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Sep. 5th, 2003 04:22 pmWrote this last night --
Just got back from seeing Chicago. My thoughts:
In short, the performance was great. I was especially blown away by the woman who played Roxie. It was one of those performances that was just a joy to watch. She breathed a vibrance into the character that made me smile despite knowing what a desipicable person I was smiling at. But then, I felt the same way about Rene Zweilleger's performace in the movie and others seem to believe I was way off base about that. Whatever. I thought she was great. Velma was also done very well but, I think because she's a more serious character, I got more pleasure out of Roxie's routines. I had the same feelings about Catherine Zeta-Jones in the movie and again, others have taken issue. Your mileage may vary.
My only really major complaint was the woman who played Momma Morton. She looked like an overweight version of Dr. Ruth and belted in a way that would have made Ethyl Merman blush. There's nothing sadder than seeing Momma's song (one of my favorites) performed with *negative* sex appeal.
The most unusual thing about the performance was the staging and costuming. The band was set up in a bandstand in the middle of the stage. In fact, it took up most of the space and the performace took place on three sides around it. I'm not sure what the deal was with the costumes. I swear there was not a spec of color... anywhere. Every costume was _all_ black. And they definately were not going for period dress, either. The women in the ensemble all wore various forms of lingerie and the men were in tight black pants with various combinations of club shirts, leather vests, nothing and fedoras on top. We are seriously talking homosexual fashion warp factor 10 here. And since it was a small cast, they didn't have time to change at all, so during the court scene you knew that the bald, muscly guy wearing only leather pants and a vest had gone from ensemble to playing the judge only when he picked up a gavel.
The cast also stuck to tradition by casting Mary Sunshine as a male alto -- a big, fat male alto, even. Fantastic! I'm not sure how to critique his singing. Some of his high notes sounded strained, but then he intentionally performed the songs higher than the soundtrack, mostly to good effect. I'm not great with pitch but he was definately singing up in the mezzo range at a number of points.
Having owned the broadway soundtrack for several years and having most of the show memorized, I had still only seen the movie until now. I was a bit surprised to find that the movie had stuck to the stage version pretty well up until the courtroom scene which was different in ways that I can't really describe. Basically, it was obvious that they couldn't have made the stage version work in the movie the because it all centered around staging, blocking and such. Regardless, it was really, really hilariously done, at least in this production.
...and that's my experience of Chicago.
Oh, and I am so annoyed now. A big fan of Chicago I may be, but this season they're doing a big set of shows called "Broadway in Chicago" which includes a bunch that I want to see even more! Along with the affore mentioned "The Producders", productions of "Hairspray" and "Urinetown" (two new ones that have been getting rave reviews and Tonys left and right) are being done as well as the big one, one of my absolute favorite, so-good-i-don't-even-care-*he*-wrote-it shows, "Jesus Christ, Superstar"! Oh, what I wouldn't give to see that live! ...provided that the cast is competant, at least.
...did I mention I'm going back to Tampa tomorrow? =:(
In other news, my experience of Chicago as a city has been quite pleasant. I hear about parts of the city that have major crime problems, but the bit of the city I've seen (living on South Wabash and working on West Monroe, if that means anything to anyone) been clean, attractive and felt reasonable safe. Maybe my dad's right and I just got bitter about cities early on for some reason and never gave them (especially San Francisco, which I still don't enjoy) a fair chance.
Additional:
I've just been informed that they were shooting a new Richard Geare movie at my hotel while I was gone. So I missed my chance to see Richard Geare (I guess I'm supposed to be bothered by this) because I was out seeing Chicago, how ironic. I really did like his performance in the movie, though. It was definately one of the best singing performances by an obvious non-singer that I'd seen in a while.
*whew*
Ok. We now return you to your regularly scheduled friends list ---
Just got back from seeing Chicago. My thoughts:
In short, the performance was great. I was especially blown away by the woman who played Roxie. It was one of those performances that was just a joy to watch. She breathed a vibrance into the character that made me smile despite knowing what a desipicable person I was smiling at. But then, I felt the same way about Rene Zweilleger's performace in the movie and others seem to believe I was way off base about that. Whatever. I thought she was great. Velma was also done very well but, I think because she's a more serious character, I got more pleasure out of Roxie's routines. I had the same feelings about Catherine Zeta-Jones in the movie and again, others have taken issue. Your mileage may vary.
My only really major complaint was the woman who played Momma Morton. She looked like an overweight version of Dr. Ruth and belted in a way that would have made Ethyl Merman blush. There's nothing sadder than seeing Momma's song (one of my favorites) performed with *negative* sex appeal.
The most unusual thing about the performance was the staging and costuming. The band was set up in a bandstand in the middle of the stage. In fact, it took up most of the space and the performace took place on three sides around it. I'm not sure what the deal was with the costumes. I swear there was not a spec of color... anywhere. Every costume was _all_ black. And they definately were not going for period dress, either. The women in the ensemble all wore various forms of lingerie and the men were in tight black pants with various combinations of club shirts, leather vests, nothing and fedoras on top. We are seriously talking homosexual fashion warp factor 10 here. And since it was a small cast, they didn't have time to change at all, so during the court scene you knew that the bald, muscly guy wearing only leather pants and a vest had gone from ensemble to playing the judge only when he picked up a gavel.
The cast also stuck to tradition by casting Mary Sunshine as a male alto -- a big, fat male alto, even. Fantastic! I'm not sure how to critique his singing. Some of his high notes sounded strained, but then he intentionally performed the songs higher than the soundtrack, mostly to good effect. I'm not great with pitch but he was definately singing up in the mezzo range at a number of points.
Having owned the broadway soundtrack for several years and having most of the show memorized, I had still only seen the movie until now. I was a bit surprised to find that the movie had stuck to the stage version pretty well up until the courtroom scene which was different in ways that I can't really describe. Basically, it was obvious that they couldn't have made the stage version work in the movie the because it all centered around staging, blocking and such. Regardless, it was really, really hilariously done, at least in this production.
...and that's my experience of Chicago.
Oh, and I am so annoyed now. A big fan of Chicago I may be, but this season they're doing a big set of shows called "Broadway in Chicago" which includes a bunch that I want to see even more! Along with the affore mentioned "The Producders", productions of "Hairspray" and "Urinetown" (two new ones that have been getting rave reviews and Tonys left and right) are being done as well as the big one, one of my absolute favorite, so-good-i-don't-even-care-*he*-wrote-it shows, "Jesus Christ, Superstar"! Oh, what I wouldn't give to see that live! ...provided that the cast is competant, at least.
...did I mention I'm going back to Tampa tomorrow? =:(
In other news, my experience of Chicago as a city has been quite pleasant. I hear about parts of the city that have major crime problems, but the bit of the city I've seen (living on South Wabash and working on West Monroe, if that means anything to anyone) been clean, attractive and felt reasonable safe. Maybe my dad's right and I just got bitter about cities early on for some reason and never gave them (especially San Francisco, which I still don't enjoy) a fair chance.
Additional:
I've just been informed that they were shooting a new Richard Geare movie at my hotel while I was gone. So I missed my chance to see Richard Geare (I guess I'm supposed to be bothered by this) because I was out seeing Chicago, how ironic. I really did like his performance in the movie, though. It was definately one of the best singing performances by an obvious non-singer that I'd seen in a while.
*whew*
Ok. We now return you to your regularly scheduled friends list ---
