THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
#1THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 3:49pm
Just recently discovered this production. Did anyone see it? It featured Laurence Guittard and Dean Pitchford in the cast.
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Mr Roxy
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/17/03
#2THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 3:58pm
Nice Never knew it even existed
Poster Emeritus
#3THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 4:04pm
I think that's likely a stance held by many.
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Mr Roxy
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/17/03
#5THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 5:08pm
Wonder who else was in the cast.
Poster Emeritus
#6THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 5:11pm
Full credits:
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ggersten
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/06
#7THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 6:54pm
I saw this show in San Francisco in 1980 - based on a poster - it was the same production, but presented by Los Angeles Civic Light Opera. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Umbrellas-Of-Cherbourg-Poster-San-Francisco-Civic-Light-Opera-Orpheum-Thtr-1980-/171745186580. However, wikipedia lists the primary cast as: Stuart Baker-Bergen, Mace Barrett, Donna Bullock, Shirley Chester, Louis Valenzi. I see only one of those names on the poster from Mr. Nowack.
I remember it as being a terrific production. Very emotional like the film. I distinctly remember the opening "garage" set with cars up on hydraulic lifts. But mostly I remember the music - melodious and soaring. A few years later, I was able to track down a VHS copy of the film, but it didn't have as much of an impact on me as the stage show.
#8THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 9:01pm
I happened to see the show the same year in Paris. It was absolutely lovely. But since I didn't understand French at the time, I would have loved to hear the Harnick libretto. (But you'd better like "I Will Wait for You", because they sing it dozens of times. LOL.)
#9THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/20/15 at 10:12pm
This production was sort of required viewing for us -- Michael Yeargan and Jane Greenwood were our design teachers at Yale Drama School at the time. The show moved beautifully and was just lovely to look at (I distinctly remember the nostalgic effects Yeargan could get with this hazed plexi panels moving across a gorgeously rain-blurred drop of Mt Saint-Michele upstage.) And wasn't there a tall Esso sign that slid on to indicate the garage?
But the show and the score were pretty repetitive (which I also found true of the film), and all the imaginative effects in the world couldn't keep me engaged when they'd start in on one more reprise of "I Will Wait for you".
The team behind that great revival of Brief Interlude a few years ago mounted a surreal production of "Umbrellas" in the West End in maybe 2012 or 2013 which I took my parents to see. Great director, great cast, but again an insufferably repetitive libretto and score made all of us really eager for the thing to be over well before the folks onstage were done.
RippedMan
Broadway Legend Joined: 8/14/05
#10THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 12:20am
So I know they recently did this in The West End? Was that a musical version?
#11THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 12:44am
I don't think this story has ever been done non-musical.
RippedMan and Someone you're both thinking of the same production, from 2011. It used the same Harnick translations from the 1979 New York production.
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RippedMan
Broadway Legend Joined: 8/14/05
#12THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 12:52am
Oh gotcha. I just know the girl from Color Purple was in it in the West End. Would be curious to hear the music.
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#14THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 6:33pm
Someone in a Tree, I agree with you about the film. Charming stuff, but the score is really unremarkable and the second act drags a bit.
#15THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 7:04pm
I think the movie is kind of unbearable. I like musicals with actual songs, not sung dialogue. I much prefer The Young Girls of Rochefort.
#16THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 7:16pm
I too find the film very plodding and the sung dialogue has a few good hooks but they just go on and on and on and on.
I think it would be interesting to see someone try to convert some of the sung dialogue into said dialogue and make the songs a little more separate.
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#17THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 7:38pm
I love this for fun film and Catherine Deneuve and Michel Legrand! Vive Le France!
ARTc3
Broadway Star Joined: 8/5/13
#18THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/21/15 at 8:03pm
I was working as an usher at the time at The Public Theater and saw this production several times. It was gorgeous to look at.
ARTc3 formerly ARTc. Actually been a poster since 2004. My name isn't Art. Drop the "3" and say the signature and you'll understand.
Copperfield2
Stand-by Joined: 11/4/06
#19THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/22/15 at 9:10am
I think the film is one of the best musicals ever written for the screen. The music is gorgeous and the use of color and camera movement is masterful.
The Public Theater production was lovely and well sung with a magical feel to it and a lot fluid movement.
What didn't work were Harnick's lyrics which I believe didn't rhyme and just sounded too prosaic compared to the original French.
The company who did Brief Encounter recently tried a stage version of this not long ago in the UK but it was not well received so it didn't make it over here. I was hoping St. Ann's Warehouse might transfer it.
Esther Blodgett
Understudy Joined: 7/15/15
#20THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/22/15 at 9:41am
There was a production of Umbrellas at Two Rivers Theatre in Red Bank, NJ about 5-7 years ago. While the production was good and probably about as good as you're going to get with this show, there was a basic flaw that made the show not work. As said above, Harnick's lyrics were just too literate.These are working class people and they do not speak particularly well.
As for the film, I think it is the single most romantic picture ever made. There is something about Deneuve and her leading man plus the fact it is all set to music and the colors are vivid and saturated. The ultra-sophisticated audience at Film Forum (NYC) laughed at the first sung lines and then accepted the fact and settled in for a nice cry.
Even the idea of an umbrella shop is an off-beat and highly romantic visual.
#21THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/23/15 at 12:06am
My French comprehension skills are far from perfect, but the film lyrics do not sound like they are trying to be working-class French to my ear. For one thing, I can understand most of them--as opposed to Edith Piaf's Pigalle accent which is largely incomprehensible not only to me but to French teachers I have asked to translate her lyrics.
In fairness to Sheldon Harnick--who is, after all, the one who criticized Sondheim for the erudition of Maria in "I Feel Pretty"--perhaps the lyrics are intended to be as romantic and heightened as the cotton-candy look of the show. (Compare to INTO THE WOODS, to take but one example. A baker and his wife use more or less the same lexicon as Cinderella and her Prince. It's part of the magic of that world.)
*To be clear, in a previous post, I said I didn't understand French. That was in 1979. I've had quite a bit of schooling since then.
Updated On: 11/23/15 at 12:06 AM
#22THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG at the Public 1979
Posted: 11/23/15 at 3:21pm
It's hard for me to talk about The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" because I think it is one if the most romantic, bittersweet movies ever made. Denueve looked so ethereally beautiful it's almost laughable.
Its one of those movies that was ideally suited for the screen, however I do think ( unlike say " Amelie"
that it could work on stage with the right adaptation.
"when I’m on stage I see the abyss and have to overcome it by telling myself it’s only a play." - Helen Mirren
