I did not cry as much as I thought I would, and I think it's because they staged the ending differently than I'm used to. Yes, a main character dies (I won't say which character, in case you haven't seen the musical. And if you haven't seen the musical, I will just say, "Why?" It's a wonderful show.). However, one of the things that touches me the most and adds to the tears at the end is that members of both gangs that have been warring with each other come together to carry the body off stage. It takes the death of this character to make them realize how precious life is and it is a catalyst to possibly healing the rift between them. The culmination of all of that usually makes me bawl like a baby. Because they staged the ending differently, it didn't have quite the impact on me that it usually does, and I didn't cry as much. I hate to cry in public, but I missed that ending.
As for the rest of the production, I don't have too much to be critical about. MaryJoanna Grisso and Addison Reid Coe who played Maria and Tony respectively were very good. MaryJoanna had a beautiful, clear soprano voice, and Tony's voice was very pleasing. Michelle Alves as Anita was excellent. The dance numbers, based on Jerome Robbins original choreography were wonderful, as were the dancers who performed them. This is such a dance-heavy musical, and each number was performed brilliantly. It's wonderful to many iconic moves that are strongly associated with West Side Story.
This is the touring production of the most recent revival of the musical that opened on Broadway in 2009. The production was different from the original and previous revivals as a lot of the dialogue spoken by the Puerto Rican characters is in Spanish, and many lyrics were changed to Spanish also. I think it lent an air of authenticity, but it was a little frustrating not to be able to understand many of the things they said. I know a little Spanish, so I understood a bit, but I'm sure the majority of the audience didn't know any Spanish, and I don't know if they were frustrated about it.
There are many musicals that have been made into movies, and are changed in the process. Scenes are switched around, songs are moved or deleted, and new songs are added. Some community theaters want to change the stage production to match the movie that more people are familiar with (I've seen this done with The Sound of Music, and it makes me quite livid because you shouldn't change scripts just because you want to - it's against the copyright). I was so happy to see the original stage version of West Side Story. I love that the boys aren't in "America," that "Cool" is before the rumble, not after, and that "I Feel Pretty" is after the rumble, not before Tony comes to see Maria at the dress shop. The movie is very good, and the changes they made were appropriate for the film, but I like to see the stage production as it was originally written and performed on Broadway.
The production of The Sound of Music I was in did get permission to make changes to be more like the movie (otherwise we wouldn't have had minus tracks for the two additional songs), but they also kept some of the songs removed for the movie version, which I loved. I'm glad we started in the abbey (and not just because I got to sing the opening line alone, in the dark, center stage) rather than with Maria on the mountain. I think it worked well to move Lonely Goatherd to later so that they could make it a puppet show and use all of the double-cast kids each night who could be in all of the performances. Did I like every choice made for the production? No, but you never do.
ReplyDeleteIf you got permission, then I guess I can't be livid about that production. :) I suppose I like the stage and movie versions to be separate, because they are two different media, and you can do so much more in a movie than on stage, so it makes sense that they make changes when adapting a musical to film. But sometimes those changes don't work on stage.
DeleteI think people should be able to see the version that was written for the stage when they see the stage version even if changes made for the movie make sense and are good. That's why I was excited to see the original stage version of West Side Story, because I can see the movie anytime, but I can't see Jerome Robbins original version anytime.