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Post by chernjam on Oct 23, 2023 1:30:11 GMT
I don't know Rachel Tucker at all being from the US. Been looking regularly at the ticket situation. They definitely moved a lot of tickets the last 24 hours. I'm sure people are waiting to see the prices come down, especially since she's the "guest" star. On top of that, people are not buying far in advance, especially not for a Monday night.
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Post by chernjam on Oct 19, 2023 22:01:18 GMT
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Post by chernjam on Oct 18, 2023 16:01:18 GMT
Oh absolutely - it's so cinematic it just wouldn't work as a streaming offer. Cast recording though? Gimme that immediately with bonus tracks of Tucker's With One Look and As If We Never Said Goodbye Yeah this was what I was thinking - should've made that clear - didn't expect a film of the theatre presentation, but a cast recording. I mean the little teases we've had of Nicole (and even Rachel) singing this score sounds glorious. I know I'm a fan-atic of SB, but it's hard to imagine the Nicole fans and new SB fans being impressed with the last official, full length recording of Glenn from almost 30 years ago. I loved Glenn, even in 2017 - but vocally this is an entirely different experience |
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Post by chernjam on Oct 18, 2023 3:22:46 GMT
BTW - since we know Nicole will definitely be done with the West End by January (have to imagine that this is gruelling) what would people think of Hannah Waddingham taking over? Surely she has the gravitas and I think she has the voice to carry on this production
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Post by chernjam on Oct 18, 2023 3:00:50 GMT
I know boots are forboden - but man even these crappy recordings are thrilling.
They just have to record this
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Post by chernjam on Oct 13, 2023 14:26:34 GMT
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Post by chernjam on Oct 13, 2023 11:49:13 GMT
For what its worth, I just posted on twitter @official ALW in response to his tweet about opening night, a response asking for a new FULL cast recording with this cast. It's bonkers to me that every freaking Sondheim cast gets a new recording but for Sunset it will be 30 years since our last one
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Post by chernjam on Oct 13, 2023 3:39:04 GMT
Loving reading these reviews. From what I've read online via Google it seems mixed to positive reviews with mostly positive. Dont remember Sunset getting this type of love from critics in any previous production
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Post by chernjam on Oct 12, 2023 13:07:02 GMT
So do we know if any special A-listers are coming for Opening night? I was wondering if Betty Buckley and Glenn Close might come
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Post by chernjam on Oct 11, 2023 17:05:14 GMT
Does the press go on Opening Night or was tonight "press night"? In the US - the critics usually are there two or three days before the official opening so that the reviews go live immediately after the bows are done for the first performance. Just curious with today's cancellation if that impacts critics or what
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Post by chernjam on Oct 11, 2023 4:07:12 GMT
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Post by chernjam on Oct 11, 2023 2:11:32 GMT
I'm not worried one way or another about the critics. They're power and influence isn't what it once was. The reviews here and on BWW have been overwhelmingly positive on multiple levels. You're never going to get universal acclaim ala Hamilton for an ALW show. I think that a show that was so associated with extravagance and nostalgia like Sunset getting such an edgy re-interpretation with a cast that there's been pretty across the board acclaim is going to continue to get buzz.
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Post by chernjam on Oct 11, 2023 2:06:47 GMT
I remember him making the comments about younger performers at the time he was in hairspray. Plus to be honest, all you have to do is follow some on social media and you see how undisciplined many are. Theatre also seems to be a career where its easy to call out. If I called in sick to my job as much as some actors do, I'd be on disciplinary or being monitored. Just revisit the cinderella phase about how delicate a lot of the younger performers are. ALW gives critical feedback and they're freaking out. Diva's without ever having been able to prove themselves worthy of that title. Here you have Michael Ball sharing how he did a workshop for Sunset only to see the role go to someone else the next year. Did his life end? Was his career ruined? No. Was it pleasant? No - but that's called life. Learn to deal. Grow. |
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Post by chernjam on Oct 10, 2023 19:43:23 GMT
I would think for press night/Opening night, they want to provide footage for tv/online
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Post by chernjam on Oct 5, 2023 19:52:06 GMT
... I also really like the way that this stark, brutal staging has been applied to a lush, romantic (albeit dark and cynical) musical work. The two different styles actually play off against each other perfectly, which is why I say that ALW should write more 'adult' musicals. IMO his best work has always been where he has used his gift for melody to explore things that are actually pretty dark, and where the staging leans into that. Totally agree too about how phenomenal this sounds. I don't know what they've done, or how they've done it, but it's magnificent. Personally, I just think it's incredible that we're sitting here in 2023, discussing whether the metanarrative in an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical works or not. I repeat - and Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. Not Sondheim. Not a Jeanine Tesori musical, or a Dave Malloy one. How did this happen? More please!! That's when ALW succeeds the most. He's said that his inspiration for Dont Cry for Me Argentina was seeing Judy Garland trying to perform "Somewhere over the rainbow" when she was struggling with substance abuse issues and the crowd was practically booing her during her "anthem." Seeing something that was synonymous with this person now turned against her he found incredibly brutal in real life but at the same time very theatrical. that's what's exciting about hearing all this about Sunset. I've always loved the score and felt it was one of ALW's finest. But perhaps the original production was too reverential towards the movie in how it was staged. With this more dark/cynical approach, perhaps Sunset will finally achieve some of the artistic potential ALW first envisioned. |
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Post by chernjam on Oct 3, 2023 2:35:42 GMT
Just out of curiosity, the main Sunset Boulevd logo, (the street sign with the palm leaves in shadow) went through various colour changes of the years, The original London (sunny) LA/Broadway (Black and white) UK Tour (red) and all had various shades used within them. along with a hand holding a gun at some point. Whats your favourite? Hard to beat the original orange/yellow for me. Not sure if its my nostalgia but it still seems perfect. |
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Post by chernjam on Oct 2, 2023 22:21:58 GMT
Sarah Brightman as Norma - I can't imagine her voice in the role. But to be fair, I dislike her voice in all of ALW's stuff, except Requiem
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Post by chernjam on Oct 2, 2023 2:14:00 GMT
Was surprised to see a positive article about ALW in the NY Times referencing the revivals of Sunset, Evita, Cats and JCS this year. www.nytimes.com/2023/09/27/theater/andrew-lloyd-webber-sunset-boulevard-evita.htmlFor those unable to get past the paywall - here's the quotes on Sunset: ‘Sunset Boulevard’ Forget the staircase and the turban. Jamie Lloyd is bringing an intense interest in psychological exploration to “Sunset Boulevard” — “putting the emphasis,” he says, “on people and their emotional journey.” With that aim, he asked Lloyd Webber to rework some aspects of the score “to lean into the darkness and peculiarity of certain moments that are dreamlike or nightmarish.” And, to his surprise, Lloyd Webber agreed. “He’s been so open,” Lloyd said, “which is kind of crazy.” The production, which is now running at London’s Savoy Theater, ends with a rush of blood and integrates live camera work in a nod to the Hollywood milieu of “Sunset Boulevard.” Lloyd called it “a hybrid between theater and cinema.” Lloyd, 42, didn’t grow up seeing theater. But his father, a truck driver, liked listening to show tunes, and that’s how Lloyd first encountered Lloyd Webber’s songs. Soon he had his own cassette of the composer’s greatest hits, and he would “force my cousins to do performances in the living room.” “It was kind of the soundtrack of my youth,” he said. Fast forward to the summer of 2019. Lloyd, by then an acclaimed experimental director, had moved on from his Lloyd Webber fixation, or at least so he thought. But when he was invited to stage a musical outdoors, in Regent’s Park, one show came to mind: “Evita.” His sneakers-and-spray-paint production of that show was a hit, and he made a mental note of Lloyd Webber’s openness to “radical reappraisal.” Then, idled at home during the pandemic, he found himself imagining what he could do with “Sunset Boulevard.” “The characters he chooses to write about are weird and otherworldly, often with tormented minds, and the scores take these big leaps which are good to explore,” Lloyd said. “They are like fever dreams, and they respond well to a more experimental, less traditional approach.” |
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Post by chernjam on Oct 1, 2023 3:03:27 GMT
As the sun sets my theatre holiday, this was one hell of a last night tonight. Jamie LLoyd and his team have done something amazing with this iconic show. 2.5hrs of theatrical magic. Ripping up the rule book, the whole technical design concept was in my view genius with making the show feel like a Hollywood movie with all the camera work and big screen (shoutout to all the camera operators and vision mixers, especially for that Act 2 opener - loved it!). Coupling the camera work lighting design brought a completely different feel to the show to make it more haunting which for me worked a treat. Also, making full use of the Savoy theatre (inside and out) to create that Hollywood film set idea again worked for me. The title sequences and credits another great addition. For the cast, Nicole’s performance as Norma totally suited the style JL was going for (I certainly bought into the performance, particularly the breakdown scenes at the end.)and stunning vocals. As for Tom, having followed his career since appearing in Hope Mill’s Rent, I think tonight, there may be the makings of a new leading man in the WE. David Thaxton as Max again, stunning vocals. Sat in the Grand Circle (row D) tonight, no issues with this section and hearing that 17 piece orchestra play that fantastic ALW score - sublime. Quite simply, if this had had a longer run or had been on tour near me in Manchester or Liverpool, I’d be booking for a revisit or two I think it’s that good. Rating - 5 ⭐️ I'm really hoping for a Broadway transfer, as I don't think I can make it over there to see this... |
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Post by chernjam on Sept 27, 2023 3:25:48 GMT
Caissie Levy has some competition for the Olivier Award! This is not your Grandmas's Sunset Boulevard. Now I really didn't like Jamie Lloyds' Evita. At all. I thought it was too flashy, too random, too far removed from what it was, so I was skeptical about seeing this tonight. This SB couldn't be further from the original if it tried. It has many of Lloyds usual directorial choices, and yet it works amazingly well on so many different levels. I didn't miss the set, the costumes, the props, it helps put the score front and centre. The orchestra, with the original orchestrations (i believe) sounded amazing and the sound was spot on. You could hear individual instruments, the mix was perfect and you could hear every word that was sung. Scherzinger's Norma was kooky, sexy, scary, sensual, playful and it played very well into her known persona (There's no way that Rachel Tucker could play it the same way, she's too... mumsy) and she sung the hell out of her big numbers. In fact, alot of what i loved about this production, was that the main songs were treated as such. They were focussed, front and centre and worthy of all the applause they got. The noise made after With One Look went on for a very long time. Tom Francis has moved up into leading man status and carried the show with confidence. It was nice to hear him sing in a style that wasn't pop/rock and David Thaxton was great, sounding glorious in all his solo numbers. I wonder why he played it with an English accent? Grace Hodget Young made a wonderful Betty, a straight forward modern take on the role, without the sappiness of past productions. I won't go on but I loved almost everything about it. The tech rehearsals for this must have been long (Karen Cartwright would not be happy) because the lighting plays such an important part in this production, it's almost like it's own character. The choice to use red lighting when it does, is odd to me. No idea why there, as opposed to the final scene where she shoots Joe. The Perfect Year is a great example of things that shouldn't work and yet it does. The hats, the very modern dance references, the confetti lol, but it works brilliantly. When the scene moves onto Arties Party, This Time Next Year, They use part of the digital screen to backlight it, and the size of the screen and the angle it's tilted, is identical to the original production, when the house rose up and you saw the party underneath it. Not sure if that was intentional, but it seemed too similar for it not to be. Or maybe i was imagining it, either way it was very cool. I'm looking forward to the reviews, because it could go either way, though i hope it gets the raves it deserves. It's audacious and thrilling and i can't wait to go back. From the raves I'm reading here, I can't imagine the critics not eating this up. Especially since of ALW's scores, Sunset has often been treated well by critics in the UK and I would think they're going to appreciate the rawness of this minimalist approach, especially since its bringing a new dimension to a classic story. Really excited about all this. Is it too early to ask about a new cast recording? |
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Post by chernjam on Sept 24, 2023 2:45:16 GMT
I'm thoroughly enjoying all the back and forth on here between admirers and those who aren't. I'm far from a well-versed theater-goer. There will be years when I don't get into NYC which is only 20 miles away from me, and then there will be years like 2017 when I saw the revival of Sunset Blvd 5 times (as well as Sunday in the Park with George twice). I am biased towards ALW and all his works, but never saw School of Rock (never saw and never wanted to see the movie and the recording of the score didn't really get me excited). And as much as I enjoyed all the pre-production drops of Cinderella, thinking each song revealed another great score, again, the source material never appealed to me, and then hearing all the campiness of there version along with the melodrama and seemingly mis-cast lead here, well, it was another pass. So I'm in a weird category of being an ALW fan - with a shelf full of multiple recordings of the same show that I listen to regularly - but not a blind sycophant of him and his works. Anyway, my understanding or exposure to Jamie Lloyd is very minimal. I had obviously read and heard a lot and likened it to a lot of hype directed towards someone who is staging things in a minimalist way. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The Sunset 2017 revival was as well - what made that extravagant was a 40 piece orchestra (10 smaller than you had across the pond!) But I thought Lonnie Price had done some really interesting things that brought different dimensions to the story (the "ghost Norma" which seemed to divide people, I loved, because it made Norma more vulnerable and the audience felt deeper empathy for an old woman truly trapped in her past, not ever able to move on or find joy since) The more I thought about it, one of the challenges ALW and the creative team had with this was the knives were out from the get-go when they first set about to do this. Aspects was far from the hit of its predecessors. And now ALW/RUG really were trying to demonstrate they didn't need Cameron Macintosh. The critics, at least here in the US never really gave ALW any respect. And now with adapting Sunset Blvd -something that the sainted-Sondheim had attempted and abandoned - something considered US cinema classic - the scrutiny was epic. Add that Billy Wilder was alive and well and unfiltered as well. So had they even tried something like the "ghost Norma" he would've hated it and given everyone another talking point to bash this. So in retrospect, the creative team was very constrained to the source material. Which is why I'm excited to read and hear all this buzz about this fresh take on things. I listened to the score today skipping "The Ladys Paying" and "Eternal Youth..." and as much as I enjoyed them in the previous incarnations, they really weren't missed and I could see how just those cuts raise the intensity of the darkness of this piece. Add the change to "too much in love to care"- tonally it makes more sense. And I've been saying for awhile, especially after the 2017 revival, when I took some friends who were in the 20's, I could see that without some updates, this show would probably never have a future successful life as a revival. Silent pictures/talkies - Cecil B De Mille - its ancient cinema history by now. But the major themes of this show, the human psychological drama, betrayals, etc. sadly are universal themes that people can sadly relate to. From these early reports, it sounds like Jamie Lloyd has found a way to unlock that and get people truly excited for a favorite score of mine in a way that I haven't seen from any of the revivals, including the 2017 ENO one. So here's fingers crossed it transfers - or else I'm going to have to break down and come over and see this and I don't think my bank account can take that  |
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Post by chernjam on Sept 23, 2023 0:33:46 GMT
I'm just so excited hearing all this buzz over one of my all-time favorite scores. The Glenn-ENO was special for sure. I was shocked when they announced it was coming to NY since we had Glenn originate the role on Broadway and I couldn't imagine it surpassing that. For sure, the revival here was special. Seeing Close again perform the same role in her 70's, with that glorious orchestra, and definitely bringing some depth from lived experience was wonderful. But my one concern was it was becoming "Glenn Close's Sunset Blvd". And apart from those who saw and loved the original, wanted to see a theatrical historic performance, etc. the show didn't really break any new ground (which explains why it was completely snubbed for any Tony nominations that year)
This sounds edgy and exciting- and kind of what I was hoping they were going to try to do, make the story accessible to a world that could probably relate to the destructive nature of narcissism far better now than in earlier incarnations.
Also - as I eat up every review, am I reading correctly that they finally reverted Too Much In Love to care back to the Sydmonton version where it ends on a softer/harmonized note rather than the loud finale that it's had in almost every production (except the 2nd US National Tour) That song has always been the one low point in the score for me, but when I saw the Sydmonton/2nd US Tour versions I liked it far better. In any event, that people are noting actually feeling for Artie rather than him being completely forgotten is more evidence this is bringing a lot more dimensions to this.
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Post by chernjam on Sept 22, 2023 3:38:54 GMT
well hunting down clips on Twitter and just a minute of As if we never said goodbye and a minute of the finale were exciting to hear. Damn they better record this.
Thank you all for sharing your reviews. Been excited about this on this side of the Atlantic almost like I was when the World Premiere happened in 1993 and couldn't wait to get the New York Times the next day (even though I knew they'd hate on it) just for any info on it.
Can't say I'm disappointed that "The Lady's Paying" was cut. From all looks it was going for a darker tone overall, so not shocked that would go.
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Post by chernjam on Sept 20, 2023 3:49:56 GMT
It does mean staying true to the essence of what the creators intended and not seeking to impose things on a show that do not have strong roots in the text/score. Some of the most exciting theatre I have seen stays true to that approach. Always using the material as the basis for each production material and not seeking to use the material to tell another story. No one has argued that theatre should be trapped in a museum. Innovation is key. But it has to come from within and not be imposed. Maybe this production of SB will do many of those things, or maybe it won't, but we wont know for sure until it actually opens. I loved Kathryn Evans in Sunset Blvd, but that was about it for that production. It went too far the other way, a spiral staircase, some potted plants and a chaise lounge do not a palazzo make. Honour the original well, or do something different with it, like the 1996 revival of Chicago. That's been my suspicion with this... the pared back, black and white made me think of Chicago revival which put the focus on the score and storytelling. As an avid fan of Sunset Blvd. I'm excited by this production and the idea of something new that is already honoring the score by having a full orchestra and a leading lady that can surely sing the hell out of this. And as I said earlier, SB needs to do something to make the story more accessible to fewer and fewer audiences with any sense of movies/talkies. The main concept of being built up and forgotten - egos, using people, manipulation/delusions of grandeur are all themes that can be exploited for dramatic effect. And NS sounded so off the wall in that interview, I can't wait to see what they've cooked up. |
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Post by chernjam on Sept 13, 2023 21:06:28 GMT
Nicole is not returning to Masked Singer next year which starts filming beginning January, same time Sunset is planned to close. Could Sunset possibly extend in the West End? I thought the theatre already had a commitment right after the closing date? |
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