(no subject)
I am writing this from a bus. Cool, I know. I took the Chinatown bus to DC this weekend and am currently heading home. I went to spend time with my aunt and my uncle. Also, my aunt and I saw The Visit yesterday.
But first things first. I promised
infinitejoys I would write about the Side Show reading. That happened over a week ago now. I really should write about that, the Mufti Grind, and then the Visit. Let's see how far I get before my computer runs out of battery power. (I already watched The Signal, which I got from Netflix. Great horror/comedy, I really enjoyed it.)
My first thoughts on the Side Show reading is: they've gone a long way towards fixing it. The big numbers that are cut are "More Than We Bargained For" and "Tunnel of Love." All the performance songs were replaced with different earlier performance songs. Those of us who love Side Show have already heard these songs - "Ready to Play" and "Stuck With You" were both recorded by Emily and Alice, and on the demos (which I'm sure most of us have), you can hear "Typical Girls Next Door." Speaking of the demos, a lot of the Auntie material was put back in, but not nearly all of it. Not having done a detailed analysis, I would say that they took parts from each song and strung them together with a little new material. It's all done as a flashback when the girls are telling Terry and Buddy why they can't leave the circus. (An interesting new song was added - a trio for Harry Houdini and the girls called "All in the Mind," about how the girls can always be alone if they just create a compartment in their minds.) And then, you remember the long trial sequence from the demos. Well, it's not here, but there is a trial to determine whether or not Sir has legal guardianship over the girls. So they can't just up and leave the side show like they did in the original version.
In the second act, instead of Buddy and Terry turning into jerks at the last second, Terry finds a doctor who can separate the girls without harming them. He then says to Daisy that he will marry her as soon as they have this operation. The girls are, at first, thrilled about this. But as Buddy's wedding draws closer, Buddy is getting cold feet for some unknown reason, and Jake is trying to convince the girls not to have the operation. It all comes to a head right before the wedding, as in the original show, but here we find out that Buddy is actually gay and just wanted to make Violet happy. Daisy says that Terry is already going to marry her, why not just do it here and now before the operation? Terry can't bring himself to do that, and Tod Browning, who entered the room, asks, "What operation?" When he is told, he says that he needs the girls for his film just the way they are. The girls realize that they do need to stay together, even if it will cost Daisy the love of her life.
So, I think this ending is an improvement. It raises the stakes for "I Will Never Leave You," for one. The girls have the choice to be "like everyone else" and they CHOOSE not to, valuing each other and themselves for their uniqueness.
The actors in it were terrific, although Aaron Lazar and Betsy Wolfe (as Terry and Daisy) were the standouts. Erin Davie was very good as Violet, belting better than I've ever heard her. Bobby Steggert and Jefferson Mays (as Sir) were slightly underwhelming, but I'm sure they'd be very good with more rehearsal time. Both just looked somewhat uncomfortable. And as much as I liked Bobby in 110 in the Shade and The Slug Bearers..., he's not really a great singer.
Anyway, it was a very special experience for me - Bill Condon sat right behind me, and I ran into Harvey Fierstein in the bathroom and had a little conversation with him. I'll definitely share the bootleg with you all as soon as it's tracked.
Ok, I have 10 minutes left. The Mufti Grind I saw on Saturday night. There was a new book, and Larry Grossman and Ellen Fitzhugh went back and added a bunch of cut numbers, especially "We All George," which Hal Prince said was vital to the show, and which Ben Vereen refused to sing. (It's all about how on the train, no white people can tell the black porters apart, so to the passengers, they're all "George.") Unfortunately, some great numbers were cut too. I couldn't understand why the authors would want to cut "The Line" unless they felt it was too "on-the-nose" for Leroy to be telling us exactly how he felt and what his problems were. But it's a terrific song, MUCH better than that first song for Romaine, about how she loves young men (and I couldn't figure out what that song was supposed to mirror in real life, either.)
But I LOVED "We All George" - I thought it was a pretty terrific song, musically and lyrically. It manages to be pretty funny all the way through. And they kind of had to cut "Why, Mama, Why?" cause the bike is no longer a part of the show. And Di, according to posts on castrecl, "Rabbity Stew" was in the show in tryouts. (Although it doesn't make a good act-closer at all.)
I'm not sure how I feel about the restructuring of the story. One of the things I liked about the original script is how Leroy doesn't get with Satin. This is much more conventional - Satin and Leroy go off together, and Doyle comes to peace with himself and goes back home to Ireland. And there's very little of the racial violence and tension that seems to be underneath the show constantly in the original script. It's much less about blacks and whites and much more about these burlesque girls being abused, both black and white. (This kind of undercut the power of "We All George," although Doyle makes a very interesting reference to it at the very end of the show.)
Also, in the original script, "These Eyes of Mine" was sung at Gus's funeral. Here, it's sung by Clementine when she is remembering her own father's funeral while talking to Doyle about how she came to work at this theatre.
Speaking of Gus, why did they not use "I Get Myself Out"? That song title was printed in the program, but the lyric was not in the song that was sung. According to that guy on castrecl, it's a song that was cut in tryouts and was replaced by "I Get Myself Out." I mean, the song they used at Mufti was fine but not as interesting, musically, as "I Get Myself Out," and both songs do exactly the same thing, so...
I have read the original script, and I can't say for certain if the prostitution angle is in it or not, but it's certainly not prominent or the driving plot of the show. Which makes me wonder how "A Century of Progress" fit into the show originally, since it basically exists to comment on the corruption of the judge and the city. (Although perhaps they tweaked it lyrically. It probably could've originally been used to comment on racial violence.) I don't know, maybe the show is unfixable. But I think the authors, if they continue to work on it, need a strong director (like Hal Prince) to tell them what works and what doesn't.
Ok, no time for love Dr. Jones. My battery's about to run out. Check out this lj next time for my thoughts on the final (?) Kander and Ebb musical, The Visit.
But first things first. I promised
infinitejoys I would write about the Side Show reading. That happened over a week ago now. I really should write about that, the Mufti Grind, and then the Visit. Let's see how far I get before my computer runs out of battery power. (I already watched The Signal, which I got from Netflix. Great horror/comedy, I really enjoyed it.)
My first thoughts on the Side Show reading is: they've gone a long way towards fixing it. The big numbers that are cut are "More Than We Bargained For" and "Tunnel of Love." All the performance songs were replaced with different earlier performance songs. Those of us who love Side Show have already heard these songs - "Ready to Play" and "Stuck With You" were both recorded by Emily and Alice, and on the demos (which I'm sure most of us have), you can hear "Typical Girls Next Door." Speaking of the demos, a lot of the Auntie material was put back in, but not nearly all of it. Not having done a detailed analysis, I would say that they took parts from each song and strung them together with a little new material. It's all done as a flashback when the girls are telling Terry and Buddy why they can't leave the circus. (An interesting new song was added - a trio for Harry Houdini and the girls called "All in the Mind," about how the girls can always be alone if they just create a compartment in their minds.) And then, you remember the long trial sequence from the demos. Well, it's not here, but there is a trial to determine whether or not Sir has legal guardianship over the girls. So they can't just up and leave the side show like they did in the original version.
In the second act, instead of Buddy and Terry turning into jerks at the last second, Terry finds a doctor who can separate the girls without harming them. He then says to Daisy that he will marry her as soon as they have this operation. The girls are, at first, thrilled about this. But as Buddy's wedding draws closer, Buddy is getting cold feet for some unknown reason, and Jake is trying to convince the girls not to have the operation. It all comes to a head right before the wedding, as in the original show, but here we find out that Buddy is actually gay and just wanted to make Violet happy. Daisy says that Terry is already going to marry her, why not just do it here and now before the operation? Terry can't bring himself to do that, and Tod Browning, who entered the room, asks, "What operation?" When he is told, he says that he needs the girls for his film just the way they are. The girls realize that they do need to stay together, even if it will cost Daisy the love of her life.
So, I think this ending is an improvement. It raises the stakes for "I Will Never Leave You," for one. The girls have the choice to be "like everyone else" and they CHOOSE not to, valuing each other and themselves for their uniqueness.
The actors in it were terrific, although Aaron Lazar and Betsy Wolfe (as Terry and Daisy) were the standouts. Erin Davie was very good as Violet, belting better than I've ever heard her. Bobby Steggert and Jefferson Mays (as Sir) were slightly underwhelming, but I'm sure they'd be very good with more rehearsal time. Both just looked somewhat uncomfortable. And as much as I liked Bobby in 110 in the Shade and The Slug Bearers..., he's not really a great singer.
Anyway, it was a very special experience for me - Bill Condon sat right behind me, and I ran into Harvey Fierstein in the bathroom and had a little conversation with him. I'll definitely share the bootleg with you all as soon as it's tracked.
Ok, I have 10 minutes left. The Mufti Grind I saw on Saturday night. There was a new book, and Larry Grossman and Ellen Fitzhugh went back and added a bunch of cut numbers, especially "We All George," which Hal Prince said was vital to the show, and which Ben Vereen refused to sing. (It's all about how on the train, no white people can tell the black porters apart, so to the passengers, they're all "George.") Unfortunately, some great numbers were cut too. I couldn't understand why the authors would want to cut "The Line" unless they felt it was too "on-the-nose" for Leroy to be telling us exactly how he felt and what his problems were. But it's a terrific song, MUCH better than that first song for Romaine, about how she loves young men (and I couldn't figure out what that song was supposed to mirror in real life, either.)
But I LOVED "We All George" - I thought it was a pretty terrific song, musically and lyrically. It manages to be pretty funny all the way through. And they kind of had to cut "Why, Mama, Why?" cause the bike is no longer a part of the show. And Di, according to posts on castrecl, "Rabbity Stew" was in the show in tryouts. (Although it doesn't make a good act-closer at all.)
I'm not sure how I feel about the restructuring of the story. One of the things I liked about the original script is how Leroy doesn't get with Satin. This is much more conventional - Satin and Leroy go off together, and Doyle comes to peace with himself and goes back home to Ireland. And there's very little of the racial violence and tension that seems to be underneath the show constantly in the original script. It's much less about blacks and whites and much more about these burlesque girls being abused, both black and white. (This kind of undercut the power of "We All George," although Doyle makes a very interesting reference to it at the very end of the show.)
Also, in the original script, "These Eyes of Mine" was sung at Gus's funeral. Here, it's sung by Clementine when she is remembering her own father's funeral while talking to Doyle about how she came to work at this theatre.
Speaking of Gus, why did they not use "I Get Myself Out"? That song title was printed in the program, but the lyric was not in the song that was sung. According to that guy on castrecl, it's a song that was cut in tryouts and was replaced by "I Get Myself Out." I mean, the song they used at Mufti was fine but not as interesting, musically, as "I Get Myself Out," and both songs do exactly the same thing, so...
I have read the original script, and I can't say for certain if the prostitution angle is in it or not, but it's certainly not prominent or the driving plot of the show. Which makes me wonder how "A Century of Progress" fit into the show originally, since it basically exists to comment on the corruption of the judge and the city. (Although perhaps they tweaked it lyrically. It probably could've originally been used to comment on racial violence.) I don't know, maybe the show is unfixable. But I think the authors, if they continue to work on it, need a strong director (like Hal Prince) to tell them what works and what doesn't.
Ok, no time for love Dr. Jones. My battery's about to run out. Check out this lj next time for my thoughts on the final (?) Kander and Ebb musical, The Visit.