| LEMPICKA last night | |
| Posted by: student_rush 12:00 pm EDT 04/25/24 | |
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| Eden was out; must have been a quick decision, as there were no paper inserts. No matter, the standby Mariand Torres is perfectly competent. The show, however ... wooooooooooof. At intermission, my partner and I remarked how it felt like four different shows at once, all with different writers, tones, styles -- and all competing with one another for the story's attention. For the low low price of admission, we got to see Rachel Chavkin's CABARET, ANASTASIA, LES MIZ -- a complete abdication of directing or dramaturgical responsibilities, leaving large swaths of the set barren for major periods of time; an incoherent and boring mess of visuals or dramatic momentum. Lest the attention went to the performers for their acting, only George Abud (a ferociously alive performance, thrashing against the banal nothing surrounding him ... his bio is braver than anything remotely represented in the musical) and Beth Leavel (picking up a paycheck, as she should) are trying to communicate emotion or storytelling through their scenework. I suppose none of us should be surprised that a show written by men that won't stop telling us What It Means To Be A WOMAN isn't successful. Each song written for Lempicka builds the exact same way, modulating and climbing and modulating and climbing and climbing higher!! -- a shallow attempt to replicate 'The Wizard and I'/'Defying Gravity' combination of screaming for the rafters (but without Schwartz' skillset or musicality). Screaming, screaming, screaming -- this show is not performable eight times a week (because it's bad and sloppy), and someone from the creative or producing teams should have seen this issue coming a mile away. It is not pleasant to listen to people shriek! Lempicka spends half the show downstage center, literally screaming. (Watch out Rebecca Frecknall -- don't get any ideas!) Act Two loses any quirkiness and fades, slowly, into boring nothingness. The choreography is a constant liability -- horrible from start to end, lazily sliding in and out of "camp" without any intentionality or specificity. The ensemble sings well but have not been drilled to have any uniformity or clarity in their dancing, often sloppy. The design is misguided and often at war with itself -- vague suggestive unit sets with overly-simple scenic elements, projection design built like a powerpoint presentation ("HERE IS WHERE POLAND IS, HERE IS WHERE RUSSIA IS!"), lighting that doesn't pair with Chavkin's "slow motion" moments (bad, as you'd expect). It doesn't feel like a single creative team member spoke to one another, led by a director who ignored any responsibility to propel the acting, scenework, storytelling, visual pictures, or overall clarity of intent or mission. God bless commercial theatre. This ran and developed across multiple non-profits, but only in front of audiences who must pay to keep the doors open and lights on is it being revealed for the shambolic Frankenstein'd musical that it is. We need better art. The world demands better art. Surely, Lempicka herself would understand. |
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