Hugh Jackman in The Music Man- Page 19

[Pose2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:34pm

the only one of the six who is a monetary draw is Hugh Jackman.

I laughed out loud at that ridiculous statement. Thank you. Now, I will watch Sutton Foster's TWO TONY award winning speeches. Anything Goes. Violent. Milly. Sweet Charity. SHE is the reason people go to shows. 

I don’t care if you have six or sixty Tony winners in your cast; this is shaping up to be the whitest revival since...Hello, Dolly!

Cool, yet the cast is set, people are excited and it will be a huge success. 

[Highland Guy]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:39pm

This is EXCELLENT casting!  Plan to fly in from the West Coast for an extended weekend with "The Music Man" as the centerpiece.

Updated On: 9/5/19 at 03:39 PM

[EllieRose2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:41pm

This casting is brilliant, and I cannot wait until next Fall!

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:44pm

Pose2 said: "the only one of the six who is a monetary draw is Hugh Jackman.
I laughed out loud at that ridiculous statement. Thank you. Now, I will watch Sutton Foster's TWO TONY award winning speeches. Anything Goes. Violent. Milly. Sweet Charity. SHE is the reason people go to shows."

Keep laughing. She means very little at the box office, despite a TV series and 2 Tonys. This isn't knocking her talents –– theatre people know who she is and like her. But Sutton without Hugh means significantly less; there are very few people who would go to see her in this who aren't already going because of Hugh.

I'm not going to make judgements about the ethnic breakdown of the cast until we see the entire list. But please remember that there are MANY factors that go into casting a first-class production of a classic musical: Rudin and Zaks obviously have final say, but Jackman has approval, the Meredith Willson estate will have approval (and as we saw with the All My Sons hooplah, some estates are very particular), the choreographer and music director have some say, etc. We also don't know who was offered each role prior to these actors. It's rare that you get your first choices when doing offer-only casting; maybe all these were first choices, maybe more diverse talents were offered the roles first and turned them down. We'll never know and it doesn't do any good to speculate.

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:44pm

Having two Tony Awards is a draw...for theatre folk. I’ll admit she’s a small draw, but the ticket demand will mostly be for Hugh Jackman. I’m glad I provided some amusement!

[EllieRose2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:47pm

Keep laughing. She means very little at the box office, despite a TV series and 2 Tonys. 

Complete crap. I will laugh at you though for that untrue statement! Have a great day!

[Pose2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 3:51pm

HeyMrMusic said: "Having two Tony Awards is a draw...for theatre folk. I’ll admit she’s a small draw, but the ticket demand will mostly be for Hugh Jackman. I’m glad I provided some amusement!"

Absolutely! Tourists see her all the time (not really hardcore theater folk). She is the star and draw of the shows she is in in NYC. People go to see her, and that's that reason I'm attending this show. Hugh Jackman isn't a great singer IMO, but I will still go since I see everything Sutton is in. What a talent. 

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 4:53pm

You do know Harold Hill is written for a not-that-great singer, right? And Marian is written as a soprano?

Anyway, this has no weight on the casting announcement today. No one except serious theatre fans will know who any of the four Tony winners announced today are.

[Call_me_jorge]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 5:09pm

I think enough people watch Younger to make Sutton Foster somewhat of a draw. I’m sure middle aged white women from New Jersey will be all over this, because of Suttons involvement.

[SweetLips22]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 5:10pm

Stating the obvious that Hugh Jackman isn't a great singer. Even he tells that he was told to have singing lessons when cast in Beauty and the Beast.

You don't go to see Hugh to hear him sing-you go for the package and boy is that some package. He has a little bit of everything that just explodes in front of you, and THAT sells tickets.

Sutton Foster has her own very successful market and is totally dependable and incredibly talented. Maybe Sutton Foster as Mame could change all that.

[The Distinctive Baritone]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 6:44pm

Hugh Jackman's singing voice is...fine. He sings about as well as any chorus boy. He is handsome and charming and a really good actor, which makes one forgive him for his nasal, brassy singing.

In regards to the race thing...yes, The Music Man is a show about white people. It takes place in Iowa in the early 1900's. In reality, every single character in the play would be white.

But...it's not reality. It's musical theater. If we can believe that people randomly start singing and dancing, we can believe that River City has, say, a Latino mayor. I think that there are some roles that could actually be problematic in casting a POC (i.e. do we really want Marcellus Washburn to be the black sidekick to a white Harold Hill?), but Marian, Mrs. Paroo, Major Shinn and Mrs. Shinn...those roles could all go to POC's, and in 2019, when we are trying to make theater something for EVERYONE, and attract a more diverse audience...really, at least a couple of those roles should have been cast with POC.

[JP2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 7:08pm

Pose2 said: "How can you justify being upset about the lack of diversity in casting, when you don't know everyone who auditioned for the show? I don't understand.

Thank you, I completely agree. It's a business, they are trying to make money, and casting well known people gets you there."

Yes, that's what Hugh Jackman is for. The rest aint selling ****.

[EllieRose2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 7:19pm

^ That's your opinion, and nothing more. Sutton Foster has always sold tickets to Broadway shows. Fact.

I wanted Norm Lewis to continue to Broadway with this because his voice is heavenly and there would be some diversity. What a shame. 

[Pose2]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 7:22pm

Sutton Foster, like Audra McDonald, is known for her career on Broadway. Their other roles are all average that any other person could do. But, they are both Broadway stars, and once again, people attend the theater for certain people. Sutton Foster is one of them. Anyone who doesn't get that doesn't see Broadway musicals. 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 7:51pm

EllieRose2 said: "Sutton Foster has always sold tickets to Broadway shows. Fact."

 

Millie, Little Women, Young Frankenstein, and Shrek ALL lost money on Broadway due to low sales; Anything Goes, Violet, and Sweet Charity were nonprofit productions with built-in subscriber bases to cushion the sales (and 2/3 were limited runs); only Drowsy recouped in Broadway.

It would be nice if she was as successful as she is talented, but that’s simply not the case. Financially, she’s on a similar level as Audra McDonald.

[Call_me_jorge]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 7:58pm

SonofRobbieJ said: "They're going to lean hard into the 'Marian is Winthrop's mother' subtext, right? Cause Marie Mullen won a Tony for playing a middle aged spinster twenty years ago. For her to have a 10-year-old would be some next level miracle of modern science for turn of the century Iowa."

I just wanted to make sure this reply didn’t slide! THIS! It’s posts like this that I love Broadwayworld oh so much.

[jo]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 10:17pm

Revisiting the original announcement of the revival of TheMusicMan, via HollywoodReporter, provides some interesting insights on how this production is going --


www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hugh-jackman-lead-broadway-revival-music-man-1194075
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"The idea of bringing The Music Man back to Broadway has been lurking in the back of my brain for a long time, maybe even for 35 years," continued Jackman. "When Scott Rudin called me with that very idea, I was floored. To finally be doing this is a huge thrill."

"There is just no way to accurately describe the level of excitement I feel about the opportunity to present Hugh in what I think is the best role ever written for an actor in all of Broadway musical theater," added Rudin.
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With premium pricing having significantly pumped box office earning potential in the five years since the most recent of those productions, a Jackman-led revival of a canonical property like the 1957 Meredith Willson musical promises to be massive, particularly given that the actor has signed on for a full year.
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"These are great American works of art that deserve to be put on stage with as much love as you can give them," Rudin told The Hollywood Reporter. "What I learned on Dolly was that there is an enormous hunger for them from the theatergoing audience. But the hunger I think is to see these Golden Age musicals done in a Golden Age way."

"When you take on one of the 10 or so great, beloved titles, you're trying to do the urtext version of it," he continued. "That's what I think we did with Dolly and what we're going to do here. We're going to do it in a way that no one has ever seen it before. It's going to be big and beautiful and super-luxe and gorgeous and incredibly romantic, and very much in the world of why the show has lasted for 60 years."
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Rudin said Jackman thought long and hard on the right musical-theater project to bring him back to Broadway, and the conversation that led to this project has been going on for about three years.
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"When we did Dolly, my desire was to put 1964 onstage," said Rudin. "That's what we want to do here. We want basically to put onstage an experience that is our version of what we believe people felt when they walked in to the Majestic to see The Music Man in 1957, which is that blow-the-roof-off-the-theater, blow-the-doors-off-their-hinges musical-theater hysteria that only a handful of shows have ever generated. That's the job."
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Like Jackman, Rudin also has connections to the show that go way back. The Broadway premiere was a huge hit for influential producer Kermit Bloomgarden, in whose offices Rudin got his start in the theater business at age 14.
"I was obsessed with The Music Man when I was a kid," said Rudin. "I would ask him endless questions about it and spend months and months poring through his files for every single document I could find that related to The Music Man. A ton of what I learned about being a producer I learned from Kermit, and in a way, for me personally, this is kind of a valentine to him."

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The production plans for the revival did revolve around Scott Rudin's passion project objectives and Hugh Jackman's total interest in it. They were discussing the project for a number of years ( see above) before a final agreement ( especially on Hugh doing a full year's run).  Looking forward to this revival especially given the attention and care that Rudin et al is giving to it.
 

 

 

[VintageSnarker]

Posted: 9/5/19 at 11:22pm

jo said: "These are great American works of art that deserve to be put on stage with as much love as you can give them," Rudin told The Hollywood Reporter. "What I learned on Dolly was that there is an enormous hunger for them from the theatergoing audience. But the hunger I think is to see these Golden Age musicals done in a Golden Age way."

"When we did Dolly, my desire was to put 1964 onstage," said Rudin. "That's what we want to do here. We want basically to put onstage an experience that is our version of what we believe people felt when they walked in to the Majestic to see The Music Man in 1957, which is that blow-the-roof-off-the-theater, blow-the-doors-off-their-hinges musical-theater hysteria that only a handful of shows have ever generated. That's the job."
 

Like, I said. Loaded nostalgia. Make America great again.

[magictodo123]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 5:37am

EllieRose2 said: "^ That's your opinion, and nothing more. Sutton Foster has always sold tickets to Broadway shows. Fact.

I wanted Norm Lewis to continue to Broadway with this because his voice is heavenly and there would be some diversity. What a shame."

Oh my god. That would have been amazing-I love him!! 

[Mark Waltz]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 8:55am

What a thrill to see the full major cast announced! I researched group tickets and it looks like the best tickets available for 10 or more a few weeks into the run are $250 and up. I have already planned to buy my ticket on the very day I get my federal tax return, just like I did for Bette in "Hello, Dolly!", which with fees was $209. As I saw Donna and Bernadette at discounted prices later on, I averaged my three "Dolly" visits to $100 each, and if they have some exciting replacements for Harold & Marian, I will definitely re-visit. The 2000 revival is one of my all time theater going experiences with Rebecca Luker's voice haunting me in a beautiful way to this day. Her performing "Goodnight My Someone" on the Kennedy Center Honors salute (a twin soliloquy with Kelli O'Hara, singing another song, both in gold) was stunning, and it was ironic that Sutton was also in that tribute, singing "Everybody Says Don't". I haven't posted here in a very long time, but was too overcome not to re-join. 

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 10:22am

This may have been asked already, but are there any examples of Sutton sining legit soprano or are they likely to simply lower the keys for her? I'm not sure I've ever heard her sing anything approaching what this score generally requires.

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 10:28am

This announcement should thrill everyone on here who was complaining that people of color were being utilized too prominently in the WEST SIDE advertising, complaining that it looked "too modern" and pontificating that it was a way to "seem woke"!

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 10:33am

SonofRobbieJ said: "They're going to lean hard into the 'Marian is Winthrop's mother' subtext, right? Cause Marie Mullen won a Tony for playing a middle aged spinster twenty years ago. For her to have a 10-year-old would be some next level miracle of modern science for turn of the century Iowa."

I'm definitely a fan of the theory that Marian is Winthrop's mother, but it really isn't impossible for a woman in turn-of-the-century Iowa to have children as far apart in age as Marian and Winthrop are in the script. She could've absolutely had Marian at 17 and then had Winthrop 25 years later at 42. What I do think lends credence to the theory that Marian is Winthrop's mother is that there's no mention of other children between the two of them. 

[ErmengardeStopSniveling]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 10:55am

Having a baby at 42 is somewhat believable, but Marie Mullen would have had Wintrop at 57 :) Pert Kelton was 51 when she originated the role, but Barbara Cook was also 30.

Guess it all depends on how the linereadings are done for Mrs. Paroo's "you didn't even say hello to your sister" and Marian's "the boy's father is dead." (paraphrasing all)

There's also the idea that Winthrop was adopted by Mrs. Paroo...which could be emphasized by a child of color since everything else is so literal.

 

[binau]

Posted: 9/6/19 at 3:01pm

Ok I'm listening to the OBC for the first time (ok, very late to the party). I know this has topic has been done to death but I'm VERY worried about Sutton Foster in this role. This sounds like a Kelli O'Hara or Audra McDonald Or Kristen Chenoweth job.