresses have become a little simpler. There aren’t so many places to go to after the show, but there are lots of nice restaurants to choose from. The Absinthe House on 48th Street is featuring frogs legs, and the Russian Tea Room has borscht and blinchiki. The ad for Tavern on the Green says it’s the city’s only country-club restaurant and that they have dancing in the Rose Room! At last – we found one!
I have a collection of old Playbills and these were pulled out of just a few of them (and these were all from one theatre – the Imperial). People definitely knew how to enjoy the theatre then!
www.thebreastcancersite.com
A click for life.
mamie4 5/14/03
A click for life.
mamie4 5/14/03
#38re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/23/08 at 9:22pmMore from the old Playbills, please Mamie? I loved the pictures they painted of very different theater-going experiences way back when. Would love to see those old ads.
Mamie
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/26/04
#39re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 5:46amHappy to - but I'll have to wait till I get home from work. I love going through them!
www.thebreastcancersite.com
A click for life.
mamie4 5/14/03
A click for life.
mamie4 5/14/03
#39re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 7:34amMamie, you're a doll and a sweetheart, did you know that? You just got my day off to a great start. I feel about you the way Brooks Atkinson felt about Roz Russell in Wonderful Town! Mamie for president!
#40re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 8:10am
I was at the opening night of Cats in NY. My best friend Reed Jones was playing Skimbleshanks. It was the 3rd of 6 times I saw that show, and not because I liked it that much. We went to Sardi's afterward with Ken Page and Armelia McQueen and then to the party. Somehow we all ended up at Les Mouches. Like after most evenings when I ended up at Les Mouches in the 80s, I remember very little.
Seven years later we held a memorial service for Reed on the stage of the Winter Garden, provided gratis courtesy of the producers and the stagehands. It was one of the first of all-too-many AIDS memorials on the stages of Broadway shows.
The cast of the 1980 revival of West Side Story performed the Jets Song (Reed had played Action). Mark Fotopoulos, who had played Tiger, was sitting in the front row, too ill to perform. But when he heard the opening notes of the Jets song, he had a sudden surge of energy and jumped onto the stage and performed it with them. Two dancers then performed the Somewhere ballet, which Mr. Robbins had repeatedly cut Reed from during rehearsals.
At Reed's request Mandy Patinkin sang "No One Is Alone" and Debbie Gravitte sang "Junk Man" and Ashford and Simpson sang a spiritual. Betty Buckley ended the service by singing an a capella "I'll Be Seeing You," which came out like a prayer.
He's been gone almost 20 years and I still miss him.
#41re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 8:19amWhat a beautiful story and a wonderful way to celebrate his life.
jayclay
Understudy Joined: 9/11/08
#42re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 8:19am
When Phantom opened there were reports about it for several days on the news and entertainment shows. It was a huge deal - I remember taping a lot of the interviews and reports. (Some reviews described Sarah Brightman as "Minnie Mouse on quaaludes". I still like that description.) Then everyone started pulling together pieces on ALW (biographies, retrospectives, etc) and showing old Michael Crawford stuff like Barnum, Hello Dolly, etc. We had just moved back east from AZ and even though all of the reports said sold out for a year, I thought I'd call up, and see if maybe we could get tickets for the following summer (it opened in Jan.)I asked when the next available tickets were and to my and the ticket agent's surprise he said "How about next Wednesday?" He said "take them now - obviously no one knows these are available". Apparently a large group had just returned two of their tickets (when we arrived at the theater it was obvious we were in the middle of a large group of people who knew each other). So we saw the OBC a week after it opened.
When Jesus Christ Superstar opened in '71 it was on the cover of Time magazine.* It was quite controversial at the time (some nuns at my elementary school got in trouble for teaching the songs to us). The article mentioned there was the smell of pot backstage...oooh what a scandal! JCS was the first Broadway show I saw and the following night my mother took us to see the second-last performance of Hair.
*I wonder how many Broadway shows have been on the cover of Time...obviously JCS, Rent, ALW for Phantom...what else?
#43re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 8:33am
Mamie and PalJoey, your posts were amazing to reaad!!! Thank you for sharing
"TO LOVE ANOTHER PERSON IS TO SEE THE FACE OF GOD"- LES MISERABLES---
"THERE'S A SPECIAL KIND OF PEOPLE KNOWN AS SHOW PEOPLE... WE'RE BORN EVERY NIGHT AT HALF HOUR CALL!"--- CURTAINS
#44re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 10:26amI remember that "Les Miserables" was on the cover of Newsweek. I remember because I still have it! lol
TxTwoStep
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/24/03
#45re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 11:36amP JOEY (this site's answer to P DIDDY), that is a great recollection. i'm sending it to a few CATS folks i know...it will touch them deeply. Thank you.
Will: They don't give out awards for helping people be gay... unless you count the Tonys.
"I guarantee that we'll have tough
times. I guarantee that at some point
one or both of us will want to get out.
But I also guarantee that if I don't
ask you to be mine, I'll regret it for
the rest of my life..."
#46re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 1:23pmTx, if any of them were friends of Reed's, ask them to contact me.
TxTwoStep
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/24/03
#47re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 5:16pmi also wanted to say i had the privilege of seeing Page play his role when TUTS here in Houston did CATS a few seasons back....and he was amazing. You couldn't tell those decades had passed at all. It was pretty cool, as that cast had the first B'way Deuteronomy (sp?) and the last B'way Grizabella (so far).
Will: They don't give out awards for helping people be gay... unless you count the Tonys.
"I guarantee that we'll have tough
times. I guarantee that at some point
one or both of us will want to get out.
But I also guarantee that if I don't
ask you to be mine, I'll regret it for
the rest of my life..."
#48re: What Were Older Shows Like When They Opened?
Posted: 9/24/08 at 5:39pmI mentioned Reed's name to Ken a year or so ago, and the two of us got very teary.
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