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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 7, 2020 10:00:01 GMT
Christmas...directed by Richard Eyre.
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Post by couldileaveyou on Mar 7, 2020 10:21:38 GMT
I feel like they will cast Janie Dee as Vera
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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 7, 2020 10:27:41 GMT
I feel like they will cast Janie Dee as Vera Probably. |
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Post by lonlad on Mar 7, 2020 10:56:40 GMT
That's interesting. Eyre's been wanting to do this show for DECADES, and once had Diana Rigg in mind to play Vera -- who, like Dee, has played Phyllis in FOLLIES. Robbie Fairchild would be a great co-star if he feels like returning to London.
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Post by Someone in a tree on Mar 7, 2020 11:02:41 GMT
Ohhh exciting. I love the score and have wanted to see it for years.
So this is crimbo but what about the summer show? Fingers crossed for an Uncle Steve
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Post by tmesis on Mar 7, 2020 11:10:56 GMT
This is great news. Loved the 1980 production with Sian Phillips and Denis Lawson.
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Post by horton on Mar 7, 2020 11:18:20 GMT
Out of left field but I look forward to seeing the old classic. Fond memories of Denis Lawson several decades ago!
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Post by tonyloco on Mar 7, 2020 11:18:45 GMT
That's interesting. Eyre's been wanting to do this show for DECADES, and once had Diana Rigg in mind to play Vera -- who, like Dee, has played Phyllis in FOLLIES. Robbie Fairchild would be a great co-star if he feels like returning to London.
I expect the older folk among us remember the wonderful production in the West End in 1980 with Sian Phillips and Denis Lawson and all those clever sexy songs! But whoever plays Joey, I expect the show will still work if it is done well.
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Post by jampot on Mar 7, 2020 11:58:05 GMT
Ohhh exciting. I love the score and have wanted to see it for years. So this is crimbo but what about the summer show? Fingers crossed for an Uncle Steve Think Habeas corpus was rumoured... |
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Post by sophie92 on Mar 7, 2020 11:59:39 GMT
Ohhh exciting. I love the score and have wanted to see it for years. So this is crimbo but what about the summer show? Fingers crossed for an Uncle Steve Think Habeas corpus was rumoured... Habeas Corpus is May-July, there should be a musical July-September |
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Post by Someone in a tree on Mar 7, 2020 14:31:01 GMT
Ohhh exciting. I love the score and have wanted to see it for years. So this is crimbo but what about the summer show? Fingers crossed for an Uncle Steve Think Habeas corpus was rumoured... Another piece I really want to see. The Menier are really intune with my unseen shows that I want to see! If I chant for The Visit and Wonderful Town who knows what will happen... |
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Post by juicy_but_terribly_drab on Mar 7, 2020 17:03:52 GMT
Never heard of this and would love to get an idea of the music. What cast recording does everyone recommend?
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Post by alece10 on Mar 7, 2020 17:26:06 GMT
I have certainly heard of Pal Joey but have never seen it before. Just had a quick look at the songs and only familiar with one or two.
With a good cast this could be another big seller for the Menier. Very early to announce though as they normally dont announce Christmas musical until well into the summer.
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Post by tonyloco on Mar 7, 2020 20:13:49 GMT
For the younger generation I can make a few comments, but a look at Wikipedia will supply plenty of information about Pal Joey.
Firstly, the 1940 show by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart starred Vivienne Segal, by then a Broadway and Hollywood veteran, and a young Gene Kelly playing his first leading role. In those days Broadway original cast recordings were a rarity and nothing was recorded, but in 1950 Goddard Lieberson at CBS made a sort of 'original cast' LP with Vivienne Segal and Harold Lang (who had taken over the role of Joey). This led to a revival of the show on Broadway in 1952 when Capitol made a studio cast album featuring some of the members of the Broadway revival cast but not the leads who were replaced by Jane Froman and Dick Beavers. It was these two wonderful LPs that introduced me to the show and I can recommend both of them without reservation. The London revival cast with Sian Phillips and Denis Lawson was also recorded and is worth checking out.
The original show has some of Larry Hart's most overtly sexual lyrics and the songs were banned from radio broadcast in their original form although a sanitised version of 'Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered' was recorded by a number of performers and became a big hit in 1950. The film version made in 1957 with Frank Sinatra, Rita Hayworth and Kim Novak was also watered down and does not represent the original stage show with any accuracy.
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Post by Mr Snow on Mar 7, 2020 20:24:58 GMT
I will swear it was the Albery, somewhere I have the programme.
I'd been to plays, concerts etc but nothing prepared me for my first musical. Went 5 (6?) Times that summer. Still have the cassette the cast made.
Guessing 1978 (will check).
The young Dennis Lawson and the DIVINE Sian Phillips will be tough to better.
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Post by Mr Snow on Mar 7, 2020 20:48:57 GMT
Checking it must have been 1981 when it knocked me sideways.
Today on here it's hard to appreciate just how 'unhip' a classic musical was. With friends I'd been going to see David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, The Who, The Dammed, Elvis Costello, Queen etc etc etc
But if I had a time machine this is what I'd go back to see.
A year later there was a production of another R&H show, On Your Toes and I'd discovered Opera.
Still go to the occasional 'rock' concert but as far as I'm concerned, I've never looked back.
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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 7, 2020 22:20:44 GMT
There’s a very good one with Patti LuPone and Peter Gallagher .. I think it may be an Encores recording ?
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Post by tonyloco on Mar 8, 2020 3:17:56 GMT
Checking it must have been 1981 when it knocked me sideways. Today on here it's hard to appreciate just how 'unhip' a classic musical was. With friends I'd been going to see David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, The Who, The Dammed, Elvis Costello, Queen etc etc etc But if I had a time machine this is what I'd go back to see. A year later there was a production of another R&H show, On Your Toes and I'd discovered Opera. Still go to the occasional 'rock' concert but as far as I'm concerned, I've never looked back. And of course that production of On Your Toes introduced Tim Flavin to London audiences and starred the brilliant ballerina Natalia Makarova, whose Swan Lake and Giselle with the Kirov Ballet Company were the greatest performances of those two classic roles I have ever seen. So, Mr Snow, with those memorable productions of Pal Joey and On your Toes you couldn't have had a better introduction to top class musical theatre IMHO. And as for opera....well let's not go into that on this thread! |
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Post by frankubelik on Mar 8, 2020 3:59:47 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2020 7:43:57 GMT
Chichester did it at the Minerva in 2000 and there was a production which went to Ipswich & Nottingham in 2002 I saw both of those. It was the Chichester production that introduced me to the show. It was popular enough that they transferred it across to the main house, and it's still one of my favourite productions of all time. |
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Post by popcultureboy on Mar 8, 2020 9:13:16 GMT
I saw the 2008-2009 revival of this at Studio 54 which cut the character of Melba Snyder and her number "Zip!" was reassigned to Gladys Bumps. Martha Plimpton was, if I recall correctly, excellent.
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Post by tmesis on Mar 8, 2020 9:50:21 GMT
The first thing I encountered from the show was 'Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered,' but this was as a teenage pianist, when my teacher, Miss Saxton, was exhorting me to play Chopin instead. It's a beautiful song to play, I love how the tune keeps pulling up to the upper tonic note giving it that unique yearning quality.
When, years later I heard it sung by Sian Phillips in the WE it was the fabulous sexy lyrics that I had never encountered before that dazzled.
A selection:
I'll sing to him
Each spring to him
And worship the
Trousers that cling to him
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered
Am I...
When he talks he is speaking
Words to get off his chest
Horizontally speaking
He's at his very best...
Vexed again
Perplexed again
Thank God I can be
Over-sexed again
Bewitched...
And Sondheim doesn't rate Hart as A lyricist!
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Post by winonaforever on Mar 8, 2020 9:52:01 GMT
Ooh this is exciting! I've been singing the score all week, I must be psychic...
I'd love to have seen the original production with Gene Kelly, that's perfect casting!
I won't watch the film though, as I can't stand Frank Sinatra or Kim Novak😖
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Post by tonyloco on Mar 8, 2020 10:44:36 GMT
Thanks tmesis for the musical analysis of 'Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered' as well as reminding us of some of Hart's clever if naughty lyrics.
One aspect of Pal Joey is that, like Cabaret, a significant number of the songs are performed in a nightclub setting and the contrast between these and the story songs is striking, especially in the musical writing by Richard Rodgers.
When I played piano for the bar entertainment at the Theatre Royal, Stratford East, I sometimes had the wonderful Toni Palmer sitting by the piano leading the singing. Toni, as a young dancer, had been in the 1954 London production of Pal Joey and one of the songs we both enjoyed performing was 'That Terrific Rainbow'. Hart's lyrics are ingenious but Rodgers's 'bump and grind' belt music from 1940 is perfect for the style and could hardly be further away from the music he was about to write with Oscar Hammerstein starting with Oklahoma! in 1943.
This new production of Pal Joey is going to have a lot to live up to...!
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Post by alece10 on Mar 8, 2020 12:15:37 GMT
Oh God, Trevor Nunn again though. Don’t the TCF have any other directors for musicals in their Rolodex? It would be good to see this revival put into a slightly more innovative pair of hands. The original poster has said directed by Richard Eyre. |
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