Worst performances you've seen

#1

Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:32pm

Since there was a thread of best performances, i think there deserves to be a list of worst performances

1. Fosse
2. Contact
3. South Pacific

#2

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:36pm

Shows or performances?

#3

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:37pm

Wait....Fosse? On Broadway? How in the hell does that end up in your worst performances?

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Some people paint, some people sew, I meddle.

#4

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:38pm

I found the casts of Fosse and Contact to be wonderful. I don't know what South Pacific you are talking about, but if you are refering to the recent concert at Carnegie Hall, I found that cast to be beyond wonderful as well.
Some terrible performances in recent memory-
Orfeh and Laura Bell Bundy in Legally Blonde
The Cookie-Cutter Stars of the current Grease
The Otherwise Wonderful Charlotte D'Amboise in Chorus Line (She's just been badly miscast here)
Christine Baranski in The Encores! Follies (Okay, fine. She did well in everything but "I'm Still Here." But isn't that what the character is all about?)
Christina Applegate in Sweet Charity (Again, lots of talent, just terribly miscast)
Josh Strickland in Tarzan

Updated On: 8/9/07 at 01:38 PM

#5

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:40pm

If we're talking performances, Molly Ringwald in the Charity tour. I give her points though. She tried her hardest, but she just didn't have the dance chops for the choreography.

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Some people paint, some people sew, I meddle.

#6

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:40pm

Richard Kind in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Harvey Fierstein in Fiddler
Bernadette Peters in Gypsy
Charlotte D'Amboise in A Chorus Line
Daphne Rubin-Vega in Les Miserables

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"It does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are 20 gods or no god. It neither picks my pocket, nor breaks my leg." -- Thomas Jefferson

#7

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:43pm

yeah those were all performances in Austin Bass Hall, sorry I haven't that many in NYC to say any of them were bad

#8

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:43pm

Griffith in Chicago. Hands down.

#9

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:44pm

Hands down winner:

Michael York in Camelot.

#10

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:45pm

"Griffith in Chicago. Hands down."

Oh God. Don't remind me. And Usher too!

#11

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:47pm

Charlotte D'amboise in A Chorus Line
David Burnham in The Light in the Piazza Tour
Scary Spice in Rent

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Theatre is a safe place to do the unsafe things that need to be done. -John Patrick Shanley

#12

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:50pm

Christine Baranski in Encores! Follies. She was a huge dissapointment because she had so much potential and she just looked like she couldn't possibly care less about what she was doing.

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#13

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:53pm

"Michael York in Camelot."

Oh no. You can't get much worse than Richard Harris. As if he wasn't self-indulgent enough in the movie, onstage he was worse.

Updated On: 8/10/07 at 01:53 PM

#14

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 1:59pm

Robert Evan and Josh Strickland in Tarzan.

#15

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:02pm

Barry Bostwick and most of the cast of 1990's NICK & NORA. An exception was Christine Baranski who was her usually enjoyable self.

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"Madam Rose...and her daughter...Gypsy!"

#16

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:07pm

Robert Morse in Wicked.

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"This thread reads like a series of White House memos." — Mister Matt

#17

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:10pm

Rebecca Pitcher in Phantom of the Opera.

#18

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:12pm

This is a rather nasty thread.

That said: Tony Curtis in the musical version of "Some Like It Hot." He actually sang. Kind of. But at least he looked like he was having a good time.

(I'm assuming non-professional performances are non-canonical here)

#19

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:13pm

I'm also going to add Josh Strickland in Tarzan. I didn't the first time because I was affraid some Tarzan fan might come on and bash me into oblivion.

#20

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:20pm

Brian Dennehy in the My Fair Lady concert.

#21

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:22pm

Here's your BASH! It's not Josh Strickland's fault that "Tarzan" was the worst junk ever to appear on a Broadway stage. He was actually the best thing about the show!

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< Patty Duke (the original Neely O'Hara) & me (March 8, 2010)

#22

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:38pm

the only time i ever really left a show thinking "god that was AWFUL..." was when we saw Chicago many many years ago and Melanie Griffith was in it.

It was awful. The show was great tho.

#23

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:41pm

Brian F. O'Byrne in THE COAST OF UTOPIA -- sheer bloody horror, he just gabbled and gabbled on and on and on and on. I've never come so close to standing up and screaming at an actor to please SHUT THE F*CK UP as I did when I writhed through his unforgiveable work.

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"If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers." Thomas Pynchon, GRAVITY'S RAINBOW "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." Philip K. Dick My blog: http://www.roscoewrites.blogspot.com/

#24

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:44pm

Dee Hoty in MAMMA-MIA!

Ashley Brown in MARY POPPINS

(she wasn't the worst, but I sure didn't like her)

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My 2007/2008 Season: Grey Gardens (7/5) 110 in the Shade (7/6) Mary Poppins (7/7) Xanadu (7/7) Deuce (7/8) Spamalot (7/8) Jersey Boys (8/25) The Year of Magical Thinking (8/25) Mauritius (11/2) Young Frankenstein (11/3) Rock 'N' Roll (11/3) Pygmalion (11/4) Mauritius (11/10) Mauritius (11/21) Mauritius (11/21) Sunday in the Park with George (3/6) South Pacific (3/7) Gypsy (3/8) Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (3/9)

#25

re: Worst performances you've seen

Posted: 8/9/07 at 2:46pm

Jerry Mathers - Hairspray
Sebastian Arcelus - RENT

I'll add more as I think of them.