A Gushing Review of The Producers
Hi! I just saw The Producers at the Ohio Theater last night, and I can now say that "I Get It." I get why people see Broadway shows.
It seems like all my life I've heard critics tear King 'O Broadway Andrew Lloyd Webber and all of the fools who see his schlock a new one. After seeing some scenes of various Broadway musicals acted out on shows like Rosie O'Donnell, I found myself wondering "why do all these people see this crap?" It got to the point where Broadway seemed to my completely unexperienced brain not much better than, say, Nascar--thousands of bloated mid-American people in kitty and sports sweatshirts packing in to see what is supposed to be entertainment.
How high-brow I was! How humbled now.
It could be that The Producers, which won numerous Tonys (a distinction that I never cared about, by the way), is just much better than the average Broadway show. As it was my first show of this type, I don't know. But I can say that if they are mostly all like this, then I need to start buying tickets.
It was great! I would go see it again, it was that great. The performers seemed dead-on accurate, with strong voices and amazing control of their stagecraft. (Ach! So talented!)Of course, it helps to have a Mel Brooks script. He had a bevy of ballgown and tux-wearing singers, after seeing one of Max Bialystock's crappy shows, cheerfully and operatically bellow, "We've seen shit but never like this!" in the first number.
Despite my otherwise intriguing writerly talent, I am a bad reviewer made even worse by the fact that I have nothing but love for the show. It was a thoroughly entertaining evening made even better by front-row seats in one of the prettiest rooms around.
It seems like all my life I've heard critics tear King 'O Broadway Andrew Lloyd Webber and all of the fools who see his schlock a new one. After seeing some scenes of various Broadway musicals acted out on shows like Rosie O'Donnell, I found myself wondering "why do all these people see this crap?" It got to the point where Broadway seemed to my completely unexperienced brain not much better than, say, Nascar--thousands of bloated mid-American people in kitty and sports sweatshirts packing in to see what is supposed to be entertainment.
How high-brow I was! How humbled now.
It could be that The Producers, which won numerous Tonys (a distinction that I never cared about, by the way), is just much better than the average Broadway show. As it was my first show of this type, I don't know. But I can say that if they are mostly all like this, then I need to start buying tickets.
It was great! I would go see it again, it was that great. The performers seemed dead-on accurate, with strong voices and amazing control of their stagecraft. (Ach! So talented!)Of course, it helps to have a Mel Brooks script. He had a bevy of ballgown and tux-wearing singers, after seeing one of Max Bialystock's crappy shows, cheerfully and operatically bellow, "We've seen shit but never like this!" in the first number.
Despite my otherwise intriguing writerly talent, I am a bad reviewer made even worse by the fact that I have nothing but love for the show. It was a thoroughly entertaining evening made even better by front-row seats in one of the prettiest rooms around.
posted by lulu at 8:34 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
What is it about a show about a show? Half a lifetime ago - I remember this clearly because it was my birthday - Gven Golly and I went to see A Chorus Line at the Schubert Theater in Chicago, our first big splurge after moving to the city that works. I had seen a couple of musicals before - Man of LaMancha in Detroit, Mame in New York, Hair in Atlanta - but this was different somehow. I can still hear one character tap dance (da-ta-ta-tah, da-ta-ta-tah) while singing "I can do that, I can do that" and another reconstruct the audition experience in the song "Tits and Ass." The ensemble cast of relative unknowns, the comedy and tragedy of talented people trying to make it by doing what they love to do. Have I become a regular theater-goer? No. Why not? I dunno. I saw my friend Rick perform the lead in The Music Man one summer in Schiller Park, and, come to think of it, he was in Oliver, too. I won't list the ones I should have seen but didn't beginning with Rent...maybe they'll come around again.
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