BANDSTAND Previews

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 9:35am

Previews for the new musical Bandstand begin in two days (Friday, March 31, 2017) at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre! Starring Laura Osnes, Corey Cott, and Beth Leavel, Bandstand takes place in the 1940s swing scene and features both direction and choreography from Andy Blankenbuehler (of Hamilton fame). The show moves to Broadway from a world premiere run at Paper Mill Playhouse in the fall of 2015, and is set to officially open on April 26 for an open run. 

Who's going?!

[Ado Annie D'Ysquith]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 10:13am

I predict this show will either be a sleeper hit or go the way of Bright Star with less Tony noms. No in-between. Lol.

(And with this post, I'm now a Broadway Legend!)

[Cfried]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 10:14am

Saw it at Paper Mill. It has great potential and I'm curious to see the many changes.

[Butter Broadway]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 10:20am

I hear they made lots of changes. Agree Cfried, it has a lot of potential, but we shall see.

[disneybroadwayfan22]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 10:28am

Planning on catching it in May. Love Laura and Cory :)

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 11:01am

Rush policy: https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/BANDSTAND-Announces-Rush-Policy-20170329

[A Canadian in NYC]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 11:26am

Looking forward to the previews.  I have one slot left in my May trip that I've saved for this one.  Really hoping its going to be great!

[Butter Broadway]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 1:07pm

What is a sleeper hit. 

[BroadwayConcierge]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 1:09pm

Butter Broadway said: "What is a sleeper hit."

A production that achieves commercial/financial success but which nobody expected or saw coming. A Bronx Tale is the most recent one.

Updated On: 3/29/17 at 01:09 PM

[Back Row]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 1:11pm

Butter Broadway said: "What is a sleeper hit. 

 

I think it is when your partner's elbow bangs you in the head at about 3:00 a.m.

[ntrackbar]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 2:32pm

They just posted a video from their sitzprobe - a song I don't think I had heard from them before... this got me really excited.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqqIgvWNwDQ

[_IrisTInkerbell]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 2:37pm

I really loved this show at Paper Mill, I was ready to buy a cast recording at intermission. So I can't wait to see this again and see where they took the show. I really really hope this will be success in this terribly crowed season!

[willrolandsframes]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 4:36pm

I may be getting a little bit ahead of myself here, but I feel like the Best Musical nominees have a shot to lock in tonight.

Unless Bandstand manages to throw a hail mary and have it work out, I believe that DEH, GC, CFA, and WP will be the noms. But again, 5-star reports could come back tonight.

Tonight will certainly be interesting.

[DaveyG]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 5:35pm

Really looking forward to this one! Had promise at Paper Mill.

[Butter Broadway]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 8:25pm

Woah that song in the sitzprobe is fantastic!!  Love Laura's 11 o'clock number as well.

[GreasedLightning]

Posted: 3/29/17 at 8:40pm

Back Row said: "Butter Broadway said: "What is a sleeper hit. 

 

I think it is when your partner's elbow bangs you in the head at about 3:00 a.m.

 

"

LOL. Thanks for the laugh!

[Clyde15]

Posted: 3/31/17 at 3:16am

Was anyone at the final dress last night? How did it go? Has the show made the right improvements?

[Butter Broadway]

Posted: 3/31/17 at 7:03pm

Make sure to report back tonight :)

[supersam1026]

Posted: 3/31/17 at 11:17pm

Can post more later, was hesitant going in after not really liking it at Papermill, but wow, have they done some work on this thing! The same story, but the whole book has essentially been re-written (and for the better!). 

This still is not the greatest musical of all time or anything, but, in my opinion, it is certainly an enjoyable evening at the theater which is way more than I could have said after Papermill! 

[HenryTDobson]

Posted: 3/31/17 at 11:35pm

Any reports? I'm interested to hear more!

[RippedMan]

Posted: 3/31/17 at 11:57pm

I was there tonight - snagged a TDF seat late last night (Row R in the orchestra, last row)

I hadn't seen any other version of this show, but all I can say is that it is "fine." It's neither amazing nor is it embarrassingly bad. It's just kind of banal.

I've never found either of the leads (Osnes and Cott) to be terribly interesting actors. They both do a fine job, but I can see any number of people stepping in to their respective parts. They both were in fine voice and had great chemistry, but the book didn't do them any favors. 

Beth Level was hilarious, I just wish we had gotten more of her. She a master at comedy and knows how to work her way around a joke and milk laughs even from a terrible joke. Her solo is quite effective as well. 

The music/lyrics are fine. The Act 1 closer was the stand out to me, as is the big 11 O'clock "Coming home" number. But the rest of it is just rather "Eh." The whole NYC segment is pointless. It doesn't help the story or help the characters. 

I think Andy did a fine job directing this show. The design is beautiful: lights/sets. But the show needs trimming. It's too long. There are one too many "interlude" moments where there's some movement going around of people "going to work" or whatever. It just slows the whole momentum down. Honestly, the whole thing could be a great 90mins. There's no "what will happen" moment for Act 1 to end on. The show basically does exactly what you think it will. Will the boy get the girl? Hm, I wonder, etc. 

It's not a miss, but I don't think it's very interesting or unique. It all comes across as very sentimental, and it might be a hit with older audiences. 

[dave1606]

Posted: 3/31/17 at 11:58pm

I was there tonight. I have to say I found the show to be disappointing. 

The positive. When the band is all together, playing live (as they make a point to tell you), the show is decent. Laura Osnes sounds (and looks) fantastic, and there are a few songs that I liked quite a bit.

The real frustrating point is the shoddy book.  Aside from mostly being devoid of conflict (nearly every thing seems to be almost immediately resolved), there are so many lines that are out of line for the time period and a few that our downright tasteless. (All of the "rubber" jokes are truly awful). 

I will say that this is the first time I have liked Corey Cott onstage. Based on all the posters I had assumed this was Laura's story, but for the first 25 minutes or so the story is nearly all Corey's. I thought he carried the show well and displayed a nice vulnerability.

The choreography was too much for me. In nearly every scene there seemed to be a dancer leaping through the room or running through the back of the set, mostly having nothing to do with the story. I thought all this did was add time and could have been cut without much notice. 

The sets were very blah for me. 2/3'rds of the show is the bar set which is almost all one color and felt small on such a large stage. 

Act 2's big finale was such a disappointment, and the show just stumbles towards an ending at this moment. Tonight's audience was very into the show and would have loved an extended curtain call. Instead we got 30 seconds of one song. I think one (fixable ) thing would be to add a nice curtain call either a medley or at least a full song from the show.

Overall, I just didn't find the show satisfying. There were bits and pieces that I really liked and even a few songs I thought were tuneful, but it didn't add up to much. Still, I'd listen to Laura Osnes sing anything and will probably buy the cast recording. Beth Leavel was totally wasted, but she still made me laugh on some VERY silly one liners.

 

[RippedMan]

Posted: 4/1/17 at 12:03am

Agree 100%. The jokes in the book are TERRIBLE. The "Trojan" thing is just a pointless, lame joke. And most of the comedy comes from people telling jokes to one another instead of actually being funny characters. 

And I found Cott irritating. The first like 15mins I think he was playing "drunk?" But it just came off all wrong. And his voice was not my taste. Why does he need to riff? It's bandstand music.. 

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 4/1/17 at 1:03am

I was there tonight too and I found it to be satisfactory, but nothing more. The show is earnest and has the best of intentions, but the execution is too erratic to overlook its flaws. I didn't care for the opening number/sequence much at all, but after that I actually did enjoy most of the score. It's a mix of swing and jazz with some modern LaChiusa-type touches thrown in. The lyrics are mostly decent to good. 

I think a problem is that the same team, Richard Oberacker and Rob Taylor wrote both the lyrics and book (Oberacker wrote the music by himself) and I think it could have benefited from another mind looking it over. The book really was problematic. It was slack and devoid of tension, but there were also some anachronisms and way too modern sounding speech that jarred. With that said, I think the story was interesting and could have been more engaging in the hands of a more skilled book writer. 

I do believe worse than the book was Andy Blankenbuehler's direction and choreography. Is this Blankenbuehler's first major gig pulling double duty? I think it shows in that everything is way over-directed and over-choreographed, like he was so happy to show off his whole bag of tricks for the first time that he never stopped to edit himself. The stage is always way too busy- so much so that you don't know where to focus your attention. 

Some of the directorial choices are pretty half-baked too. Blankenbuehler borrows from Follies in a few early sequences by having ghosts follow our members of the bandstand around, except this time it's not younger selves haunting our characters, but rather their fallen brothers in war that they can't shake. The ghosts push the survivors around as they struggle to go through their daily routines. It's an interesting idea and if we didn't have 50 swing dancers gallivanting around the stage at all times I would be more on board with this concept. He makes the odd decision to drop the ghosts about halfway through act one anyway, so it becomes a moot point.

It's a pretty small story in the first place, and the ensemble- hardworking that they are- tend to get more in the way than enhance the proceedings. The story revolves around Donny (Cott) who was best pals with Michael "Rubber" Trojan in the war. Rubber dies in the opening sequence, but not before asking Donny to check in on his soon to be widow Julia (Osnes) if/when he gets back home. After the war NBC holds a talent contest that will select one group from each state to go to NYC and compete for a cash prize and spot in an MGM picture singing the winning song. Donny decides to enlist only fellow veterans in his bandstand group and convinces Julia to be the co-lead singer as a stand in for the musically inclined Rubber.

Yes there are "rubber" jokes and "Trojan" jokes. Yes you will cringe.

Beth Leavel, as Julia's mother, is the comic relief and is wonderful, but also woefully underused. She only gets one song in act two. Maybe they could write her something funny for act one when Donny comes over to dinner at the mother's house.

The bandstand members all play their instruments live, and it is impressive, but nothing we haven't seen in Million Dollar Quartet, Company, Sweeney...the list goes on.

I liked Osnes quite a bit, and I think she's the chance they have at a nomination. She has really beauty and glamour- Osnes really could have been an old 40's movie star. She sings well and never pushes or tries to hard to manipulate the audience with Julia's pain and sorrow.

Cott was solid too- certainly much better than in Gigi. He has a distinctive timbre to his voice and like that he's not just another off the assembly line cookie cutter performer.

A major theme of the show is the PTSD soldiers suffer when they return from war. Of course, the term PTSD wasn't really used by the psych community until the 1980's after Vietnam, and luckily no one utters the acronym during Bandstand, but the authors clearly expect a 2017 audience to understand what's going on. That's fine, and obviously PTSD existed before it was "discovered" and labeled, but one must be careful about how much understanding you can allow lay characters to have of an issue that wasn't formally identified in their lifetime.

I would describe Bandstand as a very noble effort, but one that is ultimately too flawed to really be called a success.  

[AKarp2013]

Posted: 4/1/17 at 1:06am

I'm looking forward to seeing the show next week. Do you have a song list by any chance?