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Post by Deleted on Jul 14, 2017 15:24:09 GMT
I really really liked this, its main flaw was the staging. The train was brilliant but the rest of the projections just didnt work, at best looked flat, at worst were laughable ( i still cant believe anyone thought the running upstairs was a good idea). It needed a more atmospheric gothic type staging.
The other issue was the story, despite their best efforts the two woman never really looked like eachother and the mystery element was never quite there.
Great cast, shame Martin Crewes didnt do more west end work
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Post by steve10086 on Jul 14, 2017 15:35:05 GMT
The story was awful. As has been mentioned, screaming "I have a secret" over and over again during a show gets very boring - to the point where you no longer care about the bloody secret and just wish someone would shut her up!
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Post by ptwest on Jul 14, 2017 16:50:47 GMT
There are some good melodies in there, but the saving grace of the original cast was it was so well sung - the leads (excepting Crawford who could barely do anything other than phone it in under that huge suit) were absolutely exceptional. Broadway abridged did a good job on this : www.broadwayabridged.com/scripts/womaninwhite.html |
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Post by notmymuse on Jul 14, 2017 17:02:04 GMT
I'm in the minority on this one, but I loved the original version. Going to see it is one of my fondest theatre-memories; I loved the projections; and I think it's one of his strongest scores. The voices on the cast recording aren't my favourite, with the exception of the young evil dude (whatever his name was) but it's a great score.
And Thom is usually great at this kind of small-scale re-invention of musicals, so I'm there. And I'd put money on Pitt-Pulford starring (do she and Thom still share a flat? They at least used to and she's starred in probably half of all of his output in recent years).
In totally unrelated Thom Southerland news, when I saw Umbrellas of Cherbourg years ago, he sat in front of me. He has a big head and is very tall and so totally blocked my view. Which wasn't a problem as it wasn't the best show...
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Post by showbizkid on Jul 14, 2017 17:46:01 GMT
Hahahaa I hated this musical too. I blagged my way in to the opening night party at the limelight pub/church across the street and got wasted with Hasslehoff, Madaline Lloyd Webber and others. It IS the worst show Andrew ever wrote. He famously said before he wish he hadn't written it and wanted to keep busy. That said I have booked again and look forward to seeing Tom Sutherland version no doubt with wheeled scenery!
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Post by Deleted on Jul 14, 2017 18:21:14 GMT
Just booked so I can tick another ALW musical off the list and another London theatre I've not visited.
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Post by ali973 on Jul 14, 2017 19:25:11 GMT
Does anyone know where I can get the libretto for the show? I have a project I'm working on and would need it as a reference.
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2,677 posts
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Post by viserys on Jul 14, 2017 19:33:23 GMT
The full libretto was included in the 2-CD-Set...
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Post by mrbarnaby on Jul 14, 2017 21:42:20 GMT
Maria Friedman sounded like a cat being strangled and ALW took a great atmospheric novel and ruined it. The design absolutely sank the show.
Kind of intrigued to see a new version of it, it can't be worse.. can it?
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Post by steve10086 on Jul 14, 2017 22:18:14 GMT
Kind of intrigued to see a new version of it, it can't be worse.. can it? Well that is the million dollar question! Can't wait to find out. |
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Post by Phantom of London on Jul 15, 2017 0:20:30 GMT
Hahahaa I hated this musical too. I blagged my way in to the opening night party at the limelight pub/church across the street and got wasted with Hasslehoff, Madaline Lloyd Webber and others. It IS the worst show Andrew ever wrote. He famously said before he wish he hadn't written it and wanted to keep busy. That said I have booked again and look forward to seeing Tom Sutherland version no doubt with wheeled scenery! Andrew does what he does best and dismisses his latest flop, to promote the next. Maria Friedman sounded like a cat being strangled and ALW took a great atmospheric novel and ruined it. The design absolutely sank the show. Kind of intrigued to see a new version of it, it can't be worse.. can it? In fairness Maria Friedman got rave reviews in New York and was desperately sad she got diagnosed with breast cancer whilst there. Lets call it for what it is and the book has been bastardised for a modern audience and was an epic fail, it moved away from Wilkie Collins novel, there was no fight between Walter and Glyde at the end, Glyde doesn't run in a tunnel and gets killed by a train, it finishes more innocent than that Glyde dies in a house fire, when it is discovered he is illegitimate and wasn't entitled to inherit the property (Limmerige) or the title, the book focused more on the absolute shame of using a title when not entitled (wonderful lyric there, Zippel). Both book does capture well and the musical succeeds here in highlighting the plight of Victoran women and if your husband was titled, he could have you committed to a mental asylum on the most spurious and ridiculous evidence, so it is a sociology lesson, the same mould Charles Dickens was. I agree the St James would be a better theatre to stage this, not only is the Charing Cross Theatre a dump, it has no wing space or fly space and ultimately no where to put the orchestra, so the set designer definitely got thee work carried out. |
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Post by chernjam on Jul 15, 2017 3:45:08 GMT
I saw this twice in NY... There was some beautiful music in there (Trying not to notice to me is the most beautiful) and Friedman was phenomenal (her All for Laura where she held the high note brought a huge ovation both times I saw it) That being said, the story was amazingly clunky. If I remember correctly they changed the ending several times here and in London - musically and dramatically - even up till the last month. Obviously they recognized there were issues that they weren't able to fix. The sets - well they were kind of weird at first, but I thought some of the criticisms were overblown. And it amazes me how ever since, so many shows have followed suit using projections in their productions. I wish I could find the interview where ALW said he thought the show didn't work because in the end no one cared about the story.  |
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Post by anthony40 on Jul 15, 2017 7:17:57 GMT
I wonder if they'll have to audition rats.
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Post by mallardo on Jul 15, 2017 10:54:34 GMT
I still think it's one of ALW's best scores. I agree with Chernjam, above, that Trying Not To Notice is absolutely exquisite. When I saw it I was seated up in the gods and that was actually a great place to take in all the projections - they played well from up there - so I had no problems with a production which felt spooky and appropriate.
I caught the second cast with Ruthie Henshall as Marion and Damian Humbly as Walter and both were wonderful. Yes, the story itself is a tad clunky and David Zippel's lyrics were, at times, too clever by half, but I thought it all worked. It seems the show's negative reputation - as reflected here - is something that has grown up in retrospect since its New York failure. As I recall it was pretty well thought of while it was running in the West End.
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Post by steve10086 on Jul 15, 2017 12:27:11 GMT
It seems the show's negative reputation - as reflected here - is something that has grown up in retrospect since its New York failure. As I recall it was pretty well thought of while it was running in the West End. I can assure you the name "The Woman in Sh*te" was coined long before it got to Broadway. |
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Post by mallardo on Jul 15, 2017 13:19:23 GMT
It seems the show's negative reputation - as reflected here - is something that has grown up in retrospect since its New York failure. As I recall it was pretty well thought of while it was running in the West End. I can assure you the name "The Woman in Sh*te" was coined long before it got to Broadway.
Of course there are always detractors, especially with an ALW show, but - just from memory - the reviews were generally decent and the show was pretty well received. It would never have transferred to Broadway otherwise.
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Post by steve10086 on Jul 15, 2017 13:27:03 GMT
It ran about a year and a half and they constantly fiddled with the story throughout that time. I really don't remember it being that popular.
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Post by showtoones on Jul 15, 2017 16:21:22 GMT
I may be mistaken but if I remember correctly, wasn't Jo Riding supposed to have replaced Maria in London but then she got pregnant? I would love to see her do the role. She'd kill it! I just love her and she's the real deal
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Jul 15, 2017 16:43:06 GMT
What's it about? In a nutshell!
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Post by steve10086 on Jul 15, 2017 17:05:47 GMT
What's it about? In a nutshell! A woman has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret... We learn the secret. It was a crap secret. The End. (Oh, and there's a rat) |
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Jul 15, 2017 17:41:02 GMT
Oh.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 15, 2017 17:50:37 GMT
I don't remember much about it other than the rat. I suspect if I'd been able to watch the rat for a couple of hours I'd have remembered more.
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Post by chernjam on Jul 16, 2017 3:57:32 GMT
What's it about? In a nutshell! A woman has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret, she has a secret... We learn the secret. It was a crap secret. The End. (Oh, and there's a rat) I think Steve won the internet with that mic drop |
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Post by duncan on Jul 16, 2017 10:03:45 GMT
What's it about? In a nutshell! Steve is nearly spot on But in reality - SOME SPOILERS AHEAD Act 1 - Poor honest young artist Walter is hired to tutor two sisters in the art of painting. Luckily for us they live in the arse end of nowhere where Walter gets to meet some very clichéd yokels including Basil Exposition the local train station doom monger. He also meets a Woman in White who spends the entire first act entering every 15 minutes to repeat a song about having a secret but not willing to tell anyone the secret (even when asked!!) Walter wants to make whoopee with the pretty sister (Laura) whilst the plain sister (Marion) is so wantonly panting over Walter she needs a storm of water thrown over her to cool her down but alas the pretty sister is to be married to a titled man (Sir Percival Glyde). But wait the Woman in White in one of her many secret singing sessions has told Walter to be wary of Sir Percival!!! Being a fine upstanding man Walter decides to confront Glyde with this information but Glyde explains it all away as the ramblings of a madwoman and everyone believes him rather than poor Walter. Walter decides he'd rather be a poor artist back in London than watch the love of his life get married to someone he considers a titled rogue so off he goes but not before one final meeting with the titular character which leads to all sorts of shenanigans. ....and from then on would be spoilerific if you've never read the book, seen any of the tv versions or listened to the OCR. And they spend a lot of time telling us that Laura is pretty and that Marion isn't. That's most of the plot of first act and in all seriousness that first act is a mess of storytelling - its all exposition for the second act. Things pick up after the interval but the repeated secret singing really will test the patience of a lot of people and come the end you'll be begging for the secret to be revealed and then one of the other storytelling flaw will hit you and you'll say to yourself "hang on a minute, Mr Fairlie could have sorted all of this out within 10 minutes of the show starting!" I love the original Wilkie Collins book and the original projections were fine from the upper levels but somewhere in here a good romantic ALW score is buried under a book and lyrics that don't go anywhere for the best part of an hour. Its not until Marion and Walter become detectives that things pick up. |
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Post by mallardo on Jul 16, 2017 11:32:27 GMT
To be fair, there's a plot twist in the second act that I did not see coming and which retrospectively made much of what had gone before fall neatly into place. So Duncan is right, the second act is, dramatically, much better. The first act has the better songs.
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