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| Making brazen 'Overtures' | |
| Last Edit: WaymanWong 11:28 pm EDT 06/21/22 | |
| Posted by: WaymanWong 11:22 pm EDT 06/21/22 | |
| In reply to: it's also an exceptionally original, intelligent, witty, stunningly beautiful piece of musical theater - Chazwaza 02:56 pm EDT 06/21/22 | |
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| ''Pacific Overtures'' (1976) is one of the most visually stunning Broadway shows I've ever seen. I'm thrilled that the Tony voters rewarded Florence Klotz for her ravishing costumes and Borin Aronson for his breathtaking sets. I can still picture his big ''black dragon'' of Perry's ship onstage. Wow! Given that its cast was mostly unknown Asian actors, I guess it's fortunate that Mako and Isao Sato got Tony nominations. The critics didn't help. In the reviews, the actors seldom got singled out. Maybe it's the ensemble nature of the show. Rex Reed thought it was just a Japanese troupe. (Shimono told me he auditioned for the Engineer in ''Miss Saigon'' but was told he couldn't do it: ''A total lie. Instead, [they cast] Jonathan Pryce.'') By the way, I agree that the 2004 revival of ''Pacific Overtures,'' directed by Amon Miyamoto, definitely should've won the Tony for Musical Revival. And the less said about John Doyle's 2017 Off-Broadway revival, which reduced it to one-act and cut ''Chrysanthemum Tea,'' the better! |
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| He cut "Chrysanthemum Tea?" That is an outrage! | |
| Last Edit: BigM 02:30 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| Posted by: BigM 02:30 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| In reply to: Making brazen 'Overtures' - WaymanWong 11:22 pm EDT 06/21/22 | |
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| I generally like intimate productions of big shows; probably the best theatre piece I ever saw was a teeny production of the Scottish play with Ian McKellen and Judi Dench in London. But cutting that wonderful number is inexcusable. | |
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| re: He cut "Chrysanthemum Tea?" That is an outrage! | |
| Last Edit: Chazwaza 04:59 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| Posted by: Chazwaza 04:52 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| In reply to: He cut "Chrysanthemum Tea?" That is an outrage! - BigM 02:30 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
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| Oh that was just the beginning. He cut lots of stuff, but that was the only full song. The show was done as a 90 minute one-act musical, cutting at least 40 minutes of the original show. What I find especially bizarre is when new productions try very hard to pretend the show was not conceived and written, in structure and dialogue especially, as a piece of Kabuki theater mixed with a musical. Kabuki is quite different than the kind of thing Broadway or American audiences are used to seeing. But this show was *written* to take on many of the kabuki theatrical essentials and styles. To take that away, like it's just any old musical, only makes the show harder to wrap ones head around and get into. The 2005 Broadway revival did it as more of a mix of Noh and Kabuki and modern, but that all works because Noh is also an ancient and extremely stylized form of Japanese theater, and that as well as Bunraku are inherently in or possible in the show as it was written/conceived. Doyle seemed to want to forget all of that and just treat it like stripping down any musical... and it just isn't the same thing. If you don't want to do Pacific Overtures then don't do Pacific Overtures... |
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| What a traves-'Tea,' indeed! | |
| Last Edit: WaymanWong 07:27 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| Posted by: WaymanWong 07:11 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| In reply to: re: He cut "Chrysanthemum Tea?" That is an outrage! - Chazwaza 04:52 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
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| According to an actor in that 2007 revival, Doyle cut down ''Pacific Overtures'' to 90 minutes, so he could ''focus'' on the relationships among Manjiro, Kayama and Lord Abe. If that's the criteria, why did he keep, say, ''Someone in a Tree'' or ''Pretty Lady,'' which are not related to that trio? ... Doyle told American Theatre he cut ''Chrysanthemum Tea'' because ''there's a slight tendency for comedy to thrive at the expense of the Japanese. ... There was a danger of 'Chrysanthemum Tea' ... eliciting humor.'' So why did Doyle keep ''Welcome to Kanagawa,'' which also elicits humor? Ironically, Doyle claims this is his favorite Sondheim show. But if you change it so much, is it ''Pacific Overtures'' anymore? The Signature Theatre in Arlington, Va., a Tony-recognized regional theater, has announced it's reviving ''Pacific Overtures'' in their next season. But did anyone see their 2005 revival of ''Pacific Overtures,'' directed by Eric Schaeffer? It featured an all-Caucasian cast and a woman as the Reciter. Musicals that feature good roles for Asians are rare enough; if you're going to cast white actors in ''Pacific Overtures,'' why not just do ''The Mikado''? I'm hoping the Signature's upcoming revival features Asian-American actors and DOES NOT use any of Doyle's cuts! (Thank goodness, Japanese TV shot the original ''Pacific Overtures'' and it lives on, on YouTube, in all its grandeur and glory!) |
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| re: What a traves-'Tea,' indeed! | |
| Posted by: Chazwaza 10:58 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
| In reply to: What a traves-'Tea,' indeed! - WaymanWong 07:11 pm EDT 06/22/22 | |
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| Absolutely. The original script/score understood the choices it was making... it wasn't giving more time to Manjiro and Kayama's relationship (let alone Lord Abe) because the piece is not *about* them (hence why there's only one song for them together, and none of the other songs, even the ones they sing, are directly about their relationship as friends or their feelings about it -- the show does track them both as the focal point/anchor, but not exclusively their relationship... their journeys as are much real as they are symbolic), it tells many stories, the stories of the reactions and impact of this major event on the local people of Japan, and uses that relationship as a throughline and stand-in for a larger view of the evolution of Japan and the internal conflict as a nation/culture/people. The style of play they were doing intentionally does not do what Doyle seems to have wanted it to be doing. And yes, why leave Welcome to Kanagawa which is even more of a comedy song than Chrysanthemum Tea and also shows focuses on Japanese prostitutes and their Madame, which in theory is an even more risky line to walk in terms of who the joke is "on", and in what ways the Japanese are portrayed to American audiences. I think both songs are brilliant, in no way problematic (so to speak) and are both very valid, clever and interesting viewpoints to see as the country responses to this situation of the arrival of the war ships. Cutting one for the reason he gives, but not the other, is silly. I think Tea was just at least twice as long, and that's why. But yes... is it the show anymore? And how could this be your favorite Sondheim show but cut 40+ minutes from it and 1 of the 11 songs. And yes... any theater, especially a theater of such note and resources as Signature, producing this show with any non-asians in the cast, let alone an entirely white cast, is a bad idea... I'd be very curious what the intention and concept was, surely there must have been because it's not as if they didn't have the resources to have an asian or even mostly-asian cast. And Eric Shaeffer is not a bad or stupid director - he's not the best, but he's done many excellent productions and had a long run as Artistic Director of that major theater and a long relationship with doing Sondheim shows. I also have to assume Sondheim and Weidman were made aware of this production and didn't shut it down... I have to think there was something being tried that they wanted to explore. But it is so in conflict with the concept and intention of the piece. I saw it done at NYU when I was in high school i think, and even with a mixed-race cast, it didn't work for me. But I also would like the piece to get done. So I don't know. But at the level of Signature, I do not get it. I think there's absolutely no chance this upcoming Signature production will have any non-Asian people in it, but who ever knows. |
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| Doyle's P. Overtures was a travesty | |
| Posted by: Chazwaza 02:45 am EDT 06/22/22 | |
| In reply to: Making brazen 'Overtures' - WaymanWong 11:22 pm EDT 06/21/22 | |
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| Not only did I loathe it, I was infuriated about what he'd done to it... and even more that it was not only allowed by Sondheim and Weidman, but they'd been involved. Not as a purest even, but the musical presented made little sense, and was a betrayal of the entire concept of the show and its existence... I was baffled in ways I didn't even know I could have been. But it also took a beautiful musical and made it ... ugly? |
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| The less said about ANY John Doyle musical... | |
| Posted by: DistantDrumming 12:02 am EDT 06/22/22 | |
| In reply to: Making brazen 'Overtures' - WaymanWong 11:22 pm EDT 06/21/22 | |
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| ... the better. It still rubs me the wrong way that his "style" of teeny tiny musicals became the standard for Sondheim revivals for a while. Sondheim was a genius, but he seemed to be very... tolerant of questionable direction and production when it came to his revivals. I guess it was compromise or don't get produced? | |
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