I saw that production twice, but I have very few memories of it. It was solid, but really nothing more. It's most notable now for being Laura Benanti's Broadway debut, after she understudied and then replaced Rebecca Luker as Maria. Melissa Errico has said in interviews that she was offered Maria (as well as that same season's Leonide in TRIUMPH OF LOVE), but chose to play Tracy in HIGH SOCIETY instead.
In "Do Re Mi," Maria also taught the kids hand signals for each of the notes, which I gather was a thing in music education at one time.
The nuns were shown at potters wheels at various point, because, if I remember correctly, this was something the actual nuns in the actual convent that Maria had lived in actually did.
Jan Maxwell and Patti Cohenour were pretty much ideal as Frau Schraeder and the Mother Abbess, but I remember few details of what they actually did.
When Richard Chamberlain replaced Michael Siberry as Georg, I've literally never seen so much makeup on a man who wasn't a drag queen. Chamberlain's performance opposite Benanti was fine. No memories at all of Benanti's performance other than that she was so young to be playing opposite Chamberlain. |
