Brantley
dgsweet
review to a new musical that takes its characters seriously. Never.
(Somebody have an exception that proves the rule?) He likes his
musicals fast, funny and jokey. He doesn't much care for shows in
which that characters have any interior life.
If he were writing for another publication, I think that would be OK.
But to have a guy who dislikes 50% of the potential range of musical
theatre by definition is an enormous shame, and it has something to do
with what gets produced and where we're at with this form.
fmomoon
"dgsweet" <DGS...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1111945264.5...@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
Try living in an area where the main critic publicly states he dislikes
Sondheim and that is the primary composer whose works I like to do. Yeah,
fun stuff.
--
Moni
Steve Newport
Stephen Farrow
...he's got a piece in today's New York Times about the hegemony of pop wailers
in contemporary Broadway musicals:
It makes interesting reading (and he's not a writer I admire much, and hearing
him give the keynote at a conference a couple of years ago didn't do anything to
change my mind).
--
Stephen
Believe me, I have seen my dark side, and it is yucky.
dgsweet
As I said, a "new musical." When FOLLIES premiered, I still had all my
follicles.
Harlett O'Dowd
"Steve Newport" <srrne...@webtv.net> wrote in message
news:10179-42...@storefull-3155.bay.webtv.net...
> He liked FOLLIES. At Paper Mill.
he was also a big champion of B'way's SIDE SHOW. And IIRC he kinda liked A
CLASS ACT too.
Steve Newport
DGS...@aol.com (dgsweet)
Yes you did, but the FOLLIES characters do/should have an inner life.
dgsweet
As I said, a "new musical."
Yes you did, but the FOLLIES characters do/should have an inner life.
>> I think he nods in the direction of established classics, but new
works ... That notice for A CLASS ACT, by the way, was nowhere near
good enough to help that show significantly. No, I think he's not
useful to serious musical theatre.
Stephen Farrow
Brantley did not review "A Class Act", either on or off Broadway. Both reviews
were by Bruce Weber.
--
Stephen
I was going to go on Mastermind, but I can't sit on leather.
Steve Newport
Brantley: "Close your eyes and listen as their larynxes stretch and
vibrate with the pain of being an underdog and the joy of being really
loud. Bet you can't tell them apart. For that matter, bet you can't
distinguish the heroines of the current Broadway musicals "Wicked,"
"Little Women" and "Brooklyn" from the average female finalist on
"American Idol." When it's time for a big ballad on Broadway these days,
theatergoers can pretend they are still in their living rooms, basking
in the synthetic adrenaline glow of their favorite TV show. Give the
people what they already have. This reigning philosophy of Broadway has
been translated into a multitude of musicals inspired by popular movies
and vintage pop songbooks. So why not reality television? "American
Idol" also-rans have been dropped into Broadway replacement casts,
including Tamyra Gray ("Bombay Dreams") and Frenchie Davis ("Rent").
"Brooklyn," Mark Schoenfeld and Barri McPherson's gooey fairy tale of
street people and pop stardom, actually features a climactic "American
Idol"-style sing-off between a pair of crowd-courting divas. The
tentacles of the "American Idol" sensibility actually reach much deeper,
into the very throat of the American musical, and may change forever the
way Broadway sings. This is not a happy prognosis. The style of
vocalizing that is rewarded on "American Idol" - by its panel of on-air
judges and by the television audience that votes on the winners - is
both intensely emotional and oddly impersonal. The accent is on abstract
feelings, usually embodied by people of stunning ordinariness, than on
particular character. Quivering vibrato, curlicued melisma, notes held
past the vanishing point: the favorite technical tricks of "Idol"
contestants are often like screams divorced from the pain or ecstasy
that inspired them.
When Simon Cowell, the most notoriously harsh of "American Idol's"
judges, describes a contestant as "too Broadway,"
----------------------------------------
SN:Yet another reason, as if we needed one, for Broadway devotees to
look down their noses at this show, its participants, and its viewers.
------------------------------------------
it is meant as a withering dismissal. Carol Channing, Robert Preston,
Jerry Orbach and Gwen Verdon wouldn't stand a chance in the court of
Cowell. And if they were starting out today, they probably wouldn't
stand a chance in Broadway musicals either.
Like the Olympics telecasts, "American Idol" celebrates stamina, will
power and gymnastic agility. The most successful contestants take an
athletic approach to a melody. They hoist, hold and balance notes like
barbells in a weight-lifting exhibition. And the audience claps and
hoots instinctively every time such muscle-flexing occurs. That same
Pavlovian reaction is now being elicited on Broadway as well. At the
performance I attended of the new musical "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels," ,
the audience greeted each number with subdued warmth, though the show's
stars, John Lithgow and Norbert Leo Butz, were working hard to put over
the songs with style and character. Finally, in a self-addressed
valentine that is the show's last number, Mr. Butz claimed his "American
Idol" moment with one musically stretched-out phrase: "I think we still
deserve a ha-a-a-a-nd ..." I suspect that the composer David Yazbek
intended the moment to be comic. All the same, the audience roared with
approval . It was what they had been waiting for. That
self-congratulatory element is also part of the "American Idol" package
- the subtext that goes, "I deserve to be a star because it's my right
as an American, and because I try so hard." It seems appropriate that
musicals as seemingly different as "Wicked," a politically corrected
back story of "The Wizard of Oz," and "Little Women," adapted from the
Louisa May Alcott classic, both have first-act finales that are
virtually interchangeable declarations of self-worth and
self-determination.
In "Little Women," the tomboy heroine Jo (Sutton Foster) bursts out with
a number about her will to succeed called "Astonishing." In "Wicked,"
the maverick witch Elphaba (a role created by Idina Menzel, now played
by Shoshana Bean) proclaims her independence in the ear-blasting
"Defying Gravity." (A parody in Gerard Alessandrini's priceless spoof
"Forbidden Broadway" has Ms. Menzel "defying audio.") When it opened,
"Wicked" also starred Kristin Chenoweth, as Elphaba's opposite, the
popular and pretty Glinda (now portrayed by Jennifer Laura Thompson). If
Ms. Menzel tackled her numbers, Ms. Chenoweth teased and flirted with
them. The face-off between the witches of "Wicked" became a nightly
confrontation between Old and New Broadway. It was Ms. Mendel who won
the Tony and, from what I gather from parents of school-age children,
the hearts of the little girls in the audience. By the 1980's, a
homogenizing force had begun to steal over the Broadway voice. It
started with the invasion of the British poperettas by Andrew Lloyd
Webber ("Cats," "Phantom of the Opera") and the team of Alain Boublil
and Claude-Michel Schönberg ("Les Misérables," "Miss Saigon"). Their
swoony, ever crescendoing music required voices that were pretty and
strong, but not much else. It seems appropriate that the ultimate Lloyd
Webber star was Sarah Brightman, who possessed a register-testing but
anonymous soprano.
Lord Lloyd Webber's spiritual heir in the United States, Frank Wildhorn,
came up with cruder versions of the poperetta formula. "Jekyll and
Hyde," "The Civil War" and most recently "Dracula" were costume musicals
drenched in ersatz blood and ersatz passion. Though his characters were
intense, as mad scientists and vampires tend to be, when it came to
selling a song they all sounded pretty much the same, especially with
their voices synthetically processed and amplified by the aural
equivalent of Sensurround.
Whether the source was rock opera ("The Who's Tommy"), or rock 'n' roll
(the songs of Lieber and Stoller, for "Smokey Joe's Cafe") the
performers largely registered as cute, eager and personality-free, like
peppy summer interns in a Disney World pavilion. Their voices came
across as shiny, smooth and antiseptic, like those of grown-up
Mouseketeers.
The upside for the producers of such shows is that their cast members
are eminently replaceable. Sui generis stars are not necessarily
advantages for investors hoping for long, sold-out runs. (And a
full-scale Broadway musical needs to run and run and run just to break
even.) Then there is that greatest of all obstacles to intimacy between
audience and performers: the microphone, which "American Idol"
contestants use as if it were a body part. Though miking has been
ubiquitous for at least four decades, it still feels oddly primitive at
most shows. It's often hard to tell where on the stage a voice is coming
from. And while uncertain voices can sometimes be smoothed and bolstered
by mechanical amplification, good voices are often roughened or neutered
by the same process.
Good, well-trained voices that can carry a tune and turn up the volume
come cheap. What does not is the voice that identifies a character as
specifically and individually as handwriting. It's what you hear every
time Barbara Cook, the 50's Broadway ingénue and enduring concert
artist, sings a number by Stephen Sondheim or Harold Arlen. Ms. Cook has
a ravishing soprano. But a great Broadway voice doesn't have to be
pretty. Floating on a stream of exquisite sound is easy. Finding in that
sound all the kinks and bumps and curls that make a person fascinating,
exasperating and unique is what transforms a Broadway musical from a
cookie-cutter diversion into ecstatic art.
Noel Katz
> in contemporary Broadway musicals:
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/27/theater/newsandfeatures/27bran.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=all&position=
>
> It makes interesting reading
Indeed!
Something I'm often telling young performers is that it's not about
the money note, it's about your individual personality coming through.
Brantley correctly identifies a major problem with today's Broadway,
but also acknowledges that there are still idiosyncratic stars, in the
grand tradition, still doing musicals.
Steve Newport
stephen...@gmail.com (Stephen Farrow) ...he's got a piece in
today's New York Times about the hegemony of pop wailers in contemporary
Broadway musicals:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/27/theater/newsandfeatures/27bran.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=all&position=
He picked on PLAY ON! but not HAIRSPRAY? He's much too kind to LuPone,
J. Holliday, Heather H.
Steve Newport
bbernarW...@comcast.net (Brian Bernardini) <<<NY Times Theatre
Critic Ben Brantley: "When Simon Cowell, the most notoriously harsh of
"American Idol's" judges, describes a contestant as "too Broadway," it
is meant as a withering dismissal." >>>
most of the tunes the Idol contestants sing aren't exactly the latest
hit releases. It has to do with vocal technique that's complete and
total crap, and the sacrifice of melody for the sake of vocal
"gymnastics". Take it from a music teacher, this show has made teaching
proper vocal technique that much harder. On the brighter side, we can
take pleasure in the fact that most of the Idol contestants will
completely blow out their voices in the next few years due to improper
use. The Broadway singers, on the other hand, will still be doing 8
shows a week with no problems.
---------------------------------------
Not if the current trend continues.
Harlett O'Dowd
what you said in your original post - which was that Ben doesn't *like*
serious musicals.
I've been corrected on the CLASS ACT front - but that doesn't take away
the fact that Ben and the Times *LOVED* SIDE SHOW (how many puff pieces
did they run?)
But yes, the Times can no longer (if it ever could) force the pubic to
support show it doesn't want to see.
Steve Newport
longer (if it ever could) force the pubic to support show it doesn't
want to see.
And more and more big musicals seem to be Times-proof. WICKED,
SCOUNDRELS, SPAMALOT.
dgsweet
He thought RAGTIME was boring, and has had similar disdain for anything
else attempting more than a little song, a little dance, a little
seltzer down your pants.
This isn't to say that everything serious is swell, but an awful lot of
the writers I know are pretty depressed about the Brantley wall. Fred
Ebb died upset that his last two shows couldn't get the funding to come
in, and that's largely because investors don't think THE VISIT stands a
change against Brantley.
dgsweet
SCOUNDRELS, SPAMALOT.
>> Each of those are movie-hooked, pre-sold titles. What hope for
shows that are NOT movie-hooked and pre-sold? And it remains to be
seen whether SCOUNDRELS gets a run. (I still haven't seen it so can't
venture my opinion about whether it deserves to.)
cristobal
>
> . . . Ben and the Times *LOVED* SIDE SHOW
Yet weren't there some smelly fumes going up over that one, i.e., Frank
Rich had a piece of the pie, or some such "appearance of conflict of
interest"?
\cx
--
Posted via Mailgate.ORG Server - http://www.Mailgate.ORG
cristobal
THINK) wrote
> most of the tunes the Idol contestants sing aren't exactly the latest
> hit releases. It has to do with vocal technique that's complete and
> total crap, and the sacrifice of melody for the sake of vocal
> "gymnastics". Take it from a music teacher, this show has made teaching
> proper vocal technique that much harder.
Yeah, I blame Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey for all that useless
warbling.
I noticed how ignorant Brantley's language about the physiology of
singing seemed -- references to "stretching the larynx" and "vocal
cords" and such. Perhaps I am amalgamating this article with the one
about the fat broad who had her stomach by-passed and lost 100 lbs. (It
actually looked more like a 200 lb loss, didn't it? also, she said she
is now a size 14, but she definitely looks more like a size 20, but
that's beside the point . . .)
Anyway I know it was in the latter article they spoke about the voice
coming from "the diaphragm" which is what everyone with scant knowledge
of vocal physiology says, and the statement is meant to somehow convey
some expertise is on display. That just bugs me enormously, as there is
so much more to creating technically correct sound than "the
diaphragm" (which, when properly placed, does support the column of
air, but has next to nothing to do with resonance.
Vocal students need to learn how to sing with volume and power without
risking blowing out the voice. Knowing what to do with the diaphragm is
going to get them about 10% of the way to that goal.
While I'm raving . . . something else that bugs me is people calling
certain "loud" singers "belters." That's another gloss to pretend
knowledge, IMO.
Forgive me, Julie Taymor, I love you more than almost anyone, however
calling Selma Hayek a "belter" is just silly. The lady has a nice voice,
but her singing in FRIDA was strictly "folksie," naturalistic and raw --
i.e., she was yelling out her head. Her mother may have been an opera
star, but Selma apparently didn't learn anything about technique in
singing. BTW, I think the vocal style worked fine within the context of
that story, so this is not a criticism of the movie.
Usually when someone refers to "belt" singing or the "diaphragm," I take
it as an early indicator of a tendency to bs.
Just my 2c.
Harlett O'Dowd
"cristobal" <cas...@nine3.com> wrote in message
news:a6666f573115d2104c7...@mygate.mailgate.org...
> "Harlett O'Dowd"
> >
> > . . . Ben and the Times *LOVED* SIDE SHOW
>
> Yet weren't there some smelly fumes going up over that one, i.e., Frank
> Rich had a piece of the pie, or some such "appearance of conflict of
> interest"?
> \cx
>
If there were I haven't heard about it. And although a revival, didn't Ben
also love ASSASSINS? And I think he liked THE DEAD as well.
I sorta kinda get the general argument of this thread, but I'm not easily
worked up into B'way conspiracy theories (was Davis REALLY fired from LA
CAGE?). And to be fair - how many truly GREAT *serious* original musicals
has BB been on hand to see? I'm not saying the lighter shows he liked
(PRODUCERS, LION KING) are necessarily better than some other shows of the
past ten(?) years BB has been on the job but by aiming lower, it's often
easier to succeed. It's the WICKED vs. AVENUE Q argument. Is WICKED a more
complex ambitious evening? Yes, but AVENUE Q set its sights on a very
tightly defined subject matter and tone and is extremely successful in its
(limited) aims.
The bulk of what I remember from Ben's reviews of RAGTIME and some others is
that they (for the most part) were quality, professional evenings that aimed
high and didn't quite get there. Most of the time the lack of excitement
was blamed largely - if not solely - on the score. Now I think about half
of the score of RAGTIME is some of the best music of the last 25 years. The
other half....
How many post "I Am What I Am" extractable hit songs have new musicals -
*serious* or *comic* -produced in the past 20 years?
On the flip side, Ben certainly has not suffered such musical *comedies* as
SEUSICAL, FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS or even LITTLE WOMEN gladly. And his
vivisecton of GOOD VIBRATIONS may well be the cruelest thing (not to suggest
it's unearned) I ever read in my life. His Saturday piece about the
American Idolization of B'way voices suggests - to me at least - he doesn't
wish to totally check his mind with his coat (does anyone still wear a hat)
when he sees a musical. He may have his preferences or is more easily
entertained by some things than others - but I don't think he consciously
bring whatever bias(es) he has into the theatre.
John W. Kennedy
> Yeah, I blame Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey for all that useless
> warbling.
I've been waiting for Whitney Houston to explode for years.
> Usually when someone refers to "belt" singing or the "diaphragm," I take
> it as an early indicator of a tendency to bs.
Most of my operatic friends disagree with you.
--
John W. Kennedy
"Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts. Only the heir to the throne
of the kingdom of idiots would fight a war on twelve fronts"
-- J. Michael Straczynski. "Babylon 5", "Ceremonies of Light and Dark"
Steve Newport
From: DGS...@aol.com (dgsweet)
SCOUNDRELS, SPAMALOT.>>>
Possible performance and writing Tony wins would help. I read SPAMALOT
had a 20 million dollar advance. Five million more than THE PRODUCERS.
jernels
<<Perhaps I am amalgamating this article with the one
about the fat broad who had her stomach by-passed and lost 100 lbs. (It
actually looked more like a 200 lb loss, didn't it? also, she said she
is now a size 14, but she definitely looks more like a size 20, but
that's beside the point . . .) >>
You may not be an opera fan, but show some respect. The "fat broad"
you refer to is ona of the greatest voices of the era, Deborah Voigt.
Listen to one of her recordings and get back to me.
-Jerry
Steve Newport
jwk...@attglobal.net (John W. Kennedy) I've been waiting for
Whitney Houston to explode for years.
Too bad she and Brandy didn't explode before CINDERELLA.
Steve Newport
From: chris.c...@worldspan.com (Harlett O'Dowd) didn't Ben also
love ASSASSINS? I'm not saying the lighter shows he liked (PRODUCERS,
LION KING) are necessarily better than some other shows but by aiming
lower, it's often easier to succeed. AVENUE Q set its sights on a very
tightly defined subject matter and tone and is extremely successful in
B'way voices suggests - to me at least - he doesn't wish to totally
check his mind with his coat
ASSASSINS reviews were the best of its season. With little result. It
couldn't manage an extension. Meanwhile FIDDLER with mixed reviews--
twice-- keeps rollin' along. The question is bigger than Rich. So many
critics gave the not so wonderful LION KING, PRODUCERS, and HAIRSPRAY
passes. (Without zeroing in on the flaws as with RAGTIME.) In the case
of LION KING, the re-review in The Times was basically a take back of
any praise beyond the opening number.
Steve Newport
From: cas...@nine3.com (cristobal)
teaching proper vocal technique that much harder.>>>
Vocal students need to learn how to sing with volume and power without
risking blowing out the voice. Knowing what to do with the diaphragm is
going to get them about 10% of the way to that goal.
While I'm raving . . . something else that bugs me is people calling
silly. Her singing in FRIDA was strictly "folksie," naturalistic and raw
-- i.e., she was yelling out her head. Her mother may have been an opera
star, but Selma apparently didn't learn anything about technique in
singing.
And even Ethel Merman used head tones.
cristobal
> ------------------------------------
> And even Ethel Merman used head tones.
>
My second "good" voice teacher, Jeannie Deva, used to give an
interesting course in pop singing that said the "break" between chest
and head voice does not really exist -- is a psychological construct.
Working with this woman's vocal exercises for years, I did learn to
appreciate that any note you "own" can be sung in many different ways,
and it is strictly a matter of artistry whether you sing a note with the
"chest" voice or the "head" voice, or the "teeth and mask" , the
"skull", "spine", or "wing" voice, &c. &c. My current personal favorite
way of making sound involves my palatis torres and the gold onlays I
recently had done on 2 back molars : ).
It actually sounds "golden" somehow : ) Anyway, it's extremely
pleasurable to have noticed, and started learning to add, this new
vocal quality in singing.
BTW, Have you ever worked with the method that has you singing from the
"netherhead"? : ) !! As I recall, it is an Italian technique. You learn
to "make a fist" out of the spot between your legs, analogous to the way
a sailor learns to "steel his guts" to overcome seasickness. You'd have
to try it. The verbal description doesn't do it justice : ) The
technique apparently makes the voice ring like iron. I worked at it a
little and found it did seem to have an effect something like that,
however I sing for pleasure and this approach definitely did not fall
into that realm for me : )
But Jeannie Deva's program showed me there is much more to thinking
about singing than the traditional "chest" vs "head" outlook , yet even
she had to stop saying there is no such thing as a vocal break: the idea
of the vocal break is so pervasive that many simply refused to entertain
this bold statement in her teaching. Instead, she started talking about
her technique in terms of "moving seamlessly through the break." And
perhaps this is the best way of looking at it. Anyone interested in a
truly liberating approach should definitely check into the Deva Method.
I studied with her in Boston. She is in Los Angeles now, but her method
has been franchised and is widely available.
This plug is entirely unsolicitied. I'm just feeling very warmly toward
her for some reason right now.
I must be procrastinating -- posting long elaborations on the minutiae
of hedonism is a dead giveaway.
casz
Steve Newport
From: cas...@nine3.com (cristobal)
of looking at it.
Yes, that's the name of the game.