One very bright spot was the wonderful choreography during the show's first 30 minutes -- some of the best I have seen On- and Off-Broadway. For some strange reason, there was virtually no outright dancing for the following 60 minutes (did they run out of rehearsal time?).
In the production I did recently, I think the only number in the latter half of the show that really was fully choreographed was "Cleanin' Women." In the earlier portion of the show, the opening number was a combination of choreo and musical staging, "Delivery" was fully choreographed, and "Brother Trucker" was as well. "It's An Art" had some true dance moments but was more stylized musical staging in general. And "Millwork" relied more on the mimed actions of the factory work, though our choreographer did some nice shaping along with that.
If I'm correct that "Lovin' Al" was added back in (it was cut for the 2012 version that clearly formed the basis for the Encores production), that number would certainly lend itself to dance as well. But again, I assume that was done early on in the show if it was indeed done.
So I'd say that maybe they did run out of time to do "Cleanin' Women?" Otherwise, you're pretty much right that, as written, the obvious places for dance are earlier in the show. |
