Review: BEAUTY AND THE BEAST at the Winspear Opera House

The 1991 Disney film Beauty and the Beast is a spectacular work of animated musical storytelling. Belle, a type of feminist in a sense (at least within the context of Disney, especially when compared to Ariel, who taught millions of young girls just two years earlier that it is important to change who you are for a man), is an independent, intelligent, and beautiful young woman who reads and finds pleasure in the pursuit of knowledge. She has found her voice and she demands to be heard. So naturally, the whole town thinks she is crazy. A heroine of this caliber is a lot to live up to in any fairy tale and such a fanciful, witty and heartfelt presentation seems impossible to duplicate, but that's what I expect from a Broadway production. I expect seats that can cost a good $120 to rival the magic created by the brilliant animators working with Disney in the early part of that transitional decade. Unfortunately, the touring Broadway musical produced by NETworks Presentations does not live up to this expectation. In fact it falls quite short of perpetuating the wonder and depth established in the original film. I brought my twin 6-year-old daughters to the show and they loved it. Certainly it was quality enough to entertain a kindergartener, but is that really what Dallas should grow to accept as quality theatrical art. We have a booming and continuously growing art scene and so-called "Broadway" productions such as this should not be tolerated in our community. Broadway is supposed to be a leader in the creation of quality art, not the preservation of an industry that overcharges audiences, underpays artists, undermines unions, and whose primary mission is not artistic success but financial success.

Now having written those harsh but necessary words, I can say that there were indeed many elements that were a part of this performance I did enjoy. Brooke Quintana, who plays Belle, performs respectable work with her character. Her voice is quite lovely and she establishes some depth to the character that was profound in the film, something generally lacking across the ensemble filled with one-dimensional characters. Ms. Quintana brought light and beauty to the stage, as she sings a number of memorable songs. At one perfect moment during the song "Something There," as the beast and Belle grow conscious of meaningful feelings they hold for each other, I swear I saw a bright Disney-style twinkle in her eye as she brought much of the same enchantment as the Disney animated Belle to this show. Both Ms. Quintana, a lovely soprano, and Sam Hartley (the beast), a passionate tenor, had spectacular voices and many of the most captivating and beautiful moments on stage were captured during a duet featuring these two talented singers. Unfortunately Mr. Hartley's acting skills were far from acceptable to play this part and his presence on the stage was flooded with overly dramatic, almost comical, gestures that were clearly meant to demonstrate to the audience just how deeply he was feeling each moment. These gestures weren't simply nit-picky annoyances about an inexperienced actor to me, they became seriously distracting as the musical proceeded and had the capability of grabbing nearly all of my focus and attention, something that I can't imagine director Rob Roth was hoping for.

For this tour, NETworks gathered most of the initial creative team from the original Broadway production, including director Rob Roth, choreographer Matt West, scenic designer Stanley Meyer, costume designer Ann Hould-Ward, lighting designer Natasha Katz, and illusion designer Jim Steinmeyer. However, this alleged dream team was incapable of working collaboratively to create a moment of theatrical history, or at the very least, a halfway decent production of a beloved fair tale.

The choreography was ridiculously simple and uninspiring, to be kind. Something you'd honestly be more likely to find in a high school musical full of performers with little to know dance experience. There was some slight variety in the basic movements but the overall choreography was entirely amateur, not even attempting to highlight who might have been some of the more skilled dancers on stage. One notable exception was the "Gaston" Tavern Scene which had layers, depth, high energy and precise and stylized choreography, not to mention the use of clinking beer mugs to create an added rhythmic dimension. This was, without a doubt, the most interesting and complex choreography in the show. The scenic design was a mixed bag of fanciful and spectacular imagery to a cheap looking flowery storybook frame. Overall, the set design was successful in that it looked spectacular and created the image of a fanciful fairy tale. It was highly elaborate and certainly created a fanciful world for the actors to play in. The costumes were spectacular and indulging to look at. They were nearly magical, but do not touch the ingenuity and creativity found in the original Broadway production. Particularly, the costumes for the enchanted objects seem to have experienced a lack of attention. At times Lumiere's and Mrs. Potts' costumes seem cheap and flimsy. Ultimately, however, the costuming is another one of the more redeeming aspects of this classic musical.

The director's choice to incorporate slapstick comedy into the scenes with Gaston could have been an interesting and wise artistic decision. But I truly felt like I was watching bad imitations of Charlie Chaplin films, with always slightly off comedic timing. Gaston was a caricature. He was less than that. The intention was clearly to represent the original version, but the physical precision, manipulation and control demanded of this difficult style of humor simply couldn't be found on stage. There were some "ha ha" moments when I laughed because it felt like the right thing to do, but the scenes with Gaston simply didn't work.

This is a non-Equity show, meaning that all of the actors and stage managers involved in the production don't have the protection of a union. I am certainly no elitist regarding the capabilities or potential for artistic success in Equity versus non-Equity performances, however the experience we should expect from a Broadway cast simply can't be found in this tour. Not a single performer has a Broadway credit to his or her name, with both leads, Ms. Quintana and Sam Hartley, having dangerously little experience. I undoubtedly don't need to see stars and seasoned Broadway performers in order to enjoy a show. Quite the opposite: most of my absolute favorite productions are carried by actors whose names I have never heard, who aren't members of Actor's Equity, and who are by no means in the position to draw in large crowds. But this lack of interest on the part of the touring company, NETworks Presentations, in hiring the best possible cast is indicative of an ongoing decrease in quality of American touring Broadway shows. It's obvious that often the cast size and the set must be scaled down for a touring show, but this should in no way suggest that the quality must be scaled down as well. The size of a set or the size of a cast is, in no way, a predictor of quality.

On a final and highly relevant note, the awfully monochromatic cast is a slap in the face to the diversity related progress made in the most recent Broadway season, (although, unfortunately, that season is an anomaly in terms of Broadway's engagement in non-traditional casting, featuring a writer of color, and a sprinkling of plays focused on non-white culture. Hopefully I'm wrong and this is a sudden shift in direction, and not an abnormality). Still, Broadway is disproportionately whitewashed and the most recent touring production of Beauty and the Beast is no exception. The cast is essentially entirely white and the creative team is no different. Even more, when counting the 20 artists involved in the creative team, only four are women. NETworks Presentations must be under the impression that quality artists of color and quality female artists don't exist.

The show's closing night was June 26th and the cast and crew will be headed to San Francisco for another run, followed by Kansas City, MO. The 2016/2017 season for the AT&T Performing Arts Center Broadway Series opens Tuesday, August 16th with the first national tour of A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder, nominated for 10 Tony's and taking home the coveted "Best Musical" award in 2014. The lead producer on this show is Joey Parnes, who also happens to be the lead producer for the original Broadway production. His syndicate of investors is operating under the name Cricket-CTM Media/Mano-Horn Productions. Let's hope that Mr. Parnes and his team have put together a touring show worthy of the Broadway title and worthy of a discerning Dallas audience, and lets maintain our high expectations of the arts in our city, demanding theatrical pieces of a great variety and of the highest quality.

Photo by Matthew Murphy

 

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