Profile for The Distinctive Baritone

With Eden’s several missed performances since opening, will enough nominators have seen her for her to make the cut? I hope she gets a nomination, especially since who knows what her career is going to look like after this thing closes. I genuinely feel bad for her. 

Looks like Sarah Paulson now has some real competition for the Tony.

I have played both Cliff and Ernst, and there is nothing in the text that suggests Ernst is attracted to Cliff. However, I distinctly remember in the Mendes production Denis O’Hare adding a sexual subtext to lines like “We make a large whoopee,” etc. It made zero sense, but O’Hare is such a great actor that it somehow worked. When was that? 1998? Strange what we remember about plays we see.

Anyway, this is not the first professional production of Cabaret

Looking at the grosses from the past couple of weeks, there is sadly no way Lempicka is not going to post a closing notice immediately after the Tony nominations are announced a week from today. The grosses have been in the $300K's, which is absolutely abysmal, especially for a musical: Broadway Grosses.

Poor Gayle Rankin is, I’m sure, doing exactly what the director told her to do. There is no reason to speculate that she will be replaced prior to her scheduled departure date. Some of the reviews have even commented on how they think she could have been a better Sally if she was allowed to play the role without so much directorial mismanagement.

I think it’s somewhat unfair to negatively compare Eden’s performance to Mariand’s in regards to pitch etc. since Eden clearly has vocal fatigue from a role that makes singing Elphaba eight times a week look like a walk in the park. Also, in the bootleg I heard of Mariand’s “Woman Is,” she actually does go painfully flat on one of the big screaming high notes - not that I can blame her, since the song is just insanely (and unnecessarily) high.

I had to look up who Greg Nubile is. A producer on Enemy of the People and last year’s Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window is dunking on stars in plays? What?

And Michael Schulman for the win. He’s funny AND correct.

I didn’t say it was a pan, I said it was negative. He praised the actors but said in the kindest way possible that the material is not very good. But I supppse it is probably more mixed, overall.

Variety is negative:

Variety review

Interesting that both musical versions cast boyish tenors (and Tonys in the two most recent WSS revivals) in the title role. 

I agree that Annie Baker's is pretty good. This year I used Richard Nelson's recent translation since it was the easiest for students to buy, and it's not bad either. Similar to Baker's in that it is closer to a direct translation, but doesn't sound like "masterpiece theater" and tries to sound relatively contemporary. I look forward to reading Heidi Schreck's (wish I could see the Broadway production).

I can't imagine any investors in Lempicka actually thought they would get any of their money back. This is the kind of show that, even if were really good and were to receive rave reviews, isn't going to run longer than about a year, and never crack $1M at the box office. It's definitely one of those "This is an important story that needs to be on Broadway and I don't care how much it costs me!" kind of endeavors.

For any Chekhov fans who haven’t seen it, I highly recommend the Conor McPherson version with Toby Jones. They filmed it onstage in an empty theater after it was shut down by COVID. The acting is exceptional and McPherson does a great job of making the language sound contemporary.

Wish I could see this version - Steve Carrell is a perfect Vanya I’m sure.

Jesus Christ I hope Eden doesn’t read this thread. If I were hedging my entire career in starring in $20M Broadway musical and this was the reaction I got you’d have to put me on suicide watch. Take it down a couple notches, people.