Okay, Sweeney Todd.
Apr. 9th, 2017 11:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deadlightsgirlThis is as good a topic as any to start off my relationship with Dreamwidth (thank you R for helping me do the thing and move over here). I don't know how often I'll be arsed to actually post, but better here than LJ. Okay, so Sweeney Todd (the interactive one currently running off-Broadway) - thoughts in no particular order. Remember, this is me being a big persnickety snob, as I unashamedly am regarding this show.
I liked this production, and thought it was fun. Overall. It is a cute premise to have Sweeney Todd up in your face, and the meat pies were yummy (Gracie VASTLY approved of the mashed potatoes). If you have a bad back, bad joints, or are uncomfortable sitting without back support, this is NOT the production for you, though. We sat up in the mezzanine, so we had fewer actors in our space, and I kind of appreciated that, tbh (they did occasionally send someone upstairs to visit us - most of the time, it was the terribly pregnant Betsy Morgan, who not only gets mad props for NOT sounding like Darth Vader the way I did when I was pregnant and tried to sing, but easily had the most physical job to do, playing both the Beggar Woman and Pirelli, thus getting killed twice). I kept thinking that I, the afraid-of-heights person, would have lasted about five minutes in this production, with all the standing on chairs, walking on narrow tables, and most of that in relatively dim light. The whole beginning of the show, I kept thinking "attend the tale of ENORMOUS FIRE HAZARD", since a lot of it is lit mostly by candlelight. Presumably, they had many many fire extinguishers hidden everywhere.
I thought that having such a small cast would thin out the score, and was pleasantly surprised that this was not the case. That said, the musical director made some REALLY weird choices here and there, having actors NOT crescendo in places where they obviously needed to, and making some weird-ass cuts. Cutting a verse of "Priest" for no reason? WTF? Having the letter read, not sung, especially in such a perfect environment for the letter to be done properly? NO. I could accept the cutting of most of "City on Fire" in such a small space, with such a small cast - but the other cuts? Why? And they left in the Judge's song, which I respect on principle since it never gets done, but sadly, this was the most jolly, least creepy Judge I have ever seen in my life. Like, don't do the song if you're not going to do it justice, and he really didn't. Alex kept equating him to Kazran Sardik - or, for you non-Whovians, I kept thinking, shouldn't you be off playing Ben Franklin in 1776 somewhere? He was just so very jolly. Nice voice, but very jolly.
Sweeney was okay. He was more shouty than I like, and he kept making these dramatic pauses at big moments that went on WAY too long (seriously, like freeze-frames, if this had been on video, I would have thought the video had frozen), and he was so busy connecting with the audience that he and Mrs Lovett didn't connect with each other AT ALL. They didn't do the pose at the end of act 1, and they needed to - it was clear that the director wanted to find a way to do it without the iconic pose, but dude - unless you have something really relevant to replace it, you leave the fucking pose (ask me some time about the Sweeney/Mrs L relationship I want to see, that plays up the sex as well as the violence, since they are banging each other by act 2, so "Priest" really should be foreplay, and this way, you can totally replace the pose). Re Mrs Lovett - I wanted to like her, I really did. Yes, I am even more persnickety about this role than I am about the rest of the show, but I really tried. It didn't help her any that her voice was trashed, and she was struggling vocally the whole time (DON'T BELT THE WHOLE ROLE, BABE) - I could tell that she had spent way too much time belting, and was now paying for it with lack of head voice, and her problem was that a lot of the role sat right on her break, and if you aren't really using your transfer the way Angela did, it isn't going to work (and I still want to punch Patti Lupone in the head for making people think that Mrs Lovett is a belter role, when SHE IS NOT, LISTEN TO THE MUSIC, IT IS MEANT TO CHANGE AND VARY, FFS. Vocally aside...she was basically all schtick, and no substance - full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. This works if you are in a penny dreadful where no one is expecting the characters to have any depth, but Sweeney has real characters, with real intentions, who need to be more than simply surface. And the fact that she wasn't like this was even more noticeable when this Johanna was fucking AMAZING, and acting her ass off, and not in the caricature way she is normally played by actresses who make the effort - Alex Finke made her a real person (and hers was the perfect soprano voice - not too sweet, not too shrill). Never in my life would I ever have thought that the actors I wanted to stagedoor and tweet later to praise would be the Anthony and Johanna, but there you go (Gracie is also madly in love with Matt Doyle, who in my opinion is an absolutely worthy first actor-crush - he shook her hand and introduced himself afterwards, and she floated home, giggling like Marcia Brady when she met Davy Jones). Just blown away by those two, especially her.
The staging and the direction started out as very clever (silverware percussion was kind of cool at first), but in act 2, it began to deteriorate from "cool and conceptual" into "community theatre using a church basement". I honestly have no idea exactly how Mrs Lovett was actually killed, since they had previously established the ovens as being in one place, and then when he killed her, it was somewhere else. The set also had Sweeney facing upstage for really important bits like the Lucy reveal and his own death (WEAK) - and he kept leaving the stage during "Johanna" (act 2), so some of his lines were lost. He was definitely scarey when he wanted to be - him coming for Johanna at the end when she's in disguise was awesome. The steam whistle was used too much, and in weird places - and NOT when Sweeney was killed. They also cut the part with Tobias and the meat grinder (where he finds the fingernail etc), and without knowing that he sees the freshly-killed Beadle etc, him going crazy at the end didn't really make sense. MASSIVE props to the fight director - all the violence was EXCELLENT. Mrs Lovett finishing off the Judge by choking him? Pirelli being knocked out by headslams on one of the tables? Yes please.
I think I may be running out of thoughts now, or just getting bored. Again, it was a fun production, and will probably be even better with the new 2 leads (Norm Lewis!). Go see it if you can.
I liked this production, and thought it was fun. Overall. It is a cute premise to have Sweeney Todd up in your face, and the meat pies were yummy (Gracie VASTLY approved of the mashed potatoes). If you have a bad back, bad joints, or are uncomfortable sitting without back support, this is NOT the production for you, though. We sat up in the mezzanine, so we had fewer actors in our space, and I kind of appreciated that, tbh (they did occasionally send someone upstairs to visit us - most of the time, it was the terribly pregnant Betsy Morgan, who not only gets mad props for NOT sounding like Darth Vader the way I did when I was pregnant and tried to sing, but easily had the most physical job to do, playing both the Beggar Woman and Pirelli, thus getting killed twice). I kept thinking that I, the afraid-of-heights person, would have lasted about five minutes in this production, with all the standing on chairs, walking on narrow tables, and most of that in relatively dim light. The whole beginning of the show, I kept thinking "attend the tale of ENORMOUS FIRE HAZARD", since a lot of it is lit mostly by candlelight. Presumably, they had many many fire extinguishers hidden everywhere.
I thought that having such a small cast would thin out the score, and was pleasantly surprised that this was not the case. That said, the musical director made some REALLY weird choices here and there, having actors NOT crescendo in places where they obviously needed to, and making some weird-ass cuts. Cutting a verse of "Priest" for no reason? WTF? Having the letter read, not sung, especially in such a perfect environment for the letter to be done properly? NO. I could accept the cutting of most of "City on Fire" in such a small space, with such a small cast - but the other cuts? Why? And they left in the Judge's song, which I respect on principle since it never gets done, but sadly, this was the most jolly, least creepy Judge I have ever seen in my life. Like, don't do the song if you're not going to do it justice, and he really didn't. Alex kept equating him to Kazran Sardik - or, for you non-Whovians, I kept thinking, shouldn't you be off playing Ben Franklin in 1776 somewhere? He was just so very jolly. Nice voice, but very jolly.
Sweeney was okay. He was more shouty than I like, and he kept making these dramatic pauses at big moments that went on WAY too long (seriously, like freeze-frames, if this had been on video, I would have thought the video had frozen), and he was so busy connecting with the audience that he and Mrs Lovett didn't connect with each other AT ALL. They didn't do the pose at the end of act 1, and they needed to - it was clear that the director wanted to find a way to do it without the iconic pose, but dude - unless you have something really relevant to replace it, you leave the fucking pose (ask me some time about the Sweeney/Mrs L relationship I want to see, that plays up the sex as well as the violence, since they are banging each other by act 2, so "Priest" really should be foreplay, and this way, you can totally replace the pose). Re Mrs Lovett - I wanted to like her, I really did. Yes, I am even more persnickety about this role than I am about the rest of the show, but I really tried. It didn't help her any that her voice was trashed, and she was struggling vocally the whole time (DON'T BELT THE WHOLE ROLE, BABE) - I could tell that she had spent way too much time belting, and was now paying for it with lack of head voice, and her problem was that a lot of the role sat right on her break, and if you aren't really using your transfer the way Angela did, it isn't going to work (and I still want to punch Patti Lupone in the head for making people think that Mrs Lovett is a belter role, when SHE IS NOT, LISTEN TO THE MUSIC, IT IS MEANT TO CHANGE AND VARY, FFS. Vocally aside...she was basically all schtick, and no substance - full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. This works if you are in a penny dreadful where no one is expecting the characters to have any depth, but Sweeney has real characters, with real intentions, who need to be more than simply surface. And the fact that she wasn't like this was even more noticeable when this Johanna was fucking AMAZING, and acting her ass off, and not in the caricature way she is normally played by actresses who make the effort - Alex Finke made her a real person (and hers was the perfect soprano voice - not too sweet, not too shrill). Never in my life would I ever have thought that the actors I wanted to stagedoor and tweet later to praise would be the Anthony and Johanna, but there you go (Gracie is also madly in love with Matt Doyle, who in my opinion is an absolutely worthy first actor-crush - he shook her hand and introduced himself afterwards, and she floated home, giggling like Marcia Brady when she met Davy Jones). Just blown away by those two, especially her.
The staging and the direction started out as very clever (silverware percussion was kind of cool at first), but in act 2, it began to deteriorate from "cool and conceptual" into "community theatre using a church basement". I honestly have no idea exactly how Mrs Lovett was actually killed, since they had previously established the ovens as being in one place, and then when he killed her, it was somewhere else. The set also had Sweeney facing upstage for really important bits like the Lucy reveal and his own death (WEAK) - and he kept leaving the stage during "Johanna" (act 2), so some of his lines were lost. He was definitely scarey when he wanted to be - him coming for Johanna at the end when she's in disguise was awesome. The steam whistle was used too much, and in weird places - and NOT when Sweeney was killed. They also cut the part with Tobias and the meat grinder (where he finds the fingernail etc), and without knowing that he sees the freshly-killed Beadle etc, him going crazy at the end didn't really make sense. MASSIVE props to the fight director - all the violence was EXCELLENT. Mrs Lovett finishing off the Judge by choking him? Pirelli being knocked out by headslams on one of the tables? Yes please.
I think I may be running out of thoughts now, or just getting bored. Again, it was a fun production, and will probably be even better with the new 2 leads (Norm Lewis!). Go see it if you can.
