Q & A: 12/6/04
A: Michael Bennett's Broadway staging of Ballroom 1978 was a beauty, but the material wasn't quite strong enough to sustain the evening. It lasted only three months on Broadway, losing $3 million, which made it one of Broadway's costliest failures at the time.
In 1992, Ballroom received a major revision for a production in Long Beach, California, with Tyne Daly giving a wonderful performance in Loudon's role. Reverting to the title of the made-for-TV film source, Queen of the Stardust Ballroom, this Ballroom divided the score more evenly among the various characters, instead of having the entire score sung by only the heroine, Bea, and the bandstand singers, as in the Broadway version.
There was talk of this revision, perhaps with additional changes, being used as the basis for another production starring Chita Rivera, with Paper Mill Playhouse rumored as the possible venue. But nothing has come of this to date.
Q: During my first trip to New York in 1990, I saw Les Miserables and Cats. I immediately admired the former, but was baffled by the latter. Even as an easily impressed college student, I found Cats to be an odd, unengaging experience. I've seen many Broadway musicals since then, some better than others, but Cats remains the one show whose appeal I cannot grasp. Given that it had become a bit of a pop cultural joke by the time it closed, others obviously felt likewise.
What was the critical response when Cats opened? How did it go from international sensation at its opening to punchline by closing? What was your opinion of the show?---Nathan Joseph, Phoenix
A: Hard as it may be to realize, Cats was considered a daring show when it premiered in London in 1981 and on Broadway the following year. It was considered risky to attempt to make a musical from a collection of T.S. Eliot verses about various kinds of cats. The show's lack of plot as well as its use of dance and spectacle were considered innovative.
It's quite true that Cats became the butt of jokes during its eighteen-year Broadway run. It still is: Mario Cantone and Dame Edna both make jokes about it in their current solo shows. I've always suspected that Cats might have left Broadway as an admired show had it merely run three or four years.
It's also often forgotten that the New York production received mixed but generally praise-filled notices. In his New York Times review, Frank Rich wrote, "It's not that this collection of anthropomorphic variety turns is a brilliant musical or that it powerfully stirs the emotions or that it has an idea in its head....It's a musical that transports the audience into a complete fantasy world that could only exist in the theater and yet, these days, only rarely does. Whatever the other failings and excesses, even banalities, of Cats, it believes in purely theatrical magic, and on that faith it unquestionably delivers....What Cats does do is take us into a theater overflowing with wondrous spectacle---and that's an enchanting place to be."
In Newsweek, critic Jack Kroll wrote, "Cats is lots of fun, but it also echoes something of a great poet's vision of loss and mortality." In The Post, Clive Barnes called the show "a shattering triumph" for director Trevor Nunn and designer John Napier. Although he expressed reservations, he went on to describe the show as "a statement of musical theater that cannot be ignored, should prove controversial, and will never be forgotten." In the Daily News, critic Douglas Watt called it "as showy a show as one could wish for," but "overblown."
In New York Magazine, John Simon found much to admire, concluding by saying, "You may justly feel that it is slight and overblown....but you cannot help experiencing surges of childish jubilance, as cleverness after sleek cleverness rubs against your shins." And there were numerous other highly favorable reviews.
I found Cats impressive when I first saw it in 1981 in London, where the principals Elaine Paige, Paul Nicholas, Brian Blessed, Wayne Sleep were more distinctive than their New York counterparts, and the show was performed partly in the round, in a circus-like arena atmosphere that even included a section of seats that rotated during the overture. I never considered it a great musical, but admired it as a one-off, an unusual, original musical entertainment. And I thought that probably no other composer could have come up with so many enticing tunes for a show that was, after all, about nothing but various kinds of cats.
When it arrived at the Winter Garden in the fall of 1982, the show seeemd to have less heart, and its emphasis on spectacle made it seem cooler than in London, where the English accents helped what was, in fact, a very English piece. Still, the Broadway Cats had much to offer, and, tired as we all may be of it by now, the score remained highly inventive.
Q: I was able to obtain the Original London Cast LP recording of Company for $2.00. Ah! the joy of living in Los Angeles; one can get great buys on old Broadway cast albums in mint condition for almost nothing, as compared to Colony in New York. My question is: Larry Kert is singing Bobby on the album. Was this album totally re-recorded in London or were his tracks laid down in place of Dean Jones', still utilizing the other members' original Broadway cast tracks? It sounds incredible considering this was done years ago before all the new technical advances. Having listened to the original cast album hundreds of times, I was able to hear clarity & enunciation of lyrics I never had previously heard.---Steve Lieberman
A: Because Larry Kert took over from Dean Jones so early in the run of the Broadway Company, and because Kert went on to head the London company, Kert was deemed worthy of his own recording. But instead of an all-new, separate recording, Kert simply got to record his numbers over the pre-existing orchestral tracks from the Broadway recording. If you listen very closely, it's possible to still hear an echo of Dean Jones' voice here and there.
The tracks that don't involve Kert are exactly the same as those featured on the original Broadway cast recording. The only number that was newly recorded from scratch for the Kert release was "Barcelona," his duet with Susan Browning.
The Larry Kert Company was released in England during his run; some copies of the LP were billed as "cast recording," while others read "London cast recording," even though Kert was, of course, singing with the original New York cast on the LP. But it's also true that original Broadway cast members Teri Ralston, Donna McKechnie, Steve Elmore, Beth Howland, and Elaine Stritch repeated their roles in London, so the Broadway album was at least partly a London cast album, particularly with the addition of Kert.
Q: Ain't Misbehavin' was the best musical filmed for TV. Everyone was at their peak. Is there any talk about it coming to DVD? Also waiting for Inner City to make it to CD. I fondly remember this terrific show and have worn out my LP!---Sam Caponegro
A: I would certainly second your motion to get the television version of Ain't Misbehavin', which features the complete original Broadway cast, released on DVD. I believe it was briefly available commercially on VHS, but it deserves reissue, even if the TV version's cabaret setting removes some of the show's theatricality. Ain't Misbehavin' remains the best of the Broadway songbook revues.
As for Inner City, you are not its only admirer. I was never partial to it, but I have received letters from other readers who are big fans of that score.
Q: Is there still talk of a revival of Dreamgirls coming to Broadway soon? Do you think a Broadway revival is a good idea?---Negley3
A: Yes, I do believe that a revival of Dreamgirls is still planned, with Jerry Mitchell the potential stager. I think Dreamgirls is one of the strongest musicals of the past twenty-five years, one that will hold up well in revival. The problem is that a great deal of its strength was derived from its original Michael Bennett/Michael Peters staging, and its original design. Few revivals these days are content to copy the original, but without doing so, Dreamgirls might not seem as dazzling. I suspect that at least some of the original concept and staging will be repeated in the revival.
Q: A few years ago, I remember that Andrew Lloyd Webber was planning to do a sequel to The Phantom of the Opera, taking its basis from a book by Frederick Forsythe called The Phantom of Manhattan. That never materialised, but I was wondering, if the movie is a success, do you think there's a possibility that there may be a film sequel? True, musical sequels have almost never been successful, what with Annie Warbucks and Bring Back Birdie on stage and Grease 2 and Funny Lady on film. But there's always the possibility, plus, I myself found Frederick Forsythe's book quite entertaining, and the song that was supposed to be in it that Kiri Te Kanawa sang at his 50th birthday celebration quite lovely.---John Curtis
A: I for one was delighted when the notion of a stage sequel to Phantom of the Opera was abandoned. Why try to follow up a uniquely successful piece of musical theatre with a sequel that could very well have fallen considerably short? But if the Phantom film should prove a smash, it might encourage a film version of the Forsythe novel to which you refer, although it could wind up as a non-musical adaptation.
A note on the Phantom sequel song sung by Kiri Te Kanawa at that Lloyd Webber gala: Its melody was recycled in Lloyd Webber's The Beautiful Game, while its title "The Heart Is Slow to Learn" was recycled by Don Black in Broadway's Dracula.
Q: I was just wondering if you think that Twelve Angry Men, which has never been presented on Broadway before, will be considered a new play or a revival come Tony time.---Joseph M.
A: I don't believe that the stage version of Twelve Angry Men has ever had a major professional production in New York. But because the piece dates back to a '50s television play and because it's so familiar from two subsequent film versions, I would assume that Twelve Angry Men ranks as a classic work that would qualify the Roundabout's production as a revival.
It's a busy season for straight-play revivals, what with Reckless, After the Fall, Sight Unseen, 'Night Mother, The Rivals, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Glass Menagerie, Glengarry Glen Ross, American Buffalo, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, On Golden Pond, Julius Caesar, and Barefoot in the Park. But at this admittedly early juncture, Twelve Angry Men is the one to beat at Tony time.
Q: Can you tell me all of the theatres the original production of Grease played in New York?---Colin Bennett
A: Grease opened in New York at off-Broadway's Eden Theatre on Second Avenue in February 1972. In June of that year, it transferred uptown to Broadway, to the Broadhurst Theatre. In November of the same year, it moved around the corner to the Royale, where it remained for eight years. Then in February 1980, Grease moved around the corner again, this time to the Majestic, where it played two months before closing.
Q: Was the Broadway cast album of Greenwillow originally on RCA or Columbia? I have seen two different editions of the LP.---Stephen Ross
A: As I understand it, Columbia was to have recorded Frank Loesser's 1960 Broadway musical Greenwillow. But it seems that Columbia passed on doing it, so the recording moved over to RCA Victor, which was Greenwillow's original label.
RCA's LP went out of print, but sometime later, Greenwillow was reissued on LP on the Columbia Special Products label. The subsequent CD of Greenwillow is on DRG.
Q: Can you tell me anything about the show How Do You Do, I Love You, which I vaguely recall seeing in stock in the '60s?---Ed Moore
A: Perhaps ahead of its time with its subject matter, computer dating, How Do You Do, I Love You had a stock tryout at the Westbury Music Fair in Long Island in 1967, and may have played other theatres in the Guber-Gross stock chain. The score was by Richard Maltby, Jr. and David Shire, the book by Michael Stewart. Phyllis Newman and Carole Cook had leading roles. Three of the songs from the show -"One Step," "Just Across the River," "Pleased With Myself"--- were heard in the Maltby-Shire revue Starting Here, Starting Now.