Tag Archives: Broadway

Fleeting: 2012 Tonys (Peter and the Starcatcher)

Last I went to New York City I saw several shows:
– Disney’s the Newsies
– Once the Musical
– Sleep No More (twice)

One show that I was cautiously interested in seeing but unable to do to time was Peter and the Starcatcher. Being a fan of fairytales and stories of the like it was natural for me to be interested in J M Barrie‘s Peter Pan, but the possibility of a prequel kind makes me uneasy. Prequels and sequels tend to make me uneasy because they could be done really poorly. Still, there was a lot of buzz surrounding the book series written by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson.

Turns out I probably should have seen the play because they were nominated for quite a few awards and ended up winning the following.
– Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play: Christian Borle
– Best Scenic Design of a Play: Donyale Werle
– Best Costume Design of a Play: Paloma Young
– Best Lighting Design of a Play: Jeff Croiter
– Best Sound Design of a Play: Darron L West

Peter and the Starcatchers got its start at the New York Theatre Workshop with some of the same cast as the Broadway show.

One of the reasons that drew me to this production was Christian Borle as the Black Stache who eventually becomes Captain Hook. I absolutely loved Christian in Legally Blonde the Musical where he played Emmett Forrest, Elle Woods’ graduate student mentor. He brought so many new nuances into the roll and as Laura Bell Bundy would say later:

He made lines funny that weren’t suppose to be funny!

Yes, he’s that talented. And now with a career in television on the NBC primetime show Smash, Christian is on his way to strengthening his acting career.

What has been a rising trend, plays now are featuring orchestrations as well as songs as opposed to being a purely straight play. Some other plays that have featured some music include:
– One Man, Two Guvnors
– Enron
– Fences
– The Coast of Utopia
Now Peter and the Starcatcher is also a part of that list… as the lines between a play and musical are being blurred, entertainment is constantly evolving. Considering the bits of comedy that the script and story lends itself too, it would be a bloody shame if there was no music whatsoever. So if I make it to New York City again sometime in the near future you can bet I’m going to be making a trip to see Peter and the Starcatcher this time.

Fleeting: 2012 Tonys (Once and Newsies)

The 2012 Tony Awards aired… I was excited this time around because two of the shows with a lot of buzz were coming in with quite a few nominations: Once and Newsies, both of which I saw on my last trip to NYC. The only major similarity is that both are based off of movies of the same name, both are special in different ways.

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SPOILERS: Disney’s the Newsies the Musical

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There have been a lot of questions swirling about in regards to the changes between the original Disney film the Newsies and the stage musical production of the same name.

In my original review I made a point of glossing over any major plot / character changes that may reveal too much of what is going to happen in the stage production. However, I am sure that there are people out there that are curious about what changes were made in the musical and how was the storyline changed.

Well I am posting that for you… mind you this is a SPOILER and all bits about the changes in the show will be just beyond the break. You enter at your own risk and as thus you cannot blame me for spoiling the musical for you.

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Review: Disney’s the Newsies, the Musical – Original Broadway Production

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When The Newsies first came out to movie theaters in 1992, it was well known as a massive financial and commercial flop. The star of the movie, Christian Bale, was said to have hated the movie so much that he reportedly wouldn’t talk or even acknowledge its existence in his acting career (but between you and me Christian should thank his lucky stars that the Newsies was a flop otherwise it wouldn’t have given him the drive to improve himself as an actor and therefore be an Oscar winner today – but that’s a different story).

Fast forward a couple of decades and the Newsies became a massive cult classic… what started as a flop in movie theaters across the country became a cult classic when put on VHS and DVD (I know I’m guilty of that). So when it came out that Disney Theatrical was working on a musical version of the beloved movie, the general consensus was cautiously positive and with just cause because the movie did not do well how would a stage production fare?

So Disney got smart, they tested the show out of town to positive reviews, reworked a few things here and there and brought it to Broadway on a limited but open ended engagement. Next thing you know it has been a packed house ever since.

Being a Newsies fan I was intrigued with the concept of the stage production and so far liked what I saw. However, knowing that some pieces of the storytelling got changed or rearranged, songs got cut others got added in, I was reasonably apprehensive. Was Disney selling out the integrity of the story in favor of catering to a larger audience? I didn’t quite know what to think, so originally I decided to wait until the soundtrack came out to make my decision of whether to see the show live or not… originally.

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