Natalia Makarova won the best actress Tony as Vera Barnova in the last revival of Rodgers and Hart's ON THE TOWN. Years earlier Thomas Mitchell won the best actior Tony as Hazel's doctor in Jule Styne's musical HAZEL FLAGG. Neither sang a note in their show.
I went to a Catholic Jesuit high school. I played a musical instrument and was in the orchestra for some other Catholic schools as well. I remember doing WEST SIDE STORY, SOUTH PACIFIC, FINIAN'S RAINBOW, CAMELOT, HALF A SIXPENCE, OLIVER!, FIDDLER ON THE ROOF, ANNIE GET YOUR GUN ("I'm an Indian Too" was cut), MAME, and MAN OF LA MANCHA. I remember other Catholic high schools at the time doing LITTLE MARY SUNSHINE, FLOWER DRUM SONG(!), HELLO DOLLY1, THE KING AND I,
IMHO, MILLIE is garbage, but it will probably sell the most tickets. (Don't a lot of schools do it?) If doing MILLIE makes it feasible to do LOVE LIFE and MACK & MABEL, so be it. I can skip MILLIE and see LOVE LIFE and/or MACK & MABEL a second or third time.
If Benanti can walk a tightrope, she'd be great in LOVE LIFE. She'd be a great CARMELINA or even COCO. But GIGI, no.
Years before this, Chita played Roxie in a production in Atlantic City. Harry Guardino played Billy Flynn. And Velma was played by Kirsten "Bubbling Black Girl" Childs.
Saw the original incarnations of WORKING and ROAD SHOW at Chicago's Goodman Theater. (WORKING back then had a through story!) Liked BOUNCE much more than ROAD SHOW. After so much rewriting, it seems like they lost interest in the story. In any event, so happy they're doing PROMENADE. The cast recording is great, but by no means complete. It was the show that opened the off-Broadway Promenade Theater. A few years ago, Carmines' THE BONUS AR
Saw this last night and was pretty disappointed. I agree that the play is still relevant, as, to paraphrase the play's last line, "the bitch that bore him is still in heat." But this production seemed quite tepid, if not undercooked. Well, at least it ended not with the chanting of "Heil, Hitler!," but "Lock her up!"
Not sure why this would be a perfect show for the Encores summer series. It did not originate off-Broadway. Although the show had some wonderful performers -- e.g., Chuck Cooper, Lillias White, Pamela Isaacs, Bellamy Young -- the material was terrible. . A musical about pimps, sex workers, AIDS, and not a single Disney princess.
How about a revival of CAMELOT with the following:
Donald Trump as Arthur; Ivanka Trump as Guenevere; Jared Kushner as Lancelot; Hillary Clinton as Morgan le Fay; Robert Mueller as Mordred; Roy Cohn as Merlin; and as Pellinore Rudy Guiliani.
I think her last stage appearance in NYC was in Encores' 70, GIRLS, 70, in which, IIRC, the NYT gave her a lovely review. She had also done the show previously in another role at the York. Nice, talented lady. She was terrific in the old TV series CAR 54. WHERE ARE YOU? She played Sylvia Schnauser, Al "Grandpa Munster" Lewis' wife.
The musical is very loosely based on MEASURE FOR MEASURE, and is not nearly as interesting as the Shakespeare play. If you're in the mood for silliness and not in the mood for subtlety, you'd probably like it.
I was also at Saturday night's performance. The audience was whooping it up, applauding, and cheering from the very beginning. I just took that as a sign that the house was heavily comped with friends of the production. Very campy show. Probably not for the Disney crowd, although it has princesses and talking sheep. I found it inane.
FWIW, the Hungarian State Opera is set to make its US debut later this year at Lincoln Center. It will be performing the Janos Vajda opera "Mario and the Magician." The opera is, of course, based on Thomas Mann's great 1929 anti-fascism novella. Sounds like this is an opera company trying to fight the good fight.
Left at intermission. Had liked the Encores production a lot, even the silly "When I'm Being Born Again." Skipped the Connick revisal because it sounded so wrongheaded: this show was always meant as a star vehicle for a singing actress with great comic timing. And what great songs, even the minor ones.
While I've enjoyed the leads in the Irish Rep production in other shows, they are simply too old for their roles here. And were it not
Saw it Saturday night rear orchestra (where seats are $54). That McKechnie was out may have colored somewhat my opinion of the show. (The understudy was underwhelming, especially in her big second act dance solo. ) The show is a cross between A CHORUS LINE and 70, GIRLS, 70. Except you find out who makes the line at the start of the show and there's no shoplifting (or deaths). You know as soon as the show begins basically how it's going to end. What
