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| re: Some early reviews noted that the score eliminated too many perfect choices. | |
| Last Edit: EvFoDr 03:15 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
| Posted by: EvFoDr 03:12 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
| In reply to: Some early reviews noted that the score eliminated too many perfect choices. - Delvino 02:34 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
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| I don't recall reading anything about that, but it really makes perfect sense, especially now with hindsight. Speaking for myself, I was overjoyed at the time to have LuPone reunite with ALW to belt the hell out of one of his scores. But it's clear now that many of the great candidates for this role would have required a less demanding vocal part. And it was certainly disappointing to me (and some, though clearly not others) to hear even a decent singer like Close approach the score after hearing LuPone do it. I still laugh (tinged with sadness) when I hear the key change DOWN at the end of With One Look so the song can conclude on what I assume was a more manageable note for Close to belt out powerfully. I assume, from recordings though I didn't see them live, that Buckley and Paige delivered the score. But they aren't big box office and certainly don't have any ties to Hollywood like a Close, Shepard, Dunaway, Carroll, MacLaine did, which adds an extra layer to the proceedings. | |
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| Close was electric in LA | |
| Posted by: bobby2 09:54 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Some early reviews noted that the score eliminated too many perfect choices. - EvFoDr 03:12 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
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| I've never seen anything like it. Her vocal deficits whatever they were didn't matter because she brought such an amazing madness and an antic comedy to the role. (I've never seen anybody else get as many laughs from it. Even Close in the revival couldn't do it.) She just connected with that role so deeply like with Fatal Attraction that it was just stunning. Makes me wonder if Dunaway could have brought that hysteria to it. By the time it got to NYC the first time she was a bit 'big" but those first few months in LA were unlike anything I've ever witnessed on stage. Shear brilliance. One thing that I think that gets distorted in Patti's whole stuff about how a movie star swept in and stole her role is that Close was in a career slump at this time. I doubt ALW ever thought in a million years that Close a faltering movie star who hadn't had a hit in a few years would give a more acclaimed performance than the woman who dazzled as Evita. I always felt Close did the role in LA (where she didn't live) in order to try and restart her film career. Being away from the New York spotlight probably enabled her to give a bold take on the role........and it worked. Close's trips up and down those stairs was a show in itself. It was like she came up with a mood for each one and each trip was like a little one act play. Plus she took the curtain call in character. Never broke. She bowed as the desperate Norma bowing to her people out there in the dark. Excellent. |
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| re: Close was electric in LA | |
| Posted by: EvFoDr 10:25 am EDT 08/27/19 | |
| In reply to: Close was electric in LA - bobby2 09:54 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
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| Thanks for sharing. I had nearly forgotten that I had tickets to see Close in LA but my trip was thwarted by the earthquake in 1994. Perhaps if I had seen her there my feelings would be different. And to be fair LuPone is my favorite musical theatre diva so she was going to be a touh act to follow for me. By the way I have no investment at all in this whole idea that Close stole the role from LuPone. I just simply want to hear a bigger voice sing the score. But by many accounts, including your above, Close was quite special live, and I don't doubt it. | |
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| re: Close was electric in LA | |
| Posted by: JereNYC (JereNYC@aol.com) 10:44 am EDT 08/27/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Close was electric in LA - EvFoDr 10:25 am EDT 08/27/19 | |
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| What sometimes gets overlooked in this LuPone v. Close conversation is that Close was playing a different version of the show than LuPone ever got to do. The show was revised for LA and those revisions did not go into the London production until Buckley took over from LuPone. So I've always wondered if LuPone was handicapped from the start by having to play an inferior version of the piece. Or, to invert that thought, was Close's performance always going to be superior because she was starting with a better version of the material? I have friends who saw the show in London and loved Patti for exactly the reason you state...that the role really works with a big voice. But I'd also heard that LuPone's best performances as Norma were at the tail end of her run, in the immediate aftermath of finding out that she'd been replaced for New York. So maybe LuPone just didn't find that extra "IT" factor in the role until it was too late. In any case, I've never understood the, apparently since buried, animosity that LuPone had for Close. Close didn't hire herself for the role. She was a actress who was offered a job and decided to take it. If she'd declined, there's still no guarantee that Andrew Lloyd Webber, et al would have brought LuPone to New York in the role if they were unhappy with her performance in some way. Although, I wonder if LuPone, given the revised material and, perhaps, some different direction from Trevor Nunn, based on his experience with Close in LA, would have been able to revise her performance in such a way that she would have gotten the acclaim that Close did. |
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| re: Close was electric in LA | |
| Posted by: EvFoDr 12:59 pm EDT 08/27/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Close was electric in LA - JereNYC 10:44 am EDT 08/27/19 | |
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| What a tantalizing notion that LuPone could have improved in the new production! Although weren't most of the changes not related to the core Norma material, aside from whatever adjustments were made for Close's vocal abilities? Like, does the addition of Every Movie's a Circus (a horrible song in my opinion) for the ensemble make the show better and improve the Norma experience? I think you have to take LuPone's animosity with a grain of salt. It's not rational, but her thinking was no doubt clouded by the anger and sadness she felt being from being fired. You'll notice if you read her book that she holds (or held) a lot of grudges. And this it the theatre and people are dramatic. I suppose there is a world in which LuPone could have been terribly rational and said: well of course Glenn Close was just taking a job she was offered, I can see beyond my own situation and acknowledge that. But that would have been awfully clear headed. Maybe unrealistically so. |
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| re: Close was electric in LA | |
| Last Edit: JereNYC 01:39 pm EDT 08/27/19 | |
| Posted by: JereNYC (JereNYC@aol.com) 01:39 pm EDT 08/27/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Close was electric in LA - EvFoDr 12:59 pm EDT 08/27/19 | |
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| I'm actually not familiar enough with the material to know exactly what the changes were for LA. But, even if all the Norma material was identical or nearly so, the fact that the show played better in the revised version (as per the creatives who, of course, thought it did) would have likely reflected on Close and every other aspect of the production. Is it better to be the one bright spot in a terrible show or the shiniest bright spot in a good show? | |
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| I didn't see her in LA, but in London and the New York revival... | |
| Posted by: DanielVincent 11:07 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
| In reply to: Close was electric in LA - bobby2 09:54 pm EDT 08/26/19 | |
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| ...I would rank her performance as pretty much the best thing I've ever seen anyone do in anything anywhere. | |
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