Why isn't Brittany Murphy starring Sweet Charity?

[Whatchmacallit]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 12:27pm

I don't mean this to be a direct bash to Christina Applegate, but I remember reading that Brittany Murphy wanted to play Sweet Charity on Broadway.

I don't know if you remember this article, it was right before her star really broke, when she was on the bubble.(right before Don't Say A Word came out, and she was in those Gap ads) She was profiled in Entertainment Weekly, and they had said she was supposed to play Sally Bowles, but kept having to put off her starting date because of filming committments. She said her dream was to star in Sweet Charity on Broadway.

Now personally, I think Brittany Murphy is awesome. I think she's a great actress, and has a great voice. I've read that she has studied dance(I know that just taking class does not make one a dancer, **cough, cough, Applegate, cough, cough **)

Maybe I'm just itching to see her back on the boards.(she previously seen on Broadway in A View From The Bridge) And a friend who worked on Gypsy said that during initial casting, she had been offered Louise.(which of course, could just be a rumor)

Sorry, I'm rambling, but I just remembered this article, and it got me thinking...

[apdarcey]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 12:52pm

christina is a trained dancer. she has taken a lot more than "one class"

she is mountains better than brittany murphy ever could wish to be.

[EverythingIsRENT]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 12:54pm

I agree, apdarcey!! Murphy does nothing for me. I liked her a lot better before she decided she needed to lose 80 pounds and straighten and dye her hair to get roles. So sad.

[apdarcey]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 12:56pm

it all went downhill after clueless. you know it's sad when your first movie is your best.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 12:59pm

I know nothing about her dance training/skills, but I have heard her sing, and did have her in mind when I heard about the last revival of GYPSY going into production - I'm fascinated to hear she was actually offered the role. Too bad she wasn't able to accept it, if that is the truth. I'm sure she would have been fantastic.

[Unknown User]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:00pm

For the life of me, I cannot understand why anyone would use the words "great actress" and Brittany Murphy. Could you explain why you think she is great? She hasn't shown much range in her ten plus years as an actress. She makes one crappy movie after another. She's unpleasant to look at and unpleasant to listen to. I'm miffed by her film success. Who cares why she hasn't starred on Broadway recently. Just be grateful she hasn't.

[BobbyBubby]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:00pm

Brittany Murphy was good until she became rail thin and apparently started doing a lot of crack cocaine. Loved her in "Drop Dead Gorgeous".

[Whatchmacallit]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:07pm

I know that Christina Applegate has taken more than one class, but she is not a dancer.

I've enjoyed Brittany Murphy's work in a number of films, and thought she was great in A View From The Bridge. I think she started strong right out of the gate. Yes, some her films have been formulaic studio pics, but I definitely think she has something special about her that warrants her notice as an actress. I've had a soft spot for her ever since she was a spunky curly haired girl on Drexell's Class.

[Unknown User]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:14pm

Brittany Murphy's transformation reminds me of Sarah Jessica Parker's physical change in the mid-1980s. Both started out as really cute, young, attractive looking brunettes. Then in an effort to gain sexy roles, both bleached their hair, assumed silly baby dolls voices and lost too much weight. As a result, they became annoying and...uh...not very attractive.

[InfiniteTheaterFrenzy]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:25pm

That's funny, because I was just about to say how amazing it would be if Sarah Jessica could've been Charity at some point...

[apdarcey]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:36pm

except now sjp is kind of enjoyable. i can't say i have the same hopes for brittany.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:44pm

I don't understand how you can say she hasn't shown much range. The Torkelsons, Clueless, Girl Interrupted, King of the Hill, Don't Say A Word, Cherry Falls - all completely different characters from one another.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:53pm

Who cares if Applegate has taken one dance class or a thousand - her dancing is the most professional aspect of her performance right now so until you see it (which I doubt you did,) keep your unnecessarily snarky comments about Christina to yourself.

She's obviously a trained dancer - you can't fake that.

[apdarcey]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 1:55pm

thank you munk.

[BroadwayGirl107]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:14pm

Just curious...where has everyone heard Brittany sing? I've never heard her...

[MrMidwest]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:16pm

First of all I want to say that I'm so proud of Christina for realizing her dream of being on Broadway. She truly deserves it.

Secondly, I find Brittany Murphy to be really fascinating. She's something of an enigma. Her sometimes daffy persona is either real or a calculated performance that she knows how to turn on and off at will. Her acting career has been like a roller coaster. I first saw her in The Torkelsons/Almost Home on tv where she was very amusing and not really that over the top most of the time. Then there was Clueless where she was quite funny if a bit much. After that she did several smaller roles, some of them wacky and flamboyant (Freeway, Drop Dead Gorgeous) and others more subdued (David and Lisa). She was a bit over the line in parts of her performance in Girl, Interrupted, but it was still clear that there was something there and maybe she just needed to reign it in. More somewhat over the top performances followed in Don't Say a Word and Riding in Cars with Boys. However, in 8 Mile her role was rather low-key and she didn't really use any big gestures or affectations. The downside was that the movie didn't really seem to know for sure who her character was or what she wanted. Her more recent roles (Just Married, Uptown Girls, Little Black Book, Sin City) have all been over the top, but not without moments of interest. Additionally, from 1997 she's given a wonderful performance as Luanne on Fox's King of the Hill...a cartoon character, which may be telling us something. I'd be really intrigued to see what she would do on stage. I know she can sing, but the question of whether her acting choices are the result of her own misundertanding of what effective acting is or mishandling by directors is unclear.

Updated On: 5/1/05 at 02:16 PM

[buffyactsing]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:24pm

Here, it's from the 2002 movie awards.

http://www.geocities.com/lindam12603/alex/BrittanyMurphy.mp3

[Whatchmacallit]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:27pm

Munk, I did see it. Thanks!

And by the by, I wasn't impressed with her technique on stage at the Hirschfield, in the rehearsal footage, or in the episode of Married With Children where she danced with the janitor. She can dance, she's not a dancer.

And like I said, I don't mean to put down Applegate, but I do like Murphy, and I would have liked to have seen what she would have done with the role. I also was wondering why she wasn't headlining the revival considering her desire to do it(at least at one point) and the fact(I believe) that her star shines brighter than Christina Applegate's.

[EponineThenardier]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:30pm

Actually Liv Tyler also expressed interest in playing Charity one day. I would of loved to see her do it.


Cannot stand Brittany Murphy.

[apdarcey]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:31pm

i much prefer applegate to murphy

[Whatchmacallit]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 2:43pm

And that's great! I didn't want to turn this into an anti-Applegate thread.(I think she's a sweet lady, and there are some merits to her performance) I was just posing a question.

[cabarethed]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 3:29pm

I just saw Sweet Charity on Saturday, and really respected everything Christina did, especially her acting. I thought she did a great job. However, this thought of Brittany Murphy is really interesting. I too have been a fan through everything since The Torkelsons, only less so since she started the coke/bony/Maxim/Kutcher binges. However, I would be totally fascinated to see what she could do in this. She has the perfect personality for Charity.

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 4:11pm

Has anyone seen the movie "spun" or "sin city" with Murphy? um...they are brillant movies and her acting is really good. I find Murphy to be interesting and somewhat intriguing. Esp, these last couple of months where she's done this random turn around and started acting differently. I saw her on TRL and she was acting very different than she normally does. Not that I know her on a friend basis, but just from talk shows.

[BroadwayGirl107]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 4:41pm

Thanks, buffyactsing.

[VIETgrlTerifa]

Posted: 5/1/05 at 4:44pm

Say what you will about Murphy, I think her daffy persona would transfer well on stage, especially in Sweet Chairty. I also think her signing voice is pretty good. I don't understand why people have to all of a sudden bash her in order to defend Applegate.

I happen to like Murphy. She's in crappy movies, yeah, but it's bit mean to say it's sad that her first movie is her best one when Applegate's movie career isn't anything to be that proud of either.