NoItAll said: "At the age of 36, Lea Michele is currently portraying, to enormous critical acclaim, a preternaturally ambitious women who ages from about 20 to 35 during the course of the show. In a few short years, she will portray a preternaturally ambitious woman who ages from about 30 to 45 during the course of the show. She will be greater in the role than women who have technically superior voices, such as Audra, for the same reason that Callas was “greater” than Tebaldi. You heard it here first.
As a huge Lea fan I find this post very interesting. Though I have to correct you in that "technically" Michelle and Audra have different types of voices. And both are the absolute BEST at that type of voice (Lea: belt, Audra: mezzo? soprano belt?...).
What we need is an interesting take on Rose. We've seen and loved the others. But to have Audra's style meeting the razzmatazz of the written Rose would definitely be interesting. And having a younger Rose who ages into the battleaxe (instead of the usual older actress aging down at the beginning) would be equally interesting.
All of the other actresses mentioned here would, of course, be wonderful traditional Roses (Chenowith would be the less traditional, probably the casting that intrigues me the most). But there can only be one Broadway Rose in the near future. But I would love to see what the musical actresses of a certain age do in Britain. They take their Roses to the regions. Johanna Riding, Ria Jones, Jodi Prenger, Caroline O'Connor, Shona White and Rebecca Thornhill have played Rose in theatres across the UK and Scotland. Maybe our own possible Roses should do the same here.
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