The Other End of the Spectrum

While driving through the streets of LA last week on our way to Legally Blonde, I was reminded of another show I saw in the area, nearly a year ago. It was a play, and about as far from my Legally Blonde experience as you can get.

First, a bit of background info: When I was in London in 2007, I took a course on British Theater, and one of the plays we read was Crave, by Sarah Kane. Skip forward one year, we’re all back at our school in Malibu, and one of my fellow Londoners discovered that Crave was playing in a small theater in LA. Although reading the play utterly confused me, I thought it’d be interesting to see performed. All in all, six of us decided to go.

Despite instructions from our GPS system - or perhaps because of them - we ended up completely lost trying to find the theater. Turns out the address we had written down was slightly incorrect, and we had to call someone back on campus to get online and get us the right one. Then when we were finally going the right way, we hit traffic. Perfect.

Our group was in two cars, and the car I wasn’t in arrived at the theater first. Upon hearing we were still on our way, the theater waited for us to arrive before they started. I think my car finally arrived around 20 minutes late, by which point they’d decided to start without us, but just barely; we only missed a minute or two.

As we took our seats, it was quickly clear why they’d been so kind to wait for us: Our group of 6 made up two-thirds of the audience. Although it looked like the theater could hold up to 25 (five rows of five seats each), the only other people there were an older couple, and a young man (who we later found out was a friend of one of the actresses).

Turns out, seeing Crave on stage helped in no way with my understanding of the material. It didn’t help that they used the simplest staging possible - each character sat on a box, looking straight at the audience the whole time. (For comparison, my professor in London said the best production he’s seen involved the four characters packing up an apartment and moving out the boxes.) At times I actually felt like laughing at the absurdness of it all, but I held it in; even though I was in the back row, I was pretty sure the actors could see me just fine. But despite my thoughts on the source material itself, I had to admit the actors were very talented.

When I look back on that night, I don’t think specifically of the performance itself, but rather the overall experience. After becoming accustomed to seeing the big-budget hits on the West End, it was a reminder that there’s still more out there. Often I’m guilty paying attention only to the shows with big theaters and lots of awards, but there’s still a lot of quality theater beyond that if you look a little deeper.

Review - Legally Blonde

The Pantages is pink.

Well, not entirely. It’s decorated with pink banners and posters, and only through September 6th. And after seeing Wicked at the Pantages seven times, I thought for sure it’d feel somewhat strange to be there for Legally Blonde instead. Surpringly, it wasn’t. That might actually be because I’ve always considered the Apollo Victoria in London my true Wicked home, but that’s another blog within itself.

So Friday night I went to see the Legally Blonde tour, with my two sisters and a friend. My friend is very much into musicals, my sisters not so much (though this was one they wanted to see, as opposed to being dragged along). Our seats were near the back of the mezzanine, giving us a nice overall view, but we were just too far back to see facial expressions.

Had I not known that the tour sets were scaled down from Broadway, I probably would have been perfectly happy with them. However, having seen the MTV airing, I couldn’t help but miss the giant sorority house in the opening, and nit-pick the other changes. When I asked my sisters what they thought of the sets (simply curious about their opinions as non-theater-goers, and completely forgetting that they helped to build sets at our college last year), they said the jail was amazing, but weren’t very impressed by the rest.

I found Becky Gulsvig very believable as Elle, in a way that I was never quite convinced with Laura Bell Bundy (perhaps because Becky looks so much more like Reese Witherspoon). But I had a love-hate relationship with her voice: It’s very high pitched, and at times almost nasally. Sometimes it fit the character well, yet other times was borderline annoying. I would love to see the show again, with a much closer seat, to get a better grip on the nuances of her portrayal.

I didn’t leave the theater with strong feelings one way or the other regarding D.B. Bonds or Megan Lewis, who play Emmett and Vivienne, respectively. I have no complaints on either of their performances, but they didn’t stand out either. On one hand, I feel sitting closer (and thus seeing facial expressions) could have made a big difference. But I don’t want to blame it entirely on our seats, as I was sitting in the back row of the mezzanine the one and only time I saw Caissie Levy as Elphaba, who subsequently became one of my favorites.

While I thought Natalie Joy Johnson was an excellent Enid in the original Broadway cast, I was less than satisfied with her Paulette. I found her portrayal closer to Paulette in the movie, which I understand that some may prefer, but I missed Orfeh. Natalie was timid and awkward, as opposed to Orfeh’s loud and spunky, which I feel helps make the character more engaging. “Ireland” is one of my favorites on the cast recording, but Friday night I was left under-whelmed.

The surprising standout was Jeff McLean as Warner. I’ve never especially enjoyed “Serious,” but with him singing I was disappointed when the song ended! Absolutely amazing. Not only does he have a gorgeous voice, but the subtle riffs he was including made it even better. At intermission my sisters asked me if “Warner” had anymore songs, because they wanted to hear him again! And when we met him afterward at stage door, it went something like this:

Me: “You’ve got a really good voice.”
Sister #1: “Like, an amazing voice.”
Sister #2: “Like, you were one of the best ones in the show.”
Jeff: *something along the lines of a very flattered thank you*

All in all it was an enjoyable night at the theater. It may not be a groundbreaking show, but it’s fun, with some catchy songs to boot.

And now I’m off to return to that “rich romantic planet,” more commonly known as Malibu. Three years of school there, and I’ve yet to find riches or romance. Wish my luck for my final semester!

"A Very Potter Musical" is Totally Awesome

I've been a Harry Potter fan since 1999. The word "fan" doesn't really cover it, but somehow the Harry Potter fandom still hasn't come up with a collective name for its members (a la "Trekkies" or "Rentheads"). I have full Gryffindor robes, went to the midnight releases, and bought everything from the socks to the trading cards. While I still love the books dearly, my obsessiveness began to move to the back burner in 2007, once the final book was released and I discovered Wicked.

So when I heard some college kids wrote a Harry Potter musical and put it on youtube, I was intrigued. How do you fit the seven book series into a single musical, especially considering the seventh book is being split into two movies?

The (perhaps, obvious) answer: You don't. Instead they molded together storylines from throughout the series, especially focusing on books 1, 4, and 7. And how to prevent the obsessive fans from nit-picking everything that differs from the books? Make it a parody!

"Harry Potter: The Musical," as it was originally titled, was uploaded to youtube so the friends and family of the cast could watch. But it wasn't long before thousands of Harry Potter fans all over the world were watching, and loving every second. Fearing the wrath of Warner Brothers, the creators removed and reuploaded the show as "A Very Potter Musical" - now with improved video quality, but lacking many of the dirtier jokes.

Admittedly, it took me some time to make it through the musical, which is split into 23 videos (and clocks in at a whopping 2 hours, 46 minutes). This was partly due to a lack of time, and partly due to me getting distracted between videos.

I found the real strengths of the show to be in the book and casting. The writers did an extremely good job of merging over 4,000 pages into a single storyline, keeping it entertaining, and still original.

Some of my favorite lines were those which poked fun directly at the series itself, such as when the characters were discussing where to search for horcruxes:

Hermione: Or it could be hidden somewhere around the mundane British countryside. Our search could entail months of depressive camping, breaking into Gringotts, and drinking boatloads of Polyjuice Potion.

Harry: Well the medallion says that's dumb, so we're not gonna do that.

Regarding the cast, in an ingenious move Lauren Lopez was cast as Draco, stealing each scene she appeared in. Bonnie Gruesen's Hermione is spot-on perfect (and she has the bushy hair!), and Joe Walker brought a humanizing side to Voldemort while still keeping him evil. Darren Criss starred as the totally awesome, guitar playing, Harry, while Joey Richter ate his way through the show as Ron.

The songs for the most part were well done, especially considering they were all written within about a two week time span. "Get Back to Hogwarts" and "Granger Danger" are both surprisingly catchy - I've had both of them stuck in my head the past few days. Another of my favorites, "Voldemort is Going Down," was taught to the cast only a day before opening.

It's a shame that if an official Harry Potter musical is ever produced, it won't be this one. Although it's not perfect, I can't imagine a better way to approach the project. Seeing as it's unlikely to be performed again (many of the cast has now graduated, and the music was never written out), thank Merlin for youtube.

Icon credit to dancingraphics on livejournal

Review - The Light in the Piazza

Last month I had the pleasure of seeing a production of The Light in the Piazza, at El Portal Theater in North Hollywood. I knew very little about the show beforehand - I’d glanced at its wikipedia page, and knew that the cast recording was highly praised.

The first thing that struck me upon entering was the small size of the theater; the circular stage was halfway surrounded by a mere three rows of seats. But I quickly learned that the small-scale sets were in no way reflective of small-scale performances.

Stephanie Wall did a great job of portraying Clara’s innocence, slowly showing more layers as time progressed, and has a beautiful voice. She is currently performing at Disneyland’s California Adventures in both High School Musical 3 and Playhouse Disney, but I’m looking forward to seeing what future theater projects she takes on.

Blake McIver Ewing had the double duty of acting as Fabrizio as well as the Executive Producer. He’s come a long way from his days as a child actor (he was Waldo in The Little Rascals, and Michelle’s friend Derek in Full House; having watched both in my childhood, I was secretly thrilled), and has a surprisingly strong voice as well.

The remaining company, including Mary Donnelly Haskell as Margaret Johnson, was well cast, with no visible weaknesses. My only, small, complaint for the production was due to how the seats surrounded the stage, sightlines couldn’t always allow for everyone to see the main action. It wasn’t often a problem for me, but the issue did come up a few times.

Despite the great cast, and beautiful songs, I left not quite sure what to think of the musical. The most climactic came near the end of act 1, and there was no real climax to lead into the end of the second act. I was left with no sense closure, and while sometimes open endings work well, in this case to me it felt more like a quick attempt to wrap things up.

Performances ran from July 10 - 26, but when I met Stephanie after the show she said they're hoping to have another run sometime in the fall, so anyone who's interested should keep an eye on the theater's website for updates. Though I wasn't satisfied with the ending, I'd still see the show again, especially if it was with this same cast.

For fun, you can watch Stephanie performing in High School Musical 2 at California Adventures here on youtube.

And you can watch Blake singing L-O-V-E in The Little Rascals here on youtube, starting at about 4:00.

Welcome to Broadway Unlimited!

When I was 5, my favorite movie was The Sound of Music.

I didn't fully understand all of the political details, but I loved it anyway. As I was the same age as Gretl, she was my favorite of the children. I would march around as she did, say her lines with her, sing along. Once I even built a barrier of sorts in the living room, piling objects on top of each other (only adding to the wall when Gretl wasn't in the current scene, of course), so I'd have something to hide behind when the von Trapps are hiding in the cemetery.

For years that was the extent of my interest in musicals. I saw other movie-musicals, and a few amateur productions, but nothing especially stood out. The only professional show my parents took me to was Cats, sometime in high school. I generally have a pretty good memory, but it made such a little impression on me that I can't even remember for sure what year that was.

And then starting in September 2007, I studied abroad in London for two semesters. When I arrived, I knew nothing about the West End, or London's theater repuation. By the time I left, I'd seen Wicked 5 times, Les Miserables, Rent Remixed, The Lion King, Mary Poppins, Billy Elliot, and We Will Rock You.

I'd found a new love.

Since then I've tried to see shows that come through LA. I returned to London this past summer for two months to complete a journalism internship, and while there I saw as many musicals as I could. After I graduate from college, I'd like to be a theater journalist.

And that's where this blog comes in. I figured I might as well get the ball rolling, and gain some experience with writing about theater. I'm still a novice to the world of musicals, but I'll be using this blog to share my thoughts and opinions, and reviews of any shows I'm lucky enough to see. It won't be limited strictly to Broadway, but will extend to anything theater-related. If you have any responses to anything you read on here, I'd love to hear them!

It took me 15 years to make the leap from singing along with "Do-Re-Mi" to being amazed while viewing a live musical. While I wish it hadn't taken me as long, I'm glad I've made it.