Elf Spreads Early Christmas CheerNo doubt banking that the best way to spread Christmas Cheer, is singing loud for all to hear,
Warner Brothers Theatre Ventures is returning to the Great White Way with the musical version of one of my recent Holiday film favorites:
Elf (2003).
Elf - The Musical is set to play Broadway's
Al Hirschfeld Theatre beginning on November 2, 2010. The tuner will open on November 14, just in time for the Holiday season that begins in earnest over Thanksgiving.
The musical will star
Sebastian Arcelus as Buddy,
Amy Spanger as Jovie,
Marc Jacoby as Walter,
Beth Leavel as Emily, and the most natural actor I can think of to fill Santa's shoes,
George Wendt.
Currently scheduled through January 2, 2011, the limited engagement will get a boost this Saturday at 12:30 p.m. when
Arcelus officially opens the Hirshfeld box office with prize giveaways including chances for young audience members to win walk-on roles.
On the official
Elf - The Musical website, the stage adaptation is
described as follows:
One of the most beloved Hollywood holiday hits of the past decade is now a full grown Broadway musical! Featuring an all-star creative team led by three time Tony-nominated director/choreographer Casey Nicholaw (Spamalot), Tony-winning book writers Thomas Meehan (The Producers) and Bob Martin (The Drowsy Chaperone) and the Tony-nominated songwriting team of Matthew Sklar and Chad Beguelin (The Wedding Singer), Elf is the one present everyone wants this holiday season.
Will audiences be willing to pass through the seven levels of the Candy Cane forest, through the sea of swirly twirly gum drops, and perhaps even walk through the Lincoln Tunnel just to see this stage adaptation? As Broadway's only real Holiday show this season, the production just might provide the elfin magic Warner Brothers is hoping for.
This is
Steve On Broadway (SOB).
In keeping with the new that unfairly discriminate against bloggers, who are now required by law to disclose when they have received anything of value they might write about, please note that I have received nothing of value in exchange for this post. Labels: Amy Spanger, Beth Leavel, Bob Martin, Broadway, Casey Nicholaw, Chad Beguelin, Elf-The Musical, Film, First Word On New Show, George Wendt, Marc Jacoby, Matthew Sklar, Musical, Sebastian Arcelus, Thomas Meehan
Did LA Critics Think Minsky's Worth Raiding For Musical?No doubt wistfully hoping for a Main Stem three-peat of sorts, Los Angeles'
Center Theatre Group -- which hosted the launch of two would-be Rialto musicals that would go on to be Tony nominated for Best Musical:
Bob Martin's
The Drowsy Chaperone and
John Kander and
Fred Ebb's
Curtains -- is currently producing the long-gestating, Broadway-aimed
Minsky's.
With score by the venerable
Charles Strouse and
Susan Birkenhead, this new tuner is being touted as a good old-fashioned musical comedy. It also marks another collaboration for Bob Martin and
Casey Nicholaw -- just as the former wrote
The Drowsy Chaperone's clever book with the latter directing and choreographing, they possess the same credits for
Minsky's.
If collaboration is the word, it may come as no surprise that their Tony-winning Best Featured Actress
Beth Leavel is also cast in this production. Leavel is joined by a truly terrific-sounding cast, including
Christopher Fitzgerald -- who is finally receiving his due as leading man in the eponymous role --
Kevin Cahoon,
John Cariani and
Rachel Dratch, along with two actors who made
Hairspray's Edna Turnblad their own as major Great White Way replacements:
Paul Vogt and
George Wendt.
So far, so good, right?
Minsky's opened Sunday night and the reviews were, well, a bit skimpy on the praise. But as
Michael Riedel points out, there's apparently enough, er, material there to keep moving forward -- albeit with some major tailoring -- to make it Broadway ready.
Leaving "
Minsky’s not with the tingly sensation of having seen something exciting and maybe a little sinful, but with the feeling that you’ve attended a comforting church service,"
The New York Times'
Charles Isherwood practically damns with the faintest traces of praise: "
Minsky’s is a musical comedy that too often seems to be looking back to familiar formulas, dusting off and sprucing up clichés from the showbiz trunk for another repurposing....
Minsky’s seems content to do the old steps in the old style, on the assumption that sentimental escapism presented with gusto and polish can turn the trick one more time.... They call it burlesque, and the sequins are used a little more sparingly, but it feels a lot like plain-vanilla Broadway.... The short and slightly portly Mr. Fitzgerald makes an appealingly offbeat leading man in the tough-talking but soft-hearted vein.... Ms. Dratch and Mr. Cariani as the matched misfits almost steal the show with a sour-grapes duet, 'I Want a Life.'... On the whole the score is bubbly and pleasant, with an accent on brassy energy."
Calling the show a "nostalgic and not terribly authentic backstage musical
," Los Angeles Times critic
Charles McNulty also offers a mixed review: "[T]hough far from terrible, isn’t quite the electric crowd-pleaser they’re intending. Intermittently delightful, the musical is just as intermittently bumbling, coming alive mostly in the colorful burlesque sequences and taking a sharp nose-dive when attempts are made to contain the parade of skimpily clad dancing girls and shamelessly hoary gags into a traditional book musical.... There are plenty of nifty one-liners and deliriously silly shenanigans, but the book, which has been transplanted from the mid-’20s (in which the film was set) to the Depression-clobbered summer of 1930, has that lumpy look of a dish that’s been fiddled with by too many cooks. Even its dire economic relevance feels belabored.... But the tone of the show could have benefited from a few more grains of documentary truth and a whole lot less musical-comedy fraudulence.... Fitzgerald, who possesses a great trumpet of a voice, excels when a gaggle of leggy showgirls is circling him to the rhythmic bleats of the live orchestra. Leading man he’s not, but he more than compensates with an offbeat charisma.... Leavel ... can be counted on for oomph.... An eccentric constellation of supporting players distracts from the musical’s more threadbare patches."
Despite declaring, "Irresistible throughout is the tuner's cavalcade of song and dance,"
Variety's Bob Verini also gives the show a mixed critique: "The potential of a tuner titled
Minsky's ... is partly realized in its Ahmanson Theater premiere thanks to a strong Charles Strouse/Susan Birkenhead score and state-of-the-art musical staging by helmer-choreographer Casey Nicholaw. On the debit side are a thin, uninvolving storyline and curiously antiseptic take on the raffish art form the tuner purports to celebrate.... Irresistible throughout is the tuner's cavalcade of song and dance.... Aside from Leavel, tuner is light on top bananas and comics generally, though Paul Vogt, John Cariani and Rachel Dratch are amusingly off-kilter zanies. Fitzgerald juggles Billy's machinations with
Mike Todd's brash vitality until he's turned cute and doughy by the love plot, which practically evaporates even as he and (
Katharine) Leonard speak the lines."
Concluding that "the outlines of a well-shaped musical shine through
," The Orange County Record's
Paul Hodgins nevertheless lays bear what he sees as the show's shortfalls: "There are moments of great fun, inspiration and even brilliance in this show.... Indeed, on the level of simple entertainment it succeeds just fine. But in its present form, Martin's contributions to Hunter's original book result in touches of whimsy (mostly welcome) that don't always gibe with other parts of the tale.... The songs are one of
Minsky's strong points.... They smartly capture the sass and verbal adroitness of the time and place.... Nicholaw captures the libertine spirit of classic burlesque with a few elaborately choreographed breast-baring (but not nipple-revealing) moments. Nicholaw shows us that Golden Age burlesque was primarily spectacle and as much a comic as an erotic diversion. I suspect
Minsky's creators know there's plenty of work to be done.... The talented Beth Leavel is given too little to do as Billy's worldly sidekick, Maisie. Fitzgerald's performance is somewhat monochromatic."
I'll be keeping a close eye on this show as it continues making its long journey to Broadway. But right now, the Los Angeles production perhaps seems as far away from its end goal as possible.
UPDATE (2.13.09, 1:45 p.m. EST): According to Playbill, Minsky's will bow on the Great White Way sometime during the 2009-10 Theatrical Season.This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Beth Leavel, Bob Martin, Casey Nicholaw, Charles Strouse, Christopher Fitzgerald, Critics' Capsule, John Cariani, Kevin Cahoon, Los Angeles, Minsky's, Rachel Dratch, Susan Birkenhead, Tryout
That's Andy-Tainment?
Tip of the hat to Boston-area (as near as I can figure) theatre director/musician/blogger
Corey Jackson at the Bullroar Report for his insider perspective on what sounds like a very promising reading for a new musical called
That's Andy.
The musical is about a young child who dreams of someday portraying
Annie -- only catch is that the young child is a
boy. Sounds like quite the original premise.
Describing the show as "
Music Man meets
Urinetown," Jackson is downright exuberant: "The crowd went crazy and wild and I think this show is on it’s way to something big. You heard it here first. Or maybe you heard it on
Playbill or
Broadwayworld first, but you heard it here second if not first. So there....This is a gold mine."
Well, Corey, although stories on That's Andy were included in those various places, they escaped me. So in my book, I heard it from you first. Thanks for sharing! I'll be looking forward to That's Andy arriving on the Great White Way before the end of the year.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Annie, Beth Leavel, Blogs, Broadway, First Word On New Show, Lauren Kennedy, Musical, Reading, That's Andy, The Bullroar Report
