Re: Music Man 2 : Why?

Date: 17 Feb 2003 21:52:51 GMT
Newsgroups: rec.music.opera
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>How was Craig Bierko on Broadway?<
I thought he was okay. Although more generically handsome than Preston (the
overused word today is "hunky") he did not have the latter's assurance and
marvelous snakey charm. He also almost consistently did what I thought was a
shockingly blatant Preston vocal impression -- it really was very obvious, and
I was surprised that Susan Stroman allowed him to do it. Stroman is, to my
mind, extremely overrated -- I find her choreography frequently shapeless and
unfocused. In fairness, it must be extremely difficult for anyone to tackle a
show like this, with the excellent film version (with Onna White's fabulous
original choreography) so ingrained in the audience's mind. Audiences loved
the revival and I must admit that it was effective but I think a lot of that is
due to the show, one of the best-written of all musicals. As a sidenote, I
took a friend of mine who is a successful actress with a lot of off- and
off-off Broadway avant garde theater to her credit -- she would be the LAST
person I would expect to enjoy a corny commercial Broadway musical. She was
absolutely transported -- her eyes as big as a kid's at Christmas -- and at
intermission she gushed, "I had no IDEA this was so much fun!" So there you
have it.