Category Archives: Uncategorized

Harold Prince’s final bow

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  • Harold Prince’s final bow

It is frustrating that the last show presented by Harold Prince, the immensely influential Broadway producer and director who died yesterday at 91, will be the misconceived retrospective of his career, Prince of Broadway, that played mercifully short runs in Japan in 2015 and on Broadway in 2017.

That career is eminently worthy of a retrospective, encompassing some of the greatest musicals in Broadway history. Indeed, it is arguable that the entire trajectory of musical theater would have been different without him. As director, he changed the look and feel of musicals with productions like Cabaret, Company and Evita that took on weightier themes and bolder approaches than what was then the standard fare, changing the game for all subsequent musicals. The history of Broadway in the second half of the 20th century can’t be written without him.

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Encores! and… Millie??

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  • Encores! and… Millie??

What is Encores! thinking? New York City Center’s celebrated limited-run concert series of rarely performed Broadway musicals, offering starry casts and an onstage orchestra playing the original orchestrations, is either running low on imagination or falling victim to some serious governance issues. Its three shows for its 27th season next year include two eminently worthy choices in cult musical Mack & Mabel and the Kurt Weill-Alan Jay Lerner curiosity Love Life, along with – wait for it – the 2002 show Thoroughly Modern Millie, a limp adaptation of the limp 1960s film spoof.

What a letdown. Continue reading →

A Critical Companion to the American Stage Musical: Brief Review

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  • A Critical Companion to the American Stage Musical (Elizabeth L. Wollman)

6/11/18 (Mon)

I don’t have much to say about this one-note history of the American musical, which is more concerned with the minority content of the shows than their quality. It discusses West Side Story in some detail, for example, without ever mentioning dance, an odd omission to say the least for this groundbreaking dance drama. In the author’s mind, the musical’s only claim to fame is that it offers roles for Hispanic characters in what she sees as an overwhelmingly white art form. Never mind that those characters were themselves created by three white guys – or, for that matter, three Jewish guys or three gay guys, if that sounds any better (all of the above, in fact). Can’t Hispanics or others create their own shows? And my guess is that Hispanics were no more numerous in the audience at that musical than at any other show – they are still significantly underrepresented among Broadway audiences with respect to their population regardless of the show’s content. This concern for a show’s PC credentials permeates the book and becomes very tiresome.

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Cendrillon (Met Live)

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  • Cendrillon (Met Live)

6/3/18 (Sun), Tokyo

Massenet’s utterly charming 1899 French take on the Cinderella story, making an overdue debut at the Met in a production by Laurent Pelly. While not as memorable musically as Rossini’s Cinderella opera Cenerentola, it is more whimsical, magical and fun. I had higher hopes for the score after the supremely melodic ballet version of Manon at the ROH just several weeks earlier, but that was a piece created long after Massenet’s death and stitched together from various of his works, presumably taking all the good parts. The only truly impressive musical moments this time were the second-half love duet and the fairy godmother’s vocal acrobatics. Even so, the virtues of the show came through in spades, especially in this light-hearted production. It’s strange that it took so long for the Met to get to this gem, especially as this is a ready-made production that has been around since 2006 with the same Cinderella; it shouldn’t have taken 12 years to decide on this, much less nearly 120 years.

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The Exterminating Angel (Met Live)

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  • The Exterminating Angel (Met Live)

1/29/18 (Mon), Tokyo

British composer Thomas Adès’ new opera, based on the 1962 Buñuel film, was a big popular and critical success in Salzburg, London and New York, and I was eager to catch this Met Live production from last November. The source film, which I had somehow never seen, happened to be playing in Tokyo at a retrospective of Buñuel’s Mexican works, so I caught that the night before.

The story, a Beckett-like setup where fancy guests at a dinner party find themselves mysteriously unable to leave the room, didn’t seem a promising subject for a full opera. For one thing, it’s largely an ensemble piece with no real leads, less about individual characters than the breakdown of the social order and how people behave in extreme situations. The film wraps up in a brisk 90 minutes or so, suggesting that a one-act opera might be more appropriate. (That appears to be the approach that Stephen Sondheim and David Ives are taking in their musical version, which will combine this film with that other Buñuel dinner-party piece The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie.) The fact that this all takes place largely within the confines of a single room with the same costuming throughout also doesn’t suggest much in the way of scale or glamour. In any event, I was curious to see what Adès and his co-librettist Tom Cairns would make of this.

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Drum Tao

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  • Drum Tao

7/24/15 (Fri), Tokyo

A performance of Japanese taiko drums dressed up in a dramatic frame. Drum Tao is a group of young well-built drummers and athletes from Oita Prefecture in Kyushu that has apparently been around a while – the program (unusually distributed free) says they’ve performed in 400 cities in 20 countries. But they were new to me.

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Concert: Buena Vista Social Club

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  • Concert: Buena Vista Social Club

1/1/15 (Thurs), Havana

There were several venues advertising shows with BVSC members, who seem to form a large but loose group of son/salsa musicians. These shows have boomed since my last visit 15 years ago, maybe a sign of the expanding tourist trade. Locals didn’t know much about it, so I asked the hotel, which recommended this one. I had imagined a small, smoky, dodgy club, and the location, a decidedly un-touristy and yet-to-be renovated part of the old city, felt appropriate. But the theater was actually quite new and more like a fancy nightclub, with a large proscenium stage and runway. Dinners and snacks were available along with drinks, all of which were served throughout the show by waitresses in retro short lacy skirts.  Continue reading →

Barbra Streisand, Rod Stewart

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  • Barbra Streisand, 8/6/16 (Sat), Las Vegas, T-Mobile Arena
  • Rod Stewart, 8/7/16 (Sun), Las Vegas, Caesar’s Palace

Barbra was making the latest of her farewell concert tours, and I figured it was about time to see her. The hefty price tag was off-putting, especially since she’s far from her peak at age 74. But I still kick myself for missing my only chance to catch Frank Sinatra in his last tour of Japan (with Liza Minnelli and Sammy Davis Jr, no less) because I was too cheap to shell out ¥30,000. I’ve long decided: no more regrets. While I’m not a big Streisand fan – I only have one of her albums, a gift from a friend – she’s undeniably a star in her own universe with a strong catalog of hits. So I combined a business trip with a side visit to Las Vegas.  Continue reading →

Diana Krall

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Diana Krall

19 February 2016, Bangkok

I only know vaguely about Diana Krall: Canadian jazz pianist, blonde beauty, Julie London-type cool, married to Elvis Costello. I’ve heard scattered songs, such as her famous version of “The Look of Love”, and was never overly wowed. But with little else to do on a Friday night in Bangkok, this seemed as good a time as any to check her out for real. Continue reading →

La Fille Du Regiment (Met Live)

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La Fille Du Regiment (Met Live)

30 May 2008 (Fri), Tokyo

The final offering of this season’s Met Live opera film series of a performance from one month earlier. I had really been looking forward to this because of its star Natalie Dessay, who was so amazing in another Donizetti title role in the Met’s opener Lucia last October. I missed the film’s initial showing in Roppongi and wasn’t about to make the same mistake with this special encore performance. The theatre was quite full, but I got a nice seat from some lady with an extra ticket. (She seemed to pick me out of the line because she wanted to speak English. I was happy to oblige for a good seat.) She actually saw this performance live in NY last month and was so delighted that she wanted to watch it again. I took that as a good sign. Continue reading →