Aladdin - Prince Edward Theatre
May 28, 2016 9:53:09 GMT
Michael, theatreliker, and 3 more like this
Post by Steve on May 28, 2016 9:53:09 GMT
Saw the first preview, and loved alot of it. A somewhat vapid central duo are surrounded by stimulating sidekicks and stupendous setpieces!
When you see a Disney show, you want wish-fulfillment: you want sentiment, you want the magic of storytelling to fill a void in characters' lives, so that for a flicker of a moment, life seems like a precious thing. Aladdin should be quintessential Disney, because it is about someone who wishes, and someone who grants wishes, it is literally about wish-fulfillment.
And in Alan Menken, Howard Ashman and Tim Rice you have theatrical genies who can grant musical wishes, in Bob Crowley, you have a designer who can grant visual wishes.
"A Whole New World," in this production, is these masters of theatre banding together to grant a wish. It is an exquisite and beautiful setpiece: the moon and the stars beckon through a giant round arabesque window, which dissolves away for a seamless magic carpet ride through the stars, ethereally illustrating the "whole new world" of Tim Rice's lyrics, accompanied by two romantic rarified and tuneful voices harmonising Alan Menken's melody.
Musical theatre wish granted then, but who's wish? Aladdin's character is so thinly conceived and underwritten, so swamped by the wishes of characters more vivid than he, such as Babkak, Omar and the mighty Kassim, that half the power of this enchanting moment is squandered by never having been fully wished for.
Howard Ashman gives Aladdin what depth he has, in the song "Proud of Your Boy." A moving programme note suggests that Alan Menken's reason for working on this musical was to restore this song, in memory of his writing partner, Ashman. Ashman was the boy that Menken was proud of, and rightly so, as this song provides Dean John-Wilson with the one moment that Aladdin's journey means anything, and John-Wilson realises the song's meaning and origin in his sensitive expression.
But this early theme, of Aladdin's desperation to make his parents' proud, is swiftly and unfortunately exhausted, with Aladdin frequently looking dazed and confused, as more vivacious characters, who have more zest for life, more spirit and spunk, swamp him.
Two of the best numbers in the show, the lyrics unsurprisingly written by Ashman, are "Babkak, Omar, Aladdin and Kassim" and "High Adventure." In these two numbers, Menken's and Ashman's inspiration, in the road movies of Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, comes to joyous fruition, as the ravenous Babkak, dreamy Omar, and muscular overconfident Kassim express immense infectious swash-buckling joie-de-vivre. Casey Nicholaw's choreography of their dances, songs and sword-fights is spectacular, encompassing humour and gumption, with costumes and backdrops enhancing it consumately. Nathan Amzi, Rachid Sabritri and Stephen Rahman-Hughes are a thrilling trio, with Stephen Rahman-Hughes's endearing Kassim the stand-out, a sweaty bearded chesty adventurer whose macho posturing, punctured by the comedy of embarrassment, was so charming that I wished it was his story I was watching lol!
In this musical, it's the sidekicks who shine.
Jafar is so one-note villainous Ming-the-Merciless that I yearned for Brian Blessed's more nuanced panto performance, but Peter Howe as his sidekick, Iago, had me laughing throughout, less aggressive than Gilbert Gottfried's parrot in the movie, with Howe offhandedly adept at milking the comedy of Iago's obsequiousness, his tendency to overstep, and his knowingness.
The genie, Aladdin's sidekick, is genius. Trevor Dion Nicholas may not be as quick as Robin Williams in the movie, but he is less conceited, more likeable, his energy, brio and goodnaturedness making him delightful. His "Friend Like Me" is a showstopper, ending as it does in a truly rousing tap routine by multiple dancers!
I talked in the interval with a pair of "theatre experts," who regularly see 14 shows in 9 days on Broadway, and they told me that Nicholas is only slightly less good than the chap he understudied on Broadway, which must mean that the Broadway guy is extraordinary, as I loved Nicholas lol! My two experts also told me that Broadway's Jafar was slightly better than ours, especially as he played the part in the movie, but they told me that our Aladdin and Jasmine are far better than those on Broadway, and that they consider Dean John-Wilson to be the definitive Aladdin, never to be matched through the annals of time.
This confirmed for me what I already suspected, that the weakness of Aladdin is mostly in the book, and not the fault of Wilson. It's not that Wilson loses Aladdin, it's that the book never finds him, and thus fails to give us a moving narrative through-line that would transform all these wonderful setpieces into something truly special.
For me, Jade Ewan's Jasmine, while also thinly characterised, popped slightly better than Aladdin, in that Ewan has a wide-eyed yearning expression that simply screams Disney princess. God help her, cos all her three year old relatives will be wanting her in costume every day off she gets.
Ultimately, my wish for a central throughline, that I care about, was not fulfilled, because this Aladdin is too absent a character to carry it. But Howard Ashman, Alan Menken, Tim Rice, Casey Nicholaw and Bob Crowley fulfilled enough of my theatrical wishes and dreams that I'd rate this a must-see once.
And if there's a sequel, I want it to be about Kassim.
At this first preview, for me, I'd say the show is hovering at about 3 and a half stars of enjoyment, which might well rise by press night.
When you see a Disney show, you want wish-fulfillment: you want sentiment, you want the magic of storytelling to fill a void in characters' lives, so that for a flicker of a moment, life seems like a precious thing. Aladdin should be quintessential Disney, because it is about someone who wishes, and someone who grants wishes, it is literally about wish-fulfillment.
And in Alan Menken, Howard Ashman and Tim Rice you have theatrical genies who can grant musical wishes, in Bob Crowley, you have a designer who can grant visual wishes.
"A Whole New World," in this production, is these masters of theatre banding together to grant a wish. It is an exquisite and beautiful setpiece: the moon and the stars beckon through a giant round arabesque window, which dissolves away for a seamless magic carpet ride through the stars, ethereally illustrating the "whole new world" of Tim Rice's lyrics, accompanied by two romantic rarified and tuneful voices harmonising Alan Menken's melody.
Musical theatre wish granted then, but who's wish? Aladdin's character is so thinly conceived and underwritten, so swamped by the wishes of characters more vivid than he, such as Babkak, Omar and the mighty Kassim, that half the power of this enchanting moment is squandered by never having been fully wished for.
Howard Ashman gives Aladdin what depth he has, in the song "Proud of Your Boy." A moving programme note suggests that Alan Menken's reason for working on this musical was to restore this song, in memory of his writing partner, Ashman. Ashman was the boy that Menken was proud of, and rightly so, as this song provides Dean John-Wilson with the one moment that Aladdin's journey means anything, and John-Wilson realises the song's meaning and origin in his sensitive expression.
But this early theme, of Aladdin's desperation to make his parents' proud, is swiftly and unfortunately exhausted, with Aladdin frequently looking dazed and confused, as more vivacious characters, who have more zest for life, more spirit and spunk, swamp him.
Two of the best numbers in the show, the lyrics unsurprisingly written by Ashman, are "Babkak, Omar, Aladdin and Kassim" and "High Adventure." In these two numbers, Menken's and Ashman's inspiration, in the road movies of Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, comes to joyous fruition, as the ravenous Babkak, dreamy Omar, and muscular overconfident Kassim express immense infectious swash-buckling joie-de-vivre. Casey Nicholaw's choreography of their dances, songs and sword-fights is spectacular, encompassing humour and gumption, with costumes and backdrops enhancing it consumately. Nathan Amzi, Rachid Sabritri and Stephen Rahman-Hughes are a thrilling trio, with Stephen Rahman-Hughes's endearing Kassim the stand-out, a sweaty bearded chesty adventurer whose macho posturing, punctured by the comedy of embarrassment, was so charming that I wished it was his story I was watching lol!
In this musical, it's the sidekicks who shine.
Jafar is so one-note villainous Ming-the-Merciless that I yearned for Brian Blessed's more nuanced panto performance, but Peter Howe as his sidekick, Iago, had me laughing throughout, less aggressive than Gilbert Gottfried's parrot in the movie, with Howe offhandedly adept at milking the comedy of Iago's obsequiousness, his tendency to overstep, and his knowingness.
The genie, Aladdin's sidekick, is genius. Trevor Dion Nicholas may not be as quick as Robin Williams in the movie, but he is less conceited, more likeable, his energy, brio and goodnaturedness making him delightful. His "Friend Like Me" is a showstopper, ending as it does in a truly rousing tap routine by multiple dancers!
I talked in the interval with a pair of "theatre experts," who regularly see 14 shows in 9 days on Broadway, and they told me that Nicholas is only slightly less good than the chap he understudied on Broadway, which must mean that the Broadway guy is extraordinary, as I loved Nicholas lol! My two experts also told me that Broadway's Jafar was slightly better than ours, especially as he played the part in the movie, but they told me that our Aladdin and Jasmine are far better than those on Broadway, and that they consider Dean John-Wilson to be the definitive Aladdin, never to be matched through the annals of time.
This confirmed for me what I already suspected, that the weakness of Aladdin is mostly in the book, and not the fault of Wilson. It's not that Wilson loses Aladdin, it's that the book never finds him, and thus fails to give us a moving narrative through-line that would transform all these wonderful setpieces into something truly special.
For me, Jade Ewan's Jasmine, while also thinly characterised, popped slightly better than Aladdin, in that Ewan has a wide-eyed yearning expression that simply screams Disney princess. God help her, cos all her three year old relatives will be wanting her in costume every day off she gets.
Ultimately, my wish for a central throughline, that I care about, was not fulfilled, because this Aladdin is too absent a character to carry it. But Howard Ashman, Alan Menken, Tim Rice, Casey Nicholaw and Bob Crowley fulfilled enough of my theatrical wishes and dreams that I'd rate this a must-see once.
And if there's a sequel, I want it to be about Kassim.
At this first preview, for me, I'd say the show is hovering at about 3 and a half stars of enjoyment, which might well rise by press night.
