| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 11:54 am EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Ann 11:32 am EST 11/24/14 |
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| The author writes, "Sondheim, who can be quite vocal about others’ productions of his work, enthusiastically endorsed Marshall’s version in a letter (he couldn’t attend after becoming ill) that Streep read (hilariously as she kept correcting his grammar) at the end of the Q&A." I have rarely heard of Sondheim being publicly critical of any production of his work. The one notable exception I can think of was the Chicago Lyric Opera production of Sweeney Todd. Even then he did not speak of his negative view of it publicly until after it had appeared at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden. It had been a co-production with the Royal Opera. He only made his negative feelings known when Los Angeles Opera wanted to borrow the production, at which time he said that while he would allow Chicago or the Royal Opera to revive the production, he would not allow it to be seen anywhere else. Can anyone think of Sondheim publicly criticizing a current or recent major production of one of his shows? (It's also a bit odd that this guy makes it sound like Sondheim sometimes directs productions of his own work.) | |
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| I have rarely heard of Sondheim being publicly critical of any production of his work. | |
| Posted by: | Greg_M 01:35 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 11:54 am EST 11/24/14 |
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| Sondheim did say "Sweeney Todd" was the best stage to film musical he ever saw - but he does slam the film of "Gypsy" which many consider to be very good and faithful to the stage show Isn't "Gypsy" a better film than "Sweeney Todd"? | |
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| re: I have rarely heard of Sondheim being publicly critical of any production of his work. | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 01:53 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | I have rarely heard of Sondheim being publicly critical of any production of his work. - Greg_M 01:35 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Oh, that's true. He has been critical of film versions of his work. But not usually till years later. In fact, on the Mike Douglas Show, some months before the film version of A Little Night Music was released, Sondheim praised Elizabeth Taylor's performance of "Send in the Clowns" in the movie, saying that she sang it so well that people would not believe it was her singing it, but it was her voice. Douglas had not asked him about it. Sondheim brought it up himself. Meanwhile, I interviewed Sondheim before the film was released for a paper I was writing. (This was a few months after the Douglas show appearance.) When I asked him about the film, he had little good to say about it. He praised Len Cariou's performance, but that was it. Of Taylor, he said something like "She has one or two good comic moments, and one or two good touching moments, but otherwise . . ." He was surprisingly open about some things in the interview. He mentioned that there was a new version of "The Glamorous Life" and said something like "That would have been good if Hal had filmed it the way I laid it out." But, of course, he never spoke about it publicly like that, certainly not at the time. I think that Sondheim really feels that way about the Sweeney film, which just proves to me how little perspective he has on these things. Of course, why should he have perspective? How could he have perspective? It's so close to him. But it doesn't exactly make you trust his judgments on these matters. Personally, I think both the Sweeney film and the Gypsy film have good points and weak points. Sondheim did try to make it sound (and he seemed to genuinely feel) that the Sweeney film was on some notably higher level than any previous film version of a Broadway musical. I think that few people, even those who loved it, quite agreed that it was so much better than any other film version of a musical. | |
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| re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. | |
| Posted by: | Guillaume 12:55 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 11:54 am EST 11/24/14 |
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| it just means he chimes in with his thoughts, doesn't it? He often praises productions | |
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| re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 01:06 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. - Guillaume 12:55 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| You may be right that the author intended it that way, but the sentence reads like "quite vocal" is meant to be in contrast to his "enthusiastically endorse[ment]" of the film. I mean, if Sondheim regularly praises productions of his work, why bother to note that he's doing it again? The only reason to do that would be if the point was something like, "Oh, here goes Sondheim again raving about a production of one of his shows. Who can trust him?" | |
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| re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. | |
| Posted by: | Guillaume 01:11 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. - AlanScott 01:06 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| I know! I think the writer was trying to build some drama and conflict in an otherwise bland article. | |
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| re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 01:13 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: "quite vocal" doesn't have to mean negative. - Guillaume 01:11 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| LOL! Yes, probably. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | Alcindoro 12:40 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 11:54 am EST 11/24/14 |
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| Wasn't there a regional production of COMPANY sometime in the '90s where one of the couples was made same-sex? Can't recall if it was two men or two women. I seem to remember him being very vocal about it ("Some people can't write so they re-write") and the production was either blocked or the revision was corrected. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 12:49 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Alcindoro 12:40 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| He has, on occasion, had productions shut down that took liberties, without asking permission, of which he disapproved. But they were mostly pretty minor productions, nonprofessional or regional. This is why I wrote (near the end of my post) "current or recent major production." A production of Side by Side by Sondheim with Cris Groenendaal and a couple of other established performers was shut down for adding a whole bunch of songs not in the licensed version without permission. But even then I'm not sure he spoke about it. He just had it shut down. The author makes it sound like Sondheim fairly often goes around saying, "Hated that production," so the fact that he's speaking positively about this one demonstrates how much he loves it. He also raved about the film version of Sweeney. If anything, I think (though I'm sure about this) that he has spoken of how he prefers not to publicly criticize productions of his work because he doesn't want to hurt the actors. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | Ann 12:42 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Alcindoro 12:40 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| There was a production in the '90s at CMU with Marta being Marty, which Sondheim gave private approval to ... was it something else or maybe a couple of memories conflated? | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | Alcindoro 02:56 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Ann 12:42 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Can't remember. But I'm pretty sure he made that statement about re-writing in conjunction with a production of COMPANY, since I've repeated it to more than one amateur director. But then, maybe I dreamed the whole thing ... | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 03:02 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Alcindoro 02:56 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| No, I don't think you did. I think he (along with Furth) forced at least one production of Company either to shut down or to recast, or perhaps he and Furth simply refused to allow a sex change for one or more of the characters when asked in advance, but he did allow Billy Porter (who knew to ask in advance and get permission) to change Marta to Marty for a production of the show at Carnegie-Mellon, because it was just a college production and because he likes and trusts Porter. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | MikeR 03:06 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 03:02 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| I was recently in a production of Company that changed Peter into a woman, making Peter/Susan a lesbian couple. We were told that the production had asked for and received permission. But I've begun to doubt that was actually the case... | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 03:13 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - MikeR 03:06 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| I would be doubtful, too. Was the scene with Peter and Robert alone cut? | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | MikeR 03:43 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 03:13 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Surprisingly, it wasn't in the scripts we got from MTI. The first time I did Company (November 2010), that scene was included. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 03:48 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - MikeR 03:43 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| That really is odd. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | Michael_Portantiere 12:25 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 11:54 am EST 11/24/14 |
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| I have never heard or read of Sondheim being publicly critical of any production of his work, and certainly not any current production. Also, I find it hard to believe that Streep would correct Sondheim's grammar (???) in a public forum. What's up with that? | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 01:12 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Michael_Portantiere 12:25 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Well, if the film is a huge hit, perhaps Streep will star in a new film of Gypsy. (Which, of course, would kill Streisand.) I can see her going up to Sondheim and saying, "Shouldn't it be 'If Momma were married, Steve?" | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | MikeR 01:19 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 01:12 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Ha! I would hope his response would be "Of course it should, but do you really think June and Louise know that?" | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 01:36 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - MikeR 01:19 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Some years back, this was discussed here. I think I brought it up, and I said that perhaps Sondheim wrote it that way because, of course, the Louise and June weren't exactly well educated. And I think someone responded that he once asked Sondheim about it, or that he'd heard about someone asking Sondheim about it, and Sondheim said it was grammatically correct. I have run this around in my brain over the years, trying to figure out if using was instead of were is correct or at least can be justified. Which doesn't sound too healthy, does it? I mean, thinking about that doesn't sound too healthy. But I never claimed to be healthy. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | Michael_Portantiere 02:10 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 01:36 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| My understanding is that "if momma was married" would be correct as part of a thought in the past tense, for example, "if momma was married to that man at the time, we didn't know about it." Whereas "if momma were married" is the correct form for the conditional, which is how it's used in the song, to mean "if momma were married (today), we'd live in house as private as private can be...." I, too, always assumed that Sondheim used "was" instead of "were" because "if momma were married" because of the characters' young age and lack of education. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | chrismpls 04:04 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Michael_Portantiere 02:10 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Agreed that it's right for the song but "if momma was married" is never correct. It's a contrary-to-fact statement, so it gets "were," not "was." | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | showtunetrivia 02:30 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Michael_Portantiere 02:10 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| That's my take, too. It takes education and experience to master the subjunctive mood, and Rose's kids have neither. Tevye, on the other hand, has read enough to state his wish correctly: "If I were a rich man..." Except....he's supposed to be speaking Yiddish, which my husband tried teaching himself a few years ago. And Yiddish doesn't have a subjunctive mood. Laura, who still has bad memories of Latin and Greek subjunctive endings in grad school | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | JereNYC (JereNYC@aol.com) 02:51 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - showtunetrivia 02:30 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Just out of curiosity, why would you assume Tevye et al would be speaking Yiddish? I would assume they'd be speaking Russian or perhaps Ukranian, depending on where their village is supposed to be located. And I have no idea if either of those languages utilizes the subjunctive. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | showtunetrivia 03:35 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - JereNYC 02:51 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Actually, it's probably a push between Russian and Yiddish. By the end of the 19th century, Russian was supplanting Yiddish (the main language for Ashkenazi Jews in Europe since the middle ages) in many Jewish communities. But I've always had the feeling Anatevka was smaller and even more isolated than other shtetls. My husband's relatives were from that part of the world, got here when Tevye did, and they spoke Yiddish. Laura | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | LegitOnce 11:53 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - showtunetrivia 03:35 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| My two Russian mavens have replied "Yiddish." Most likely a tradesman like Tevye, who had to deal with all sorts of people, would speak passable Russian and Ukranian as well, and perhaps some Polish. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 03:53 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - showtunetrivia 03:35 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| My father's mother also spoke Yiddish. Perhaps at one time she could speak Russian, but Yiddish was her primary language. She never learned more than a small amount of English. She died in 1973. I don't know exactly when she came here. My father was born in 1925. His older sister was probably born in 1922. They were both born here so it was before that. But I know very little about their history. And now no one is around to ask. I wonder what records might exist if I tried to find them. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | showtunetrivia 04:42 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 03:53 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Online genealogical searches are incredibly easy. The Mormons' FamilySearch.org is free, if somewhat clunky to use. Ancestry.com is the biggest; to get anything really interesting you have to join, but you can make family trees for free, and they have (or they used to have) a free trial. State resources are free, as are sone of the US censuses. Liberty-Elis Island Foundation has a free passenger search, too. By way of keeping this on topic, I wonder how much the ban on Yiddish theatre (enacted after the czar's assassination in 1883) contributed to the decline of the language at the end of the century. Laura | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 04:53 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - showtunetrivia 04:42 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Thanks so much. I must do that. | |
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| "Shtetl Days" | |
| Posted by: | showtunetrivia 08:32 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - AlanScott 04:53 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Apologies if this is off topic, but it does deal with the discussion of language in Imperial Russia and does involve actors, albeit fictional ones. Some Chatterati may know my husband, Harry Turtledove, writes science fiction, including a lot in the subgenre of alternate history. A few years ago, he wrote a short story set in a world where the Nazis won the war. Decades later, they're recreated a shtetl as a kind of "living museum," complete with performers playing the long-gone Jews, just like folks play Elizabethan Englishmen at Renaissance fairs today. But what happens when they start to get too deep in their roles? Laura | |
| Link | "Shtetl Days" at tor.com |
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| Correct link | |
| Posted by: | showtunetrivia 08:39 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | "Shtetl Days" - showtunetrivia 08:32 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Sorry! | |
| Link | "Shtetl Days" at tor.com |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 03:05 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - JereNYC 02:51 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| I would have tended to assume Yiddish for all the Jewish characters, except when they're talking to the Russian-speaking characters, because Sholom-Aleichem wrote in Yiddish. But now that you've brought it up, it's a good question. I don't know. | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | MikeR 03:02 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - JereNYC 02:51 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Not that it's really that important, but Russian verbs have indicative, subjunctive, and imperative moods (and there are six noun cases, just to keep things interesting). | |
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| re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film | |
| Posted by: | AlanScott 02:47 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - showtunetrivia 02:30 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| "And Yiddish doesn't have a subjunctive mood." Interesting. I didn't know that. Of course, that's translation for you. What'cha gonna do? A literal translation of Nina's most famous line in The Seagull would be "I gull." (One reason why it's been translated as "I'm a seagull," "I'm the seagull" and "I'm a gull." And maybe "I'm the gull," but I haven't come across that one.) A literal translation of the play's title would be Gull. The bird in the play isn't even a seagull. | |
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| Correcting his grammar was done very tongue-in -cheek | |
| Posted by: | Esther 01:02 pm EST 11/24/14 |
| In reply to: | re: Deadline reviews Into the Woods film - Michael_Portantiere 12:25 pm EST 11/24/14 |
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| Playbill has a link to the Yahoo chat. I watched it last night. | |
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