Dreamgirls - Savoy / UK Tour

This is called "bravado".

You know it's a load of rubbish but you brazen it out till you can't brazen it any longer, then when the axe falls everyone goes into meltdown about it and you're a victim/hard done to hero.

So terribly sad for her. This wasn't necessary and not handled right.

Surprised no one mentioned the life imitating art element of this. .

I have seen many situations like these in shows and I have seen the strangest and nastiest reasons behind it.
People from the production as well as assistant directors can be snakes. It's easy to form a front against a black sheep to make themselves feel better or get what they want.
I have seen someone kicked out of the ensemble of a professional show because he walked in the theatre early for rehearsal one day and caught the musical director screwing an ensemble girl in the wings. 2 days later he was asked to leave due to "artistic differences", and that while he was as discrete as can be and wouldn't have said anything to anyone.

I also have seen someone worked out of a show by the assistant director (who took his chance as soon as the original director was on holidays for a week), claiming the actor did not show up at rehearsals while he did, the actor was actually extremely reliable, the assistant director just deliberately did not let the actor know about an extra planned rehearsal, and the next week a good friend of the assistant director took the place of this actor....

It's a snake pit.

I'm seeing The Life on 29th evening, but could squeeze in DG on the matinee. Do we know who the alternate will be? And if it'll be the same lady on the next Monday performance? 

Sorry, but I'm afraid I can't see how it's not at least in part her fault. She is contracted to be an alternate in this show. It's therefore inconceivable that getting to do a certain number of shows regularly would not be part of her contract. If the producers don't give them to her, they are therefore in breach of her contract and she's not helping herself by not pursuing that, particularly when it's been pretty clear for a while now that she's unlikely to get on. If her lack of preparation is the reason why she hasn't been on then that is her fault, pure and simple. Either way, she doesn't appear to have done much to help herself with her twitter rants, so I'm afraid I do have limited sympathy for her.

And there's no need for the hyperbole - no-one is saying they are ok with her being publicly humiliated (which is a bit much anyway - no-one except big theatre fans will even have noticed she's off the website so it's been done as discreetly as it could have been!). I'm simply saying there's no smoke without fire, and what we've seen, including her own tweets, all point to this being down to her not being ready, in which case I don't think anyone's obliged to be terribly sympathetic given the show has now been open for 3 months.

In a theatre discussion, of all places, I'd expect people to be aware of the existence of smoke machines.

(To put it another way, the fact that you haven't thought of other possibilities doesn't mean there are no other possibilities.)

This is the key tweet I think. 




No, we don't know what has happened but speculation is 50% of what we do here right? 

I reckon she wasnt ready at the time when they all became ill over Christmas and so wasn't in a position to go on. So Marisha was rushed over, and was a huge hit AND available to stay on. Now the producers have a problem, too many Effie's. 

Maybe Ruth just didn't show them why it should be hers? If she was up against Marisha that would be one tough call given Marisha's experience. But it's so wrong that she's been kept hanging on all this time. That's GOT to be down to the producers, and it doesn't surprise me one little bit given how they have handled things previously. 

I'm not saying there aren't other possibilities, in fact I gave two in my post alone, and doubtless there are others. I'm simply expressing how I read what we have seen - i.e. Ruth's tweets and the Dreamgirls website. That is all out in the public domain and so everyone is entitled to read and interpret it as they see it. Whether that evidences something dodgy going on on the part of the producers, Ruth or both is a matter of opinion, nothing more.

And I do resent the accusation of lacking empathy. Of course I feel sorry for her losing her job, that's never nice in any situation. But this is a discussion forum where we are entitled to comment upon what is in the public domain, and my opinion on that is that it seems to indicate there is something going on as if she'd been ready to play the part then she would have been on months ago. She had the same rehearsal period as everyone else (and she was supposed to be an alternate not an understudy so she should have been as ready as Amber was to take the stage from the first preview onwards as surely the alternate role is to be able to take over from the lead at any time as well as their scheduled shows), so the fact that they've been getting on with it for 3 months and she hasn't been on once does suggest a problem to me.

That's how I see it, nothing more and nothing less,and if people see it differently that's fine - doesn't make my opinion any less valid. If it turns out I'm wrong then I'll happily hold my hands up and admit it. But I'm starting to feel as if I'm being scolded for daring to voice a different opinion, which I thought this forum was better than, so after this post I'll stop contributing to this topic in case anyone else gets offended by my having an opinion.

The last thing I will say is that having empathy for her losing her job is not mutually exclusive with commenting that it appears to have been a very strange situation all round and what she has said hasn't helped. I don't see why people can't say that - I can't think of many lines of work where if you couldn't do your job for three months people won't think there is something strange happening, and try to figure out what that might be based on what we do know. I'm not sure why it should be any different in this situation.

@posterj I fully agree with you (and I think it'd be a shame if you withdrew from this thread). Yes, there can be other possibilities why she wasn't on, but, as often, the most simple is also the most likely explanation ("Occam's Razor"), and that is that she simply wasn't up to the required standard - otherwise they wouldn't have casted someone completely new on short notice.

GUESS WHAT???!!!!

I WON THE LOTTERY. Sadly not the Euromillions, but the Dreamgirls ticket lottery; and when I say I, I mean the person I went with did, so I can still say I haven't won the lottery.

Anyway I really enjoyed the show, so much energy (and sweat) all over the stage. Great costumes too.

As I went in I took a photo of the cast board and looked at it in the bar. I then got a shock when Lily Frazer walked on stage as Deena.

There was some bad behaviour which I'll save for that thread but other than that the audience was very well behaved; appreciative but not crazy as it seems other people have experienced.

It's not my favourite score I've ever heard, in fact a couple of bits annoyed me, but it is solid and an enjoyable plot.

What is this curtain that people have been talking about getting applause?

These are the two cast lists I saw!

Oh right. Maybe the angle from where I was sitting wasn't great.

Forgot to say, Amber's voice is stunning. Tyrone is wasted in that role, but still fantastic. Jocasta and Carly have brilliant voices too! Joe Aaron Reid is very suited to this role and Adam J Bernard as Jimmy was amazing. I couldn't understand everything when Lily was singing as Deena but she sang her heart out and she still has a lovely tone to her voice.

I need to see if Jimmy's got any of those pants going spare to go with my boots!!

Which is everyone's favourite wig in the show?