| re: Michael Bennett passed away three days after this revival opened ... |
| Posted by: NewtonUK 09:32 am EDT 06/29/20 |
| In reply to: Why was the 1987 revival of DREAMGIRLS such a bust? - EvFoDr 09:50 am EDT 06/28/20 |
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| This stripped down version had been created to make some dollars in split weeks and so forth on the road. While it claimed to be the Michael Bennett Broadway production, Frank Rich pointed out in the Times review that Bennett had been ill and not working for over a year - and that there was no chance that anything approaching Bennett's stunning original production would fit on the small, shallow stage of the Ambassador. He does point out that after getting over the fact that most of Robin Wagner's physical production had been jettisoned for this 'toy-scale version", "one is knocked out all over again by what is still the most exciting staging of a Broadway musical in this decade." It didnt need that dancing set after all! The review is a love letter to Michael Bennett. "The libretto by Tom Eyen is as thematically contemporary as FENCES." The review is a rave, especially for Bennett whom Rich calls "one of the most brilliant showmen the Broadway musical has ever known." The revival opened on June 28, 1987. Mr Bennett died on July 2. I imagine that the state of his health as something of an open secret in the world of Broadway, and the review reads partly as a summation of what Bennett gave to our theatre. |
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Why was the 1987 revival of DREAMGIRLS such a bust? - EvFoDr 09:50 am EDT 06/28/20 |
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It wasn't--177 p is a darned good run . . . - keikekaze 04:54 pm EDT 06/28/20 |
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