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Post by Deleted on Mar 6, 2019 19:04:51 GMT
Are we classing Love Never Dies as a flop? Each and every time I saw it it was beautiful. And yet different from the last previous time. A behind the scenes doc on that show would have been brilliant watching. Poor old Love Never Dies - I loved it (and much prefer the London version to the Sydney version much of which I found visually unappealing). Some of ALW's best music lost in a) an odd plot and concept and b) the fact that sung through lush romantic musicals just aren't on trend currently. I don't think we can underestimate b) and wonder had it been launched in the Aspects of Love/Sunset era could it have done much better. Re: technically a flop I'd guess not. It survived well beyond a cast change which is usually (though not always) a barometer that something has recouped. Was also pretty full most times I went. |
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Post by oxfordsimon on Mar 7, 2019 0:04:07 GMT
Which Witch was something special - one of the very greatest of all dreadful musicals.
I remember seeing it on a two show day - but had to check what the other show was - and it turns out that it was Kiss of the Spiderwoman
Quite a contrast in terms of quality - though Spiderwoman should have had a longer run than 390 performances.
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Post by horton on Mar 7, 2019 7:43:42 GMT
"spectacular lewdness" What a great phrase!
And it reminds me of a real lost treasure. I loved 'Budgie' and still listen to my treasured CD often.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2019 9:35:29 GMT
"spectacular lewdness" What a great phrase! And it reminds me of a real lost treasure. I loved 'Budgie' and still listen to my treasured CD often. I loved Budgie too! it's got some great stuff in it, especially Mary, Doris and Jane and of course, In One Of My Weaker Moments. There was talk on here ages ago about a reading of a revised version but haven't heard anything since. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2019 13:01:00 GMT
Never saw Budgie although I loved the TV series. Seemed very odd at the time that Adam Faith was playing the lead as he was about 20 years older than he was when the series was made. Or did the musical have Budgie as an older man? (edited to add - I see from this - www.guidetomusicaltheatre.com/shows_b/budgie.htm - that it was set in the late 60s so I guess not). Maybe Adam should have played Charlie Endell. |
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Post by BoOverall on Mar 7, 2019 21:41:36 GMT
Which Witch was something special - one of the very greatest of all dreadful musicals. I remember seeing it on a two show day - but had to check what the other show was - and it turns out that it was Kiss of the Spiderwoman Quite a contrast in terms of quality - though Spiderwoman should have had a longer run than 390 performances. I saw those two in one day, too. It was a treat with Kiss....loved that show: Chita Rivera, wow! Then Which Witch in the evening: now that was a total hoot because of its awfulness. Those acrobatic flying witches, hilariously out of place camp dancing, endless wailing and arm waving............ I kind of loved the utter bonkersness of it all, while wrestling with disbelief at what I was seeing unfold before me - and marvelling at how the cast kept such straight faces throughout. But boy did I want to climb on the stage and join her on the stake at the end. |
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Post by oxfordsimon on Mar 7, 2019 23:12:51 GMT
I don't think the cast did keep a straight face. I remember a Radio 4 documentary about flops and the cast seemed to be having a whale of a time on that one. Not so much a mess-up matinee - just messing up every night for the hell of it!
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Post by Someone in a tree on Mar 8, 2019 7:49:59 GMT
Wasn't WW billed as a swedish opera-musical? I was 14 or so at the time the time and thought it sounded fabulous. Alas I never got to see it, my Mother chose for us to see Kiss of the Spider Woman instead, now what was fabulous
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2019 9:25:58 GMT
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Post by Someone in a tree on Mar 8, 2019 10:18:54 GMT
Brilliant. That's my Weekend sorted :-) |
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Post by horton on Mar 8, 2019 18:39:18 GMT
"spectacular lewdness" What a great phrase! And it reminds me of a real lost treasure. I loved 'Budgie' and still listen to my treasured CD often. I loved Budgie too! it's got some great stuff in it, especially Mary, Doris and Jane and of course, In One Of My Weaker Moments. There was talk on here ages ago about a reading of a revised version but haven't heard anything since. Mary, Doris and Jane is magnificent. But don't forget "If It Wasn't for the Side Effects" |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 9, 2019 0:12:16 GMT
Mary, Doris and Jane is magnificent. But don't forget "If It Wasn't for the Side Effects" I've always thought that Mary, Doris and Jane could be a fantastic drag number! I also love If That Baby Could Talk. In fact i like all the female numbers in the show, it's the men's songs like You'll Never See Palermo Again, that i skip. |
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Post by wickedgrin on Mar 9, 2019 5:41:15 GMT
We haven't had a big musical flop in the WE for some time though? Shows coming over from Broadway are already proven hits - hence the transfers, and "new" shows are worked on in fringe theatres, or subsidised theatres outside London and either finish there or become successful transfers such as Jamie.
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Post by stuart on Mar 9, 2019 8:00:43 GMT
I can’t believe we’ve gone 14 pages with nobody mentioning perhaps the biggest West End flop in recent memory.
I Can’t Sing - The X Factor Musical
Lasted just 6wks before closure with a reported loss of £4m.
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Post by basi1faw1ty on Mar 9, 2019 12:59:00 GMT
Tim Luscombe's Eurovision at the Vaudeville, November 1993. Lasted for only three weeks. Lost around £275,000.
Sir Lloyd Webber closed it early due to "negative critical appraisal"; someone in the Mail apparently described it as violating every clause of the Geneva Convention.
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Post by duncan on Mar 9, 2019 13:39:47 GMT
Never saw Budgie although I loved the TV series. Seemed very odd at the time that Adam Faith was playing the lead as he was about 20 years older than he was when the series was made. Or did the musical have Budgie as an older man? (edited to add - I see from this - www.guidetomusicaltheatre.com/shows_b/budgie.htm - that it was set in the late 60s so I guess not). Maybe Adam should have played Charlie Endell. Love a bit of Budgie, Iain Cuthbertson chews the scenery with a relish no longer seen. Got the DVD box set and rather bizarrely just watched the episode from Series 1 that forms the backbone of the Musical version. Budgie loses the money to poolsharks on TV rather than the bookies and I'm guessing the other part with the different ladies of the night is from another as yet to come episode. |
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Post by n1david on Mar 9, 2019 13:45:20 GMT
Tim Luscombe's Eurovision at the Vaudeville, November 1993. Lasted for only three weeks. Lost around £275,000. Sir Lloyd Webber closed it early due to "negative critical appraisal"; someone in the Mail apparently described it as violating every clause of the Geneva Convention. I saw that at the Drill Hall in its original production and loved it - camp, tacky, cheap and funny. But even at that time, knowing next to nothing about the financials of theatre, when I heard about the transfer, I couldn't imagine it playing to a mainstream audience as a mainstream musical. |
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Post by Someone in a tree on Mar 9, 2019 15:26:38 GMT
I'm not sure if I can thank @xanderl for informing me of the youtube link to Witch! Absolutely terrible musical. My head hurts. From Wiki. I wonder what number 1 is /was?  |
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Post by n1david on Mar 9, 2019 15:29:09 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Mar 9, 2019 15:37:37 GMT
I'm not sure if I can thank @xanderl for informing me of the youtube link to Witch! Absolutely terrible musical. My head hurts. From Wiki. I wonder what number 1 is /was? I presumed, given the timing, they were talking about Bernadette, from a couple of years earlier. [EDIT: Carrie never got to the West End. I think the link is a later attempt to find a source for the quote, it doesn’t appear in the article and Cavendish would know better. I bought a number of programmes about twenty years ago, where they’d included all contemporary reviews they could find in with them. I know I have the Which Witch ones but they are all in a box stored away. The answer might be there. I also have that VHS....] The optimism in the following promo proved to be grossly misplaced. |
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Post by djp on Mar 13, 2019 21:59:04 GMT
I can’t believe we’ve gone 14 pages with nobody mentioning perhaps the biggest West End flop in recent memory. I Can’t Sing - The X Factor Musical Lasted just 6wks before closure with a reported loss of £4m. Gave us Cynthia singing, and had a good puppet act. |
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Post by djp on Mar 13, 2019 22:20:33 GMT
We haven't had a big musical flop in the WE for some time though? Shows coming over from Broadway are already proven hits - hence the transfers, and "new" shows are worked on in fringe theatres, or subsidised theatres outside London and either finish there or become successful transfers such as Jamie. The bad news is that there's been no, or very few, new domestic replacements- fewer musicals and more American imports, often with the US social issue of the moment, and often with US leads - because the producers know nothing about UK talent. After Spice Girls, X factor, Stephen Ward, and From here to Eternity flopped, Bend it, Mrs Henderson, and Love Never Dies undersold, Shout exploded after i day, Water Babies didn't float, Officer and Gentleman didn't get a London slot, and the experience that was Exposure, people seem to have given up trying. London started charging £125 to tourists for US musicals, the touring theatres booked fewer musicals and filled dates with clairvoyants and aged comedians, Blood Brothers became perpetual, and Joseph made it back from school trips nationwide, to the Palladium. Personally I didn't much like Jamie. Kinky Boots does the same theme far better. |
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Post by horton on Mar 13, 2019 22:55:03 GMT
Carrie was ALMOST brilliant.
It still could be one day.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2019 23:11:31 GMT
Carrie was ALMOST brilliant. It still could be one day. Bringing back the original orchestrations would really help towards that. |
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Post by crabtree on Mar 13, 2019 23:44:19 GMT
It's a shame that often the quality of a piece is confused with small audiences. Some times people just don't happen to go and see brilliant pieces of theatre for whatever reason and that piece is then labelled a flop. Money seems to dictate the appreciation of quality. It was ever thus. I'm involved with a production at the moment that is having audiences numb with tears, and laughing and gasping at all the right moments, but due to a tiny tiny audience the theatre will consider never putting on good drama again, and just doing 'Whoops there goes my knickers' or second rate Christie
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