Understudies

[The two articles below, both from “Datebook” in the San Francisco Chronicle, are about understudies in the theater.  I’ve posted on understudies before, in “'The Unique Experience of a Professional Broadway Understudy’” by Steve Adubato (published on Rick On Theater on 22 August 2018) and “Swings” (9 March 2016), a collection of pieces from Equity News. 

[As Backstage, the theater industry trade newspaper, puts it, “an understudy is a performer cast in the ensemble of a musical (or a minor role in a play) who is responsible for covering a supporting or lead role” (“Swing, Standby, Understudy: What You Need to Know” [Swing, Standby, Understudy: What's the Difference? | Backstage], 22 March 2022).  ‘Covering’ in this usage means, of course, ‘replacing temporarily.’

[A “swing,” as which some of the performers featured below served, is a kind of understudy, common in musicals, who “is an off-stage performer responsible for covering any number of ensemble tracks, sometimes as many as 12 or more.”  A third type of understudy is the “standby,” “an off-stage performer whose sole responsibility is to cover the lead (usually a star) in a production.”

[Backstage expanded its definitions: “An understudy is in fact in the cast of a show for every performance, generally in an ensemble track or less sizable principal role.  However, they also understudy a larger role and their track will be filled by a swing if and when they are called upon to play that larger part.”

[“A swing is responsible for learning a number of tracks—ensemble and principal—so they’re able to step in at a moment’s notice if anyone in the cast calls out.  In most cases, a swing will step into a member of the ensemble’s role when that person has stepped into the more principal role they understudied.  Most nights, a swing is not actually on stage—and yet, the role is largely considered to be one of the most challenging gigs in theater.”

[“A standby is similar to a swing in that they rarely actually perform.  Standbys are granted only the heftiest roles in theater and are there to do exactly that: standby in the event that the actor is unable to perform. . . .  They cover just one role and must be ready to tackle it at any time.”

[In addition to swings and understudies, I’ve posted articles on ROT that define, describe, or explain the efforts of theater workers about whom most non-theater people (whom one of my teachers dubbed “civilians”) know little—or even nothing at all.  On 7 September 2010, for instance, my friend Kirk Woodward posted an article on being a Broadway investor in “Broadway Angel.”

[Then, on 14 January 2014, I posted “Stage Hands,” a description of the work of stage managers and dance captains; in “Two (Back) Stage Pros” (30 June 2014).  I ran articles that profiled set designer Eugene Lee and wig-designer Paul Huntley and on 28 November 2015, I posted “Broadway’s Anonymous Stars,” an article about actors who replace original stars on stage.

[I followed those posts with articles on theatrical intimacy coordinators (26 May 2019, plus follow-ups) and a theater photographer and another dance captain (6 May 2020), reviewers (6 July 2020), and theater boards (11 November 2022).

[I have also run several series of articles from American Theatre magazine on theater artists such as lighting designers (24 October-11 November 2018] and sound designers (25 March-9 April 2021), among others, and even pros on the business side of theater like arts administrators (2-17 December 2020).] 

“BAY AREA ACTORS ON UNDERSTUDYING DURING OMICRON,
WHEN THEY’RE NEEDED AS NEVER BEFORE”
by Lily Janiak 

[This report appeared in “Datebook” online on 18 January 2022 (updated: 19 January 2022).  “Datebook” is the art and entertainment guide for in the San Francisco Bay Area—books, theater, music, pop culture, and more—in the SFChronicle.]

Theater always depends on understudies, but never more so than in the omicron [a variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19] winter.

In late December on Broadway, “The Music Man” lead actor Hugh Jackman gave a moving curtain-call tribute to the industry’s unsung heroes after understudy Kathy Voytko filled in for Sutton Foster.

[Jackman made his remarks after the fourth preview performance on 23 December 2021, the night Voytko stepped in for Foster, who had tested positive for COVID.]

“I’m emotional because it humbles me — the courage, the brilliance, the dedication, the talent,” Jackman said in the widely circulated speech. “The swings, the understudies — they are the bedrock of Broadway.”

At around the same time, though, Broadway League President Charlotte St. Martin made comments (for which she later apologized) in a Hollywood Reporter interview theorizing that one reason some shows were closing was that some understudies “aren’t as efficient in delivering the role as the lead is” or weren’t as experienced.

[St. Martin’s comments appeared in “Broadway Boss Reveals Industry Plan Amid Omicron: ‘We’re Not Closing’” by Abby White, 20 December 2021.  St. Martin retired as Broadway League president in February 2024.]

These two incidents span extremes of the understudy experience. Understudies are hailed as saviors; they’re overlooked or disparaged as makeshifts.

For understudies in the Bay Area right now, as the variant makes them more in demand than ever, the reality is even more complicated.

For musicals at large companies and on Broadway, there’s an elaborate taxonomy for understudying. An umbrella term is “covering.” An “understudy” will usually already be performing an unnamed part in the ensemble but be prepared to cover for a named character. A “standby” waits offstage but is also prepared to cover a lead character. A “swing” can cover any track in the ensemble. At smaller companies, “understudy” might cover all these roles.

“Your job as the understudy is to keep the show open so that the work that all these other performers did can still happen,” said San Francisco actor Nic A. Sommerfeld, who’s understudied locally five times, including stepping up four times in Marin Theatre Company’s “Georgiana and Kitty: Christmas at Pemberley” this winter.

“There can be the stress of whether you match up, whether you’re quote-unquote ‘as good,’” Sommerfeld added, “and I don’t think that attitude is as helpful as just remembering that what you’re doing is making the show have another performance.” 

That doesn’t mean that understudying isn’t artistic, noted Vishal Vaidya, who’s currently understudying for John Gallagher Jr. in Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s “Swept Away” while also serving as an ensemble member.

“Someone like John Gallagher is a magical actor,” he said. “I can’t re-create that magic; I have to find my own magic.”

“Understudying is a blend,” he went on. “You don’t want the audience or the other actors to really feel like so much is different, because you have to honor the show that was built, but in order to honor the truth of the acting, you have to give it your flavor.”

Sommerfeld, who uses plural pronouns, found themself delving deeper into craft as they kept covering for principal actor Zahan F. Mehta, who had a back injury.

“The first show was just about making it happen. It was honestly a blur to me,” they said.

Their character happened to be a nervous person, so they were able to draw on their own in-the-moment feelings. “But by the fourth time I did the show, I found myself almost wishing I was getting notes,” they recalled. “I was starting to lean into certain moments and, other than audience reaction, didn’t really know what worked.”

San Francisco freelance casting director and Casting Collective founding member Laura Espino, who this season is casting San Francisco Playhouse’s shows, said that understudying demands a special kind of artist.

“You have to be satisfied with just playing the part in front of your closet mirror in your bedroom — and do it just as well,” she said.

Understudies have to deal with at least as much stress for a fraction of the glory and usually less pay. Self-motivation is key.

“You are the rehearsal process,” Espino said. “You are your director.”

Still, there can be great joy in it. San Francisco actor Michael Phillis recalled going on as understudy in his favorite role in his favorite play — Prior Walter in “Angels in America” — at Berkeley Rep in 2018.

“Your whole career flashes before your eyes,” he said. “You’re about to prove what all that money and study and struggle to be an actor was for.”

But there can also be deep concern for a lead actor who’s hurt or sick. Actor Kenny Toll, who’s now based in New York, remembered filling in for Joe Estlack, who had a back injury, during two technical rehearsals for “Bonnie & Clyde” at Shotgun Players, with the possibility that he might have to perform as well. He was ready to help — it was his job — but Toll and everyone else’s concern for Estlack, who soon recovered, cast a pall.

“Understudying is not as glorious or wonderful as it’s often portrayed,” Toll said. “It was a really awful thing. (The show) was Joe’s piece. That piece of theater was built for his body.”

Understudying demands extraordinary memory. San Francisco actor Rodney Earl Jackson Jr. has worked in various understudy capacities in several Broadway shows and tours — “Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations,” “Motown: The Musical,” “The Book of Mormon” and, most recently, “A Christmas Carol” at BroadwaySF’s Golden Gate Theatre. In “Ain’t Too Proud,” he had to know all five harmonies of the five Temptations; he also had to memorize separate choreographies — who entered on beats one, three, five and so on.

“I’ve got to have the mental capacity and gymnastics to switch between them,” he said.

Jacob Keith Watson, another “Swept Away” ensemble member and understudy, says that his many years of understudying and swinging have given him an odd skill.

“I call it ‘swing brain,’ where you accidentally know other people’s stuff,” he said. It comes from having to learn where and how to enter and exit, to grab and deposit every prop, all by watching from afar instead of doing it himself.

“Randomly, someone will be like, ‘I don’t remember where I come in,’ and out of nowhere, I’ll be like, ‘Oh, you come in stage left. Couldn’t tell you why I know that. I just saw it once, and it stuck in my brain.’ ”

That skill comes somewhat in handy right now in rehearsal, when his ensemble role in “Swept Away” requires him to be asleep and keep his eyes closed for a long stretch — time when in an ideal world he’d be simultaneously observing Wayne Duvall, the actor he’s understudying. “I can kind of hear that he’s stage right,” Watson said.

Right now, Espino said, the bulk of her work at the Casting Collective — a small, new local outfit — is finding understudies, as a result of concerns about the omicron variant. The increased likelihood that an understudy will go on, she added, is tantamount to having to cast a role twice.

At Berkeley Rep, Vaidya, Watson and other understudies don’t go anywhere besides their hotel or the theater. They know that if they took risks, they’d risk everyone else’s health too. They’re also aware that these gigs, with a greater chance that at some point they’ll have to perform, could mean exposing themselves to contagion. Yet union actors don’t qualify for health insurance unless they work a certain number of weeks per year, which complicates the calculus for any job opportunity.

Still, Vaidya spoke with calm pragmatism about the possibility of filling in: “I’m ready, but I’m still going to feel like I’m shot out of a cannon.”

[Lily Janiak is the San Francisco Chronicle’s theater reviewer.] 

*  *  *  *
“‘ASTONISHMENT, HORROR AND GLEE’:
BAY AREA UNDERSTUDIES RECOUNT ON- AND OFFSTAGE DRAMA”
by Lily Janiak 

[The second article from “Datebook” was also posted to the SFChronicle’s website on 18 January 2022.  It continues the conversation about understudying with actors in the Bay Area.  Below this article is a list of the theaters and shows mentioned in the two Chronicle articles.]

Everyone loves an understudy story — when the drama behind the scenes rivals and perhaps heightens what’s onstage, when the art form reveals how the sausage is made, when routine evaporates and every gesture, glance and line crackles with danger and life.

This winter, as the omicron variant makes the industry rely on understudies as never before, The Chronicle solicited Bay Area performers (or those with local ties) for their all-time favorite understudy memories. Here are a few, including one where actor Vinh G. Nguyen understudied in two different shows in one day:

Name: Valerie Weak

Understudy role: Viola in TheatreWorks’ “Twelfth Night,” 2007

“I had a dream where I had to go on last minute. It was terrifying, and in the dream there was a problem with me fitting into the costume. I woke up before I had to deliver any lines. I realized it had only been a dream. Then I realized it was June. The show had run the previous December and had been closed for six months. Understudying is an exercise in anxiety!”

Name: Alex Moggridge

Understudy role: Shakespeare in ACT’s “The Beard of Avon,” 2002

“At the end of the first act, Shakespeare has a gorgeous speech where he suddenly shows his amazing poetic side for the first time, impressing the hell out of the Earl of Oxford, played by Marco Barricelli. On my first performance, I completely biffed that speech. Like, it was gone. I have no idea what I said, but it was not what (playwright) Amy Freed wrote, and it was definitely not poetic.

I’ll always remember the look Marco — who I kind of worshiped and badly wanted to impress — gave me when he delivered his line in response. The line was ‘That’s not bad.’ And it was so bad. It was so, so bad. Marco’s look was a beautiful combination of astonishment, horror and glee. He almost winked at me.”

Name: Laura Domingo

Understudy role: Maria in Fairfield Civic Theatre’s “Lend me a Tenor,” 2013

“I played Maria in ‘Lend Me a Tenor’ originally with Ross Valley Players in the fall of 2012. Then in late January, now-defunct Fairfield Civic Theatre was about to open their own production when their Maria got a really bad case of the flu during tech week. It hadn’t been that long since I’d played the role, so the lines definitely came back quickly.

I think every actor has that period after a show has closed and you’ve had some space from it where you sit and think of all the things you would have done differently with the character, if you could do it all over again. And this was my opportunity to make some of those adjustments!”

Name: Benjamin Ismail

Understudy role: Damis in Berkeley Rep’s “Tartuffe,” 2015

“As soon as the cast arrived for Berkeley rehearsals, I was tapped that I’d potentially be going on for almost an entire week of performances.

[Berkeley Rep’s Tartuffe was a co-production with Costa Mesa, California’s South Coast Repertory and Washington, D.C.’s Shakespeare Theatre Company following the Berkeley mounting. The cast of the production was drawn from all three regions and assembled in each city for each presentation.]

I immediately drove down from Sacramento, learned the lines and blocking in (stage manager) Michael Suenkel’s office and was thrown onstage after watching one run. It was the fastest I think my brain has ever worked: trying to synthesize everything I was seeing and convert the actor’s choices into my versions of the same moments, do intricate blocking and — oh, yeah — say things. I was terrified and electrified.

Apparently they liked what I did because that led to a lovely relationship with Berkeley Rep and several more roles, including Louis Ironson in ‘Angels in America,’ an experience which will probably live in the most special corner of my heart for the rest of my life. And it all really ‘started’ with my shot as an understudy.”

Name: Mark Jackson

Understudy role: Characters in Shotgun Players’ “The Death of Meyerhold,” 2004

“I wrote and directed but did not perform — until one night an actor got sick, and the next night with 30 minutes notice I went on. Harrowing.

With 80 characters for the cast of 12 to play, and scenic changes also being actor-driven, the offstage show was as tightly choreographed as the onstage show. Moments of ‘break’ were rare. I have memories of seeing actors standing in the wings, beautifully lit by ambient light from onstage, closing their eyes for a precious few-seconds-long meditation before then leaping out into action. I already admired that cast for the depth of commitment and enthusiasm they brought to that piece (but) seeing their backstage ‘show’ up close, and especially the various ways in which they helped fold me into it on the fly, to keep me and the piece on track, only heightened my appreciation for what they had accomplished.

The next night when the actor returned, I was never so happy to see another human being in my life!”

Name: Vinh G. Nguyen

Understudy roles: Hilarion in Bay Area Children’s Theatre’s “Gold: The Midas Musical” and a male ensemble track in Palo Alto Players’ “Flower Drum Song,” 2019

“On one particular Saturday, I went on for two performances for ‘Gold’ in the morning and afternoon. One of the actors knew he was going to be out. I did my homework, came in, and they did a put-in rehearsal, which was nice.

I drove to ‘Flower Drum,’ and we knew that one of my castmates had injured himself the performance before, but we didn’t know how bad it was until the next day. I got a call. I ended up covering for him, along with my track. Luckily, my other track didn’t have to be onstage for the book scenes, so I just learned it really quick and hopped on. It was crazy, crazy, crazy.

As human beings we are so adaptable. I think we give ourselves less credit than we deserve. As a director, one of the things I’m very proud of is I’m very decisive. I can make a decision on the spot and back up my artistic decision and articulate that very clearly. I think some of that had to do with my experience as an actor and the times when I was swinging and had to direct myself and see what is the best course of action that will benefit the show and the bigger picture.”

Name: Lauri Smith

Understudy role: Becky in Berkeley Rep’s “Becky Nurse of Salem,” 2019

“My now-fiance and I  were hosting a football-watching party. The 49ers were playing the Seattle Seahawks. We had a bunch of people arriving at our house at 5 p.m. At around 5:15, somebody noticed that I wasn’t having anything to drink. I looked at my watch, and I said, ‘I have to wait until 6:35 for a 7 o’clock show, just on the off-chance that something happens.’ I swear to you, my phone rang when I finished that sentence. I saw the name on the phone, and it said Michael Suenkel. Michael said, ‘I really wish I was making this call in a couple of weeks.’

We had had one understudy rehearsal but hadn’t even finished it. They didn’t have clothes for me, so he started naming, ‘Can you bring a pair of shoes? Can you bring a pair of jeans? Can you bring a shirt of your own?’ I had to drive to the theater in the pouring rain, and, rapid-fire, the lines were going through my head. 

I wear a necklace around my neck most days that has a charm that says ‘Believe,’ a penguin charm, and then the third charm is an infinity symbol with my mother’s ashes in it. I took it off and laid it in my spot in front of the mirror. ‘Becky Nurse’ was so much about magic. It was sort of like I was tapping into my mother and my ancestors and their power to help give me a little extra something. I even remember thinking of Pamela (Reed, the lead actor) several blocks away. She had said something about being the channel for the role to speak through her. It was almost like I was like, ‘OK, Pamela, if you could direct some energy a couple of blocks this way so that I could be the channel tonight?’

During the first monologue, there was a moment in the middle where I finished a sentence, and I had no idea what came next. I inhaled. A thought came to me. I knew it wasn’t the next line, but it popped into my head and I just kept going.

Afterward, I had so much adrenaline going through me. I felt like I was going to be up until 4 in the morning. I wanted to do it again.”

Name: Mary Lins

Understudy role: The Baker’s Wife in Berkeley Playhouse’s “Into the Woods,” 2021

“On Thursday, at around 5 o’clock, we made the final call. That started my clock. I left all of my managing director duties and had about 26, 27 hours before curtain.

I have a background in performing — I went to school for it — but it had been 20 years. It’s a big role, and it’s Sondheim. With the timing of his death, for me there was an element of truly wanting to honor that work. As a staff member at the theater, there’s also a piece of, ‘I still have to show up for work on Monday.’

I was already off book. It was basically like auditing a class. I had sat through a lot of rehearsals, but I had not been on my feet. It was like reading and memorizing an entire textbook on how to ride a bike but never actually having hopped on a bike.

I had to make this choice to trust, and it paid off in this really human way, especially after having a couple of years where we’re separated from others.

Every time I walked backstage with the other cast members, it was like the wildest pep rally of my life. I felt like I had gotten to crowd surf through the show.

The challenge and the joy of theater really is a practice of people coming corporately together and making it happen. As a managing director, I’m looking at rights and royalties, contact lists and budgets. But to actually have the honor of embodying the thing that I’m usually managing was such a gift.”

[Below are lists of the Bay Area theaters and productions named in the two SFChronicle articles above.  I’ve listed them in the order of the reports; if I could find a web address for the theater, I’ve included it in the information noted.]

BROADWAY PRODUCTIONS

The Music Man: Winter Garden Theatre, 10 February 2022-15 January 2023

Ain’t Too Proud: Imperial Theatre, 21 March 2019-16 January 2022

Motown: Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, 14 April 2013-18 January 2015

Book of Momon: Eugene O’Neill Theatre, 24 March 2011-Present

BAY AREA THEATERS

Marin Theatre Company (https://www.marintheatre.org/) – 397 Miller Avenue, Mill Valley, CA 94941-2885; (415) 388-5200; e-mail: info@marintheatre.org

Berkeley Repertory Theatre (aka: Berkeley Rep; https://www.berkeleyrep.org/) – Admin Offices: 999 Harrison Street, Berkeley CA 94710; (510) 647-2900; e-mail: customerservice@berkeleyrep.org

San Francisco Playhouse (https://www.sfplayhouse.org) – 450 Post Street, San Francisco, CA 94102; (415) 677-9596; e-mail: info@sfplayhouse.org

Shotgun Players (https://shotgunplayers.org/) – 1901 Ashby Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94703; (510) 841-6500, ext. 303; e-mail: boxoffice@shotgunplayers.org

BroadwaySF Golden Gate Theatre (aka: Golden Gate Theatre; https://www:broadwaysf.com) – 1 Taylor Street, San Francisco, CA 94102; booking house, no resident company; (888) 746-1799; e-mail: feedback@broadwaysf.com

TheatreWorks (aka: TheatreWorks Silicon Valley; https://theatreworks.org/) – Admin Offices: 350 Twin Dolphin Drive, Suite 127, Redwood City, San Mateo County, CA 94065; (877) 662- 8978; e-mail: boxoffice@theatreworks.org

American Conservatory Theatre (aka: ACT; https://www.act-sf.org/) –  415 Geary Street, San Francisco, CA 94102; Box Office: (415) 749-2228; e-mail: tickets@act-sf.org

Fairfield Civic Theatre – community theater in Fairfield, Solano County, California; now defunct (before 2021)

Ross Valley Players (http://www.rossvalleyplayers.com/) – 30 Sir Francis Drake Boulevard, Ross, Marin County, CA 94957; Admin Office (415) 456-9555 ext. 3

Bay Area Children’s Theatre – closed in 2023; formerly located in Oakland, California

Palo Alto Players (https://paplayers.org/) – Lucie Stern Theater, 1305 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto, CA 94301; (650) 329-0891; e-mail: info@paplayers.org

Berkeley Playhouse (https://berkeleyplayhouse.org/) – 2640 College Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94704; Main Office  (510) 845-8542; boxoffice@berkeleyplayhouse.org

BAY AREA PRODUCTIONS

Georgiana and Kitty: by Lauren M. Gunderson and Margot Melcon; Marin Theatre Company; 18 November-19 December 2021 (world première)

Swept Away: book by John Logan, music and lyrics by The Avett Brothers; Berkeley Rep; 9 January-13 March 2022

Angels in America: by Tony Kushner; Berkeley Rep; 17 April-22 July 2018

Bonnie & Clyde: by Adam Peck; Shotgun Players; 17 August-19 September 2013

Christmas Carol: by Jack Thorne; Golden Gate Theatre; 26 November-26 December 2021

Twelfth Night: by William Shakespeare (et al.); TheatreWorks Silicon Valley (@ Lucie Stern Theatre, Palo Alto); 28 November-23 December 2007

The Beard of Avon: by Amy Freed; ACT; 10 January-10 February 2002

Lend Me a Tenor: by Ken Ludwig; Fairfield Civic Theatre; January 2013 (I could find no detailed record of this show by the now-defunct theater troupe; it was named in an article on the production and coverage of local theater awards, the Arty Awards of Solano and Napa Counties, but its performance dates weren’t reported)

                   Ross Valley Players; 11 September-12 October 2012

Tartuffe: by Molière; Berkeley Rep (co-production with South Coast Repertory [9 May-8 June 2015] of Costa Mesa, California, and Shakespeare Theatre Company [2 June-5 July 2015] of Washington, D.C.; I can’t reconcile the overlap of the dates of the closing at SCR and the opening at STC); 13 March-12 April 2015

The Death of Meyerhold: by Mark Jackson; Shotgun Players; 11-28 December 2003/7-25 January 2004 (world première)

Gold: The Midas Musical: book, music, and lyrics by Min Kahng; Bay Area Children’s Theatre; 23 February-12 May 2019 (world première)

Flower Drum Song: book by Oscar Hammerstein II, music and lyrics by Richard Rodgers; Palo Alto Players; 26 April-12 May 2019

Becky Nurse of Salem: by Sarah Ruhl; Berkeley Rep; 19 December 2019-26 January 2020 (world première)

Into the Woods: book by James Lapine, music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim; Berkeley Playhouse; 19 November-23 December 2021

An Odd Coupling

by Kirk Woodward

[In his first contribution to Rick on Theater since the start of the year (“Keeping Up with Mr. Dylan,” 1 January), my friend Kirk Woodward is taking a perhaps surprising look at two popular plays by two esteemed playwrights—and finding profound commonalities between them.  

[Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Sunday in the Park with George, a musical about a renowned 19th-century painter and his 20th-century descendant, and Neil Simon’s The Sunshine Boys, a comedy about two aging comics, are not only two different plays, they’re two different kinds of plays.

[Kirk’s been contributing to ROT since the earliest days of the blog—I started it largely at his suggestion—so I’ve gotten used to his proclivity of looking at things from unexpected perspectives.  “An Odd Coupling” is no exception.  You will find here an interesting and provocative look at art, artists, and personal relationships.]

Over a period of a few weeks I saw productions of the musical Sunday in the Park with George and the play The Sunshine Boys and noticed a connection between the two, which I will describe here, partly to clarify the matter for my friends who, I believe, think I have lost my mind. 

Sunday in the Park with George, of course, is the 1983 musical with a book by James Lapine (b. 1949) and music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim (1930-1921). The first act of the musical dramatizes the efforts of the painter Georges Seurat (1859-1891) to create his large (6.6 feet by 9.8 feet) pointillist masterpiece A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte.

The second act of Sunday presents a contemporary art scene and the efforts of one of Seurat’s mistress’s descendants to make his own mark in the world of art.

The Sunshine Boys is a 1972 play by Neil Simon (1927-2018) about the efforts of a pair of mostly retired vaudevillians to work together after an acrimonious breakup eleven years earlier.

From these brief descriptions, connections between the two works may not be obvious. Since Neil Simon wrote plays based “odd couples,” mismatched relationships, we might think of these two pieces as an “odd couple,” or perhaps an “odd coupling.” 

However, there is a theme common to both shows (or, more accurately, to one show and one act of the other), a theme presented in the poem “The Choice” by Wiliam Butler Yeats (1865-1939), the first four lines of which read:

The intellect of man is forced to choose
Perfection of the life, or of the work,
And if it take the second must refuse
A heavenly mansion, raging in the dark.

In both plays discussed here, an artist finds his (all concerned are men) life so impacted by his art that relationships with other people, particularly with those closest to him, are almost impossible to maintain.

In Sunday, the relationship in question is between Georges, the painter, and Dot, his mistress. She would give anything for an affectionate relationship with him, but he is obsessed with his painting, for which she is modeling. Ultimately she leaves him; he doesn’t seem to understand exactly why, but he is so wedded to his craft that he is unwilling to do anything about it.

In Sunshine the two former vaudevillians, Al Lewis and Louie Clark, once the team of “Lewis and Clark,” are so wedded to comedy patter that it’s no longer possible for them to have a conversation without resorting to gags and punchlines.

In the process they have gotten so tired of each other that when offered an opportunity to perform together again for money and prestige, they can’t manage to work together at all. Insults are pretty much the sum total of their communication with each other, and with everyone else.

Both plays raise the question of whether it’s worthwhile to sacrifice life for art. We can ask, is this a genuine choice? There are a number of ways to look at this question. A starting point might be a comment that the poet W. H. Auden (1907-1973) made on Yeats’ poem. Auden questioned whether “perfection” was possible in either art or life. He doubted that it was.

His question seems relevant to say the least. Is Yeats saying that perfection is possible, either in art or in life? What does “perfection” mean – perfection in terms of what? What would perfection look like? Since we are – I would say – imperfect people, how would we even recognize perfection if we saw it?

In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare (1564-1616) has a character say that

                                 as imagination bodies forth
            The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen
            Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
            A local habitation and a name.

Art makes “local” – it brings to a particular time and place – the material that it draws on. Under those conditions what could “perfection” mean? The artist who aims for some kind of abstract success is almost certainly headed for disappointment. George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), for example, intended his giant five-play series Back to Methuselah (see “Re-Reading Shaw – Plays from 1918 to 1933” by Kirk Woodward, 23 August 2016) to be a “world classic.” Some of his plays are; those particular five are not.

If “perfect” art isn’t possible, surely on the other hand “good work” is not only possible but is frequently created, possibly even without the artist’s “raging in the dark.”

The playwright Noël Coward (1899-1973) surely spoke for many artists when he said, in his introduction to the first collection of his works, Play Parade (1933), that his aim in writing was to do work of which he could be proud, and, by so doing, to earn his living. The relative modesty of those ambitions lacks the drama of Yeats’ formulation, but is achievable.

Mentioning Coward leads to another way of considering the question of the roles of art and life, and that is to consider the question from the point of view of the artist’s relationships, not to art, but to people. Coward, to continue with his example, was a sociable, companiable person, with too many friends to count.

Not everyone is Noël Coward, of course – probably a good thing for all of us, as I’m sure he’d admit – but his career does demonstrate that the split between life and art in the characters in Sunday and Sunshine is somewhat hyperbolical.

In both Sunday and Sunshine the choice between art and life is absolute and drastic. Are there no artists who are able to maintain good relationships with others, including those closest to them? Or – as I suppose some would argue – is no one (other than Coward) able to maintain such relationships?

I don’t know the answer to those questions, and any answer surely would be a matter of opinion. Clearly choosing to do any one thing means choosing not to do something else at that moment – if, say, I want to play the piano for half an hour, in that time frame I won’t be able to play with the dog.

However, there’s some degree of difficulty in any relationship, and people handle many of those difficulties successfully – otherwise there would probably be few of us around. Both Sunday and Sunshine present either/or cases – they seem to suggest that one utterly succeeds with a relationship, or utterly fails.

And there’s something else in the situations presented in the two plays that gives one pause. Are we talking about art in this discussion, or are we simply looking at psychological states? To be specific, isn’t Seurat obsessive, as described in the dictionary: “Having an idea or thought that continually preoccupies or intrudes on one’s mind.”

His obsession is his pointillist style of art: “A technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of color are applied in patterns to form an image.”

Such a style of painting would be attractive to someone with obsessive tendencies, and they could easily take over that person’s life – one estimate is that the Sunday Afternoon painting contains some 220,000 dots! How much of Seurat’s accomplishment is simply due to an obsessive temperament?

The question, of course, is unfair; all art works are created by somebody, just as all artist works are something (even if that “something” is nothing more than a thought, as in Conceptual Art), and everyone has human traits. The point is, though, that Sunday presents Georges entirely as an artist dedicated to his art, where another observer might advise more time off, or less coffee.

And aren’t Al and Louie, in Sunshine, compulsive in their need to turn every action, every sentence, every thought into comedy? The dictionary says that compulsion is “an irresistible urge.” Louie (and Al, but to a much lesser extent as we see him) simply has to verbally slap anybody he talks with, at the expense of anything else, including career, money, and personal relationships.

Neil Simon might agree with this diagnosis, although I doubt that he would emphasize it; as mentioned earlier, his principal concern is to present people who simply can’t get along with each other, and yet have to somehow. But, again, one can ask if we’re not dealing, not just with art (in this case comedy), but with severe neurosis.

Or are they the same? Laura Thipphawong, in her article “Art Theory: Freudian Psychoanalysis” (artshelp.com), writes that

To view art not as material, but as evidence of the most inaccessible features of the mind, transcended art into the realm of endless philosophical possibilities, as complex, frustrating, and challenging as the mind itself.

It would be pointless to name painters and comedians who, as far as we can tell, have maintained at least outwardly successful and apparently happy relationships and marriages. No one can really know what’s the actual state of a marriage – sometimes not even of the state of one’s own.

Still, I am reluctant to generalize from Sunday and Sunshine to a general admiration of people who end up sacrificing everything for their art (or for anything else – one can find such behavior in business, in social relationships, in hobbies – in practically anything, actually). In fact, neither of those shows actually end up doing that, although they come close.

Many plays present a protagonist who makes a choice that flies in the face of convention, law, family, or many other things. Sunday and Sunshine are not alone in that. Both those shows focus on artists; art is not the only arena in which people act in ways that may be considered heroic or, alternately, obsessive or compulsive or both.

As a matter of fact, when discussing Sunday, we’re only talking about its first act. In the second act, as I interpret it, the theme of art versus life is barely touched on. We hear that George, Dot’s great-grandson, is divorced, and we see his wife, but that relationship is not presented in any detail.

Instead, George, in Act II, is primarily focused on something to create art about. There is a suggestion that he will find his inspiration in life if he looks for it. However, this suggestion is at most peripheral to the large conflict between art and life presented in the first act.

And in Sunshine, Louis and Al at the very end of the play manage to achieve at least a working arrangement – they will continue to joke and jab, but they will talk. This, and the faint suggestion of a new path at the end of Sunday, are the only signs in the two shows that perhaps art and personal life don’t need to be such complete opposites after all.

In Sunday Georges never gets to evaluate his choice (and in fact he died abruptly when he was only 31), but a later George at least begins to. In Sunshine it’s almost too late for adjustments, but maybe Louis and Al have a chance.

Artists have to take their own paths; none of us has any business telling them what they ought to do, and in return we are free to make our own decisions about the results. The relative values we put on work and on personal relationships in our own lives, of course, are choices we have to make for ourselves.

"The 25 Worst Broadway Musicals of the Millennium"

by Adam Feldman and David Cote 

[Are you like me?  Do you indulge in a bit of Schadenfreude, just for fun now and then?

[Okay, I don’t really take pleasure in someone else’s bad luck.  But sometimes, when it’s anonymous—and brought on by a touch of arrogance or predictable stupidity, it can be a little fun to wallow.  If that’s you, then you’ll enjoy this article, a catalogue of flop Broadway musicals from between 2001 and 2021.  The list and the review excerpts are compiled by a couple of reviewers from Time Out New York. 

[The shows labeled the “worst Broadway musicals of the millennium” are all the product of some really bad thinking.  I managed to have stayed away from all of them because not one of them sounded like something I’d want to sit through.  For the most part, apparently, I wasn’t alone.  (The reviewers had to go, more’s the pity.)

[The article, which unfortunately lacks the past two years, appeared on Time Out New York’s website on 9 February 2022.  All excerpts from reviews are from TONY and many are online.  (Jason Zinoman, who reviewed the first two productions on the list; Adam Feldman; and David Cote, were or are staff reviewers for the weekly entertainment magazine.)]

Once you’ve seen these song-and-dance bombs, you can’t un-see them. Here are the worst Broadway musicals since 2000.

When it comes to Broadway musicals, we try to accentuate the positive. We cheer for breakthroughs such as Hamilton [Lin-Manuel Miranda; Richard Rodgers Theatre; 6 August 2015-Present; 2,989 performances (as of 21 April 2024); directed by Thomas Krail; choreographed by Andy Blankenbuehler; 15 Tony nominations, 11 awards]. We get misty-eyed when the Tony Awards hand out prizes. We curate a list of the best Broadway shows to share our enthusiasms. But anyone who loves song-and-dance spectacles has a dark side: There’s a flop vulture in each of us, keeping track of the dumbest, tackiest and most misguided musicals we’ve ever seen. Hence this list, a chronological reckoning of the worst Broadway musicals since 2000—a mix of awkward sentimentality, crimes against literature, bottom-scraping jukebox shows and deeply misconceived film-to-musical adaptations. Together, they represent more than 50 hours of agony, boredom and embarrassment in the theater. Yet today, we present them and say: Enjoy!

[1] Thou Shalt Not

Director Susan Stroman was on fire after the runaway success of 2001’s The Producers, but she doused her momentum in shallow water later that year at the helm of Harry Connick Jr.’s musical tragedy, set in 1940s New Orleans.

[The Producers: Mel Brooks and Thomas Meehan; St. James Theatre; 19 April 2001-22 April 2007; 2,502 performances; directed and choreographed by Stroman; 12 Tonys, including Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score, and Best Direction of a Musical.]

Opening date: October 25, 2001 [closed: 6 January 2002]

Performances: 85

From Jason Zinoman’s review: ”Lincoln Center’s vulgar adaptation of Emile Zola’s Thérèse Raquin is a misguided laughingstock of the variety that only Broadway can produce. Thou Shalt Not is a story of murder, greed and sin—with a little tap dancing thrown in.”

[Record (from IBDB): Plymouth Theatre; book by David Thompson, music and lyrics by Harry Connick, Jr.; directed and choreographed by Susan Stroman; no awards, nominated for 2002 Tony for Best Original Musical Score.

[Thou Shalt Not must not be confused with Thérèse Raquin, a straight play based on the same 1868 novel by Émile Zola.  It played at Studio 54 from 29 October 2015 to 3 January 2016, running for 75 regular performances.  It was written by Helen Edmundson and directed by Evan Cabnet; Keira Knightley made her Broadway début in the title role.  The criticism was middling to poor, with a few cheers in the mix.  The production was nominated for a 2016 Tony for Best Scenic Design of a Play (for Beowulf Boritt), but didn’t win.]

[2] Dance of the Vampires 

Michael Crawford sucked hard as an aristocratic neck-biter pursued by a vampire hunter somewhere in the Carpathian Mountains. The bombastic, campy score was by Jim Steinman, including his hit “Total Eclipse of the Heart.”

Opening date: December 9, 2002 [closed: 25 January 2003]

Performances: 56

From Jason Zinoman’s review: ”Subtle, this ain’t. The overamped Vampires doesn’t just preach that bigger is better. Louder, brighter and hammier work too. Why have one dancing vampire, when you can crowd the stage with half a dozen Draculas kickin’ up their heels?” 

[Record: Minskoff Theatre; book by David Ives, Jim Steinman, and Michael Kunze; music and lyrics by Steinman; based on the 1967 film The Fearless Vampire Killers by Roman Polanski; directed by John Rando; choreographed by John Carrafa; no awards or nominations.]

[3] Urban Cowboy

A Texas honky-tonk with a mechanical bull (stay on it and win a cash prize) was the main setting for this country & western rom-com about a woman who has to choose between an ex-con and a hardworkin’ good ole boy.

Opening date: March 27, 2003 [closed: 18 May 2003]

Performances: 60

From David Cote’s review: ”When not relying on pop-country classics and bump ‘n’ grind line-dancing extravaganzas, the flimsy book veers between dumb jokes and pathetic stabs at character development. Woe betide anyone hankering for a well-crafted musical. You’d be looking for art in all the wrong places.” 

[Record: Broadhurst Theatre; book by Aaron Latham and Phillip Oesterman; based on the 1980 film directed by James Bridges; stage adaptation directed by Lonny Price; choreographed by Melinda Price; two Tony nominations, no awards.]

[4] Dracula[, the Musical]

Hoping to reproduce the success of his awful but long-running Jekyll & Hyde, composer Frank Wildhorn returned to Broadway with a synth-heavy, ultrabombastic musical fright fest that had critics running for rhetorical garlic.

[Jekyll & Hyde: Leslie Bricusse and Frank Wildhorn; Plymouth Theatre; 28 April 1997-7 January 2001; 1,543 performances; directed by Robin Phillips; choreographed by Joey Pizzi; four Tony nominations, no awards.]

[Dracula, the Musical should not be confused with the successful revival of the 1927 non-musical play, Dracula by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston, that ran at the Martin Beck Theatre from 20 October 1977 to 6 January 1980 (925 performances).  That production was directed by Dennis Rosa with Frank Langella in the title role and set and costume designs by macabre cartoonist Edward Gorey.  The show won 1978 Tonys for Best Costume Design and Most Innovative Production of a Revival.]

Opening date: August 19, 2004 [closed: 2 January 2005]

Performances: 157

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”Dracula plays like the longest and drippiest Meat Loaf video [e]ver, a dunderheaded pseudoromance that travesties Bram Stoker’s novel. (A Dracula who emerges from his coffin to sing ‘It’s hard to make each moment count when you’re alone / Maybe that’s all I need to know’ is unlikely to strike fear into anyone except those with taste in lyrics.)” 

[Record: Belasco Theatre; book by Don Black and Christopher Hampton; music by Frank Wildhorn; lyrics by Black and Hampton; based on 1897 Bram Stoker story; directed by Des McAnuff; choreographed by Mindy Cooper; no awards or nominations.]

[5] Brooklyn

A cast of five wore garbage, and sang it, in this loud and bizarre musical, presented as a play-within-a-play by homeless musicians under a bridge. Somehow it all ended with a sing-off between a French convent girl and an evil Black diva at Madison Square Garden.

Opening date: October 21, 2004 [closed: 26 June 2005]

Performances: 284

From David Cote’s review: ”The latest example of urban blight is Brooklyn, by far the biggest eyesore, earsore and brainsore on the Great White Way. An infantile urban fable periodically pierced by American Idol-style bellowing, Brooklyn wallows in trash of every kind. What it deserves from any self-respecting inhabitant of the five boroughs is a loud Bronx cheer.” 

[Record: Plymouth/Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre; book, music, and lyrics by Mark Schoenfeld and Barri McPherson; directed by Jeff Calhoun; no choreographer listed; no awards or nominations.]

[6] Good Vibrations

More than 30 Beach Boys songs were crammed into this story about a geeky high-school graduate and her three friends on a cross-country sojourn to California for surfing and romance.

Opening date: February 2, 2005 [closed: 24 April 2005]

Performances: 94

From David Cote’s review: ”It’s the kind of embarrassing fiasco that only a committee of gutless and tasteless Broadway producers could foist on the public. The deformed hate child [of] Mamma Mia! and Movin’ Out, it aspires to the ditsy hit-parade nostalgia of the former and the aerobic dance appeal of the latter.” 

[Record: Eugene O’Neill Theatre; book by Richard Dresser; music and lyrics by Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys; directed and choreographed by John Carrafa; no awards or nominations.]

[7] Lennon

Another jukebox-musical misfire, this one with songs by visionary ex-Beatle John Lennon. A diverse nine-member ensemble trudged its way through Lennon’s hits in an abstract, high-concept staging.

Opening date: August 14, 2005 [closed: 24 September 2005]

Performances: 49

From David Cote’s review: ”A ’70s-nostalgia wallow and peacenik hagiography implicitly pegged to the war in Iraq [2003-11]. Advance hype on this show was misleadingly dire. It’s not the car crash that flop vultures have hoped for, but that’s only because its engine never starts.” 

[Record: Broadhurst Theatre; book by Don Scardino; music and lyrics by John Lennon; directed by Scardino; choreographed by Joseph Malone; no awards or nominations.]

[8] In My Life

Joseph Brooks was best known for the treacly pop ballad “You Light Up My Life” [originally recorded by Kasey Cisyk for the soundtrack album to the 1977 film of the same title] when he wrote, directed and produced this gobsmacker about a young man with Tourette syndrome and a brain tumor. In the show’s takeaway number, a campy angel sang “There’s a little rumor / Someone’s got a tumor,” then danced with a skeleton.

Opening Date: October 20, 2005 [closed: 11 December 2005]

Performances: 61

From David Cote’s review: ”Delusions of grandeur clearly attended the clueless construction of this musical, in which people fall in love with undetectable chemistry, suffer without arousing pity and die with no other consequence than relief. Those who decry shows made by committee should be careful what they wish for: In My Life is the sound of one man flopping.” 

[Record: Music Box Theatre; book. music, and lyrics by Joseph Brooks; directed by Brooks; no choreographer listed; no awards or nomination.]

[9] Hot Feet

An African-American twist on Hans Christian Andersen’s short story “The Red Shoes” and Michael Powell’s 1948 movie, scored to pop hits by Earth, Wind & Fire. Maurice Hines choreographed and directed this flat-footed fable about a young dancer mixed up with a satanic impresario.

Opening date: April 30, 2006 [closed: 23 July 2006]

Performances: 97

From David Cote’s review: ”This overamped, overacted eyesore barely sustains interest beyond the morbid kind: What new terpsichorean travesty will they foist on us next? In seeking to force the Faustian moral into a modern-day African-American context, Hines displays either flagrant ignorance, cynicism—or both.” 

[Record: Hilton Theatre; book by Heru Ptah; music and lyrics by Maurice White; directed and choreographed by Maurice Hines; no awards or nominations.]

[10] Lestat

After the Dance of the Vampires and Dracula[, the Musical] fiascos, Broadway hardly needed another bloodsucker musical, but it got a third anyhow in this Anne Rice adaptation, with a score by Elton John and Bernie Taupin. This one put the nail in the coffin—for now, at least.

Opening date: April 25, 2006 [closed: 28 May 2006]

Performances: 39

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”Like any bogeyman in a B-grade fright flick, the vampire musical won’t stay dead. Just when it seemed safe to go to Broadway again, Lestat has swooped into the Palace. Is Elton John’s undead musical much better than its predecessors? The short answer is: no. The long answer is: no, no, no. Episodic and maudlin, the show is bound together by crimson kitsch.”

[Record: Palace Theatre; book by Linda Woolverton; music by Elton John; lyrics by Bernie Taupin; based on The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice; directed by Robert Jess Roth; no choreographer listed; two Tony nominations, no awards.]

[11] The Pirate Queen

The buccaneering hero of this leaky historical musical by Les Misérables creators Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg was a female raider [Grace O'Malley, ca. 1530-ca. 1603] who gives England’s Elizabeth I [reigned: 1558-1603] trouble on the high seas.

Opening date: April 5, 2007 [closed: 17 June 2007]

Performances: 85

From David Cote’s review: ”Even from the most crassly pandering point of view, The Pirate Queen is a total failure: not even good schlock. If only the creative team had the courage of its lack of conviction. It puts the aar back in aartless gaarbage.” 

[Record: Hilton Theatre; book by Alain Boublil, Claude-Michel Schönberg, and Richard Maltby, Jr.; music by Schönberg; lyrics by Boublil, Maltby, and Morgan Llywelyn; based on Llywelyn's 1986 historical novel Grania: She King of the Irish Seas; directed by Frank Galati; choreographed by Carol Leavy Joyce; no Tony awards or nominations.]

[12] Baby It’s You!

Although this jukebox musical was built around the songs of the Shirelles (with the glaring exception of their biggest hit, “Will You Love Me Tomorrow”), the African-American singers took a back seat to the story of their producer, a Jewish New Jersey housewife played by Beth Leavel.

Opening date: April 27, 2011 [closed: 4 September 2011]

Performances: 148

From David Cote’s review: ”Baby It’s You! touches on a few worthy topics—payola, interracial romance, Brill Building song-factory practices—and manages to drain each of tension and subtlety. The big-voiced, warmly rueful Leavel moves heaven and earth to make us root for plucky Florence. Whole seconds pass in which you forget how dumb and shoddy the show is.” 

[Record: Broadhurst Theatre; book by Floyd Mutrux and Colin Elliott; directed by Mutrux; choreographed by Birgitte Mutrux; one Tony nomination, no awards.]

[13] The People in the Picture

Donna Murphy played a Jewish bubbe regaling her granddaughter with tales of her friends in the Warsaw Ghetto. Who doesn’t love a tear-jerking musical about the Holocaust? As it turns out, a lot of people don’t.

Opening date: April 11, 2011 [closed: 19 June 2011]

Performances: 60

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”The People in the Picture renders its story the way fat is rendered in an old Jewish home: over low heat, with traditional tools, in the service of making schmaltz. Iris Rainer Dart’s sincere, well-meaning musical caters to a taste for sentiment spread thick. But crying at this show is like crying at sliced onions.” 

[Record: Studio 54; book by Iris Rainer Dart; music by Mike Stoller and Artie Butler; lyrics by Dart; directed by Leonard Foglia; no choreographer listed; one Tony nomination, no award.]

[14] Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark (original version)

Julie Taymor could not get the Bono-and-the-Edge-scored comic-book musical off the ground. Six months of previews, onstage injuries, desperate spin and a $75 million-dollar un-recouped budget made it the flop to end all flops.

Opening date: June 14, 2011 [closed: 4 January 2014]

Performances: 1066

From David Cote’s review of version 1.0: ”Spider-Man is a crummy, pandering kids’ musical pretending to be a new form of entertainment—a ‘circus rock drama,’ as Taymor claims with Barnum-level swagger. The production is a deeply confused, ugly, ultimately boring example of artistic hubris enabled by financial excess.” 

[Record: Foxwoods Theatre; book by Julie Taymor, Glen Berger, and Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa; music and lyrics by Bono and The Edge (of U2); based on the Marvel Comics character Spider-Man, elements of the 2002 film Spider-Man, the 2004 film Spider-Man 2, and the Greek myth of Arachne; original director: Taymor (“creative consultant”/subsequent director: Philip Wiliam McKinley – see below); choreography by Daniel Ezralow; two Tony nominations, no awards.

[An explanation of why Cote writes about an “original version” and “version 1.0”: For those who weren’t around in 2010 and 2011, or weren’t paying attention to the Broadway Buzz at that time, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark was arguably the most troubled production in Broadway history, possibly in all of theater history. 

[According to Wikipedia:

Several actors were injured performing stunts and the opening night was repeatedly delayed, causing some critics to review the “unfinished” production in protest [most on 7 February 2011]. Following negative reviews, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark suspended performances for a month to retool the show. Aguirre-Sacasa, a longtime Spider-Man comics writer, was brought in to revise the story and book. The director, Julie Taymor, . . . was replaced by the creative consultant Philip William McKinley. By the time Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark officially opened on June 14, 2011, it had set the record for the longest preview period in Broadway history [28 November 2010-14 June 2011], with 182 [preview] performances.

[(I have a post on ROT on my take on the press controversy regarding the reviews of Spider-Man: “Reviewing the Situation: Spider-Man & the Press,” 20 March 2011.)

[During the retooling of the production, when Aquirre-Sacasa came in to revise the script, Taymor left the show but retained her program credits.  McKinley was brought in to replace Taymor as de facto director, but was given the title “creative consultant” in press releases and the opening-night Playbill.

[After Spider-Man finally started previews on 28 November 2010, Cote wrote two reviews.  The second one came out on the TONY website (Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark | Theater in New York (timeout.com)) on 15 June 2011, the day after the official press opening (as traditional reviews are usually published).

[Cote’s first notice was published on 11 February 2011, in the middle of the extended preview period.  This is the review he’s excerpted above (and it’s included online with the second one), slugged “original version” and “version 1.0” to distinguish this review from his final, more positive (marginally) notice of the re-jiggered production that finally opened on 14 June.

[Note that Spider-Man ran for 1066 regular performances but was still “a massive financial loss.”  The production had cost $75 million, the most expensive Broadway show ever.]

[15] Wonderland

Ever eager to put his stamp on public-domain material, Dracula tunesmith Frank Wildhorn dragged Lewis Carroll’s beloved Alice down a dingy rabbit hole in this joylessly energetic blunder.

Opening date: April 17, 2011 [closed: May 2011]

Performances: 33

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”’Tis Wildhorn, and the hapless cast / Does direly gambol on the stage. / All flimsy is the plot half-assed, / Not right for any age. / Beware of Wonderland, I warn! / The jokes that cloy, the scenes that flop! / Beware the humdrum words and scorn / The spurious, bland rock-pop!” 

[Record: Marquis Theatre; book by Gregory Boyd and Jack Murphy; music by Frank Wildhorn; lyrics by Murphy; contemporary version of Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” books; directed by Boyd; choreographed by Margueritte Derricks, no awards or nominations.]

[16] On a Clear Day You Can See Forever

The 1965 version of this musical was a famous mess about extrasensory perception, past lives and a kooky gal with a magical green thumb. The 2011 revisal, rewritten extensively enough to be considered a new show with an old score, made it even murkier.

[On a Clear Day (original version): Mark Hellinger Theatre; 17 October 1965-11 June 1966 (280 regular performances); directed by Robert Lewis; choreographed by Herbert Ross; 3 Tony nominations, no awards.]

Opening date: December 11, 2011 [closed: 29 January 2012]

Performances: 57

From David Cote’s review: “It was broke, but they sure ain’t fixed it. The famously flawed 1965 Burton Lane-Alan Jay Lerner romantic comedy has been reincarnated into a clunky bore that switches time periods and gender, inserts a gay subplot and turns its putative hero into a creepy, manipulative stalker.”

[Record: St. James Theatre; reconceived by Michael Mayer; new book (2011) by Peter Parnell; music (1965) by Alan Jay Lerner; lyrics (1965) by Burton Lane; based on original book (1965) by Lerner; directed by Mayer; choreographed by JoAnn M. Hunter; one Tony nomination, no award.]

[17] Scandalous

Morning talk-show host Kathie Lee Gifford penned the book, lyrics and some music for this manic, grating paean to the life and work of controversial Hollywood spiritual leader Aimee Semple McPherson (1890-1944).

Opening date: November 15, 2012 [closed: 9 December 2012]

Performances: 29

From David Cote’s review: ”It’s a CliffsNotes take on the 20th-century evangelist, a trinity of camp, kitsch and middlebrow morality that, through uncritical worship, makes its hero the least interesting person onstage—despite throat-shredding vocal pyrotechnics. I have seen worse shows, but few as wild-eyed and zealously wrongheaded.” 

[Record: Neil Simon Theatre; book and lyrics by Kathie Lee Gifford; music by David Pomeranz and David Friedman; directed by David Armstrong; choreographed by Lorin Latarro; one Tony nomination, no award.]

[18] Soul Doctor

Shlomo Carlebach [1925-94] was a charismatic Hasid who used folky, catchy tunes to spread a hippie-friendly message of spirituality in the 1960s and beyond. This short-lived tuner didn’t win him any converts.

Opening date: August 15, 2013 [closed: 13 October 2013]

Performances: 66

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”Gevalt! The best that can be said about this strange Broadway musical, based on the life and music of ‘singing rabbi’ Shlomo Carlebach, is that it isn’t as bad as it sounds. But the show digs shallowly into its central character, and often rings false. Reverent to a fault, Soul Doctor bleaches a story that cries out for tie-dye.”

[Record: Circle in the Square Theatre; book by Daniel S. Wise; music by Shlomo Carlebach; lyrics by David Schechter; directed by Wise; choreographed by Benoit-Swan Pouffer; no awards or nominations.]

[19] Doctor Zhivago

Boris Pasternak’s novel of life before and after the 1917 Russian Revolution was the fodder for this lumbering dud. An idealistic physician survives World War I, sadistic Soviets and multiple hardships, all while pursuing the woman he loves.

Opening date: April 21, 2015 [closed: 10 May 2015]

Performances: 23

From David Cote’s review: ”No amount of Lucy Simon’s syrupy, portentous music—swamping Michael Korie and Amy Powers’s workmanlike lyrics—can make us care for the synthetic, drably colored pageant. Des McAnuff’s staging looks expensive but ugly, with cheesy video close‑ups of actors, giant Soviet propaganda posters, eruptions of fire and the occasional explosion or gunshot to wake us up. To Siberia with it.” 

[Record: Broadway Theatre; book by Michael Weller; music by Lucy Simon; lyrics by Michael Korie and Amy Powers; based on the 1957 novel by Boris Pasternak; directed by Des McAnuff; choreographed by Kelly Devine; no nominations or awards.]

[20] Amazing Grace

First-time composer-lyricist and book writer Christopher Smith took inspiration from the life and religious conversion of John Newton [1725-1807], a British slave trader who later in life wrote lyrics for the hymn “Amazing Grace.”

Opening date: July 16, 2015 [closed: 25 October 2015]

Performances: 116

From David Cote’s review: ”A clunky period piece broken up by bombastic, generic anthems. Personally, I expect poetic license in the theater, but it should serve a strong artistic or political vision. Amazing Grace has neither. It comes out strongly against slavery; well done. But it mainly proves that folks are willing to burn piles of money trying to resurrect the 1980s-style megamusical.”

[Record: Nederlander Theatre; book by Christopher Smith and Arthur Giron; music and lyrics by Smith; directed by Gabriel Barre; choreographed by Christopher Gattelli; no nominations or awards.]

[21] Home for the Holidays

This tacky pop-up Broadway concert, the yuletide equivalent of a Halloween costume store, featured a comically motley cast: three winners of televised vocal contests, a former star of The Bachelorette, a married a cappella duo and veteran character actor Danny Aiello.

Opening date: November 21, 2017 [closed: 30 December 2017]

Performances: 47

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”Home for the Holidays is unlikely to remind you much of home, unless you were raised in a department-store elevator.”

[Record: August Wilson Theatre; no book; songs are traditional; “creative director”: Jonathan Tessero, no awards or nomonations.]

[22] Gettin’ the Band Back Together

A 40-year-old stockbroker in New Jersey must reassemble his high-school rock combo to save his mother from eviction in this schlocky and formulaic comedy by Ken Davenport and Mark Allen.

Opening date: August 13, 2018 [closed: 16 September 2018]

Performances: 40

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”Gettin’ the Band Back Together aspires to a knowing attitude toward its own silliness, but it’s not sharp enough to pull off the gambit; you can’t tell if it’s winking or just has something weird in its eye. Whatever quotation marks this musical might want to put around ‘stupid’ have melted away, leaving only desperate salesmanship.”

[Record: Belasco Theatre; book by Ken Davenport and The Grundleshotz (a collective of performers and writers); music and lyrics by Mark Allen; directed by John Rando; choreographed by Chris Bailey; no awards or nominations.]

[23] Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

An impoverished child gets the chance to take candy from a stranger in this shapeless musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s beloved children’s story.

Opening date: October 5, 2018 [closed: 14 January 2018]

Performances: 305

From David Cote’s review: ”This dull, clunky adaptation of the book and movie with none of the wit of the former nor the dreamy wonder of the latter. Adults are bound to conclude that Charlie is like what happens with an Everlasting Gobstopper: lots of sucking.”

[Record: Lunt-Fontanne Theatre; book by David Craig; music by Marc Shaiman; lyrics by Shaiman and Scott Wittman; based on the 1964 novel by Roald Dahl with songs by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley from the 1971 film Willy Wonka &  the Chocolate Factory; directed by Jack O’Brien; choreographed by Joshua Bergasse; no Tony nominations or awards.]

[24] King Kong

Broadway went apeshit in a musical a[d]aptation of the ape-meets-girl classic that featured an extremely impressive 20-foot, 2,000-pound animatronic puppet. But this very special effect was caged in a vehicle that was mostly pretty awful.

Opening date: November 8, 2018 [closed: 18 August 2019]

Performances: 322

From Adam Feldman’s review: ”The truly frustrating thing about King Kong is the waste of it all. Why did this story, whose central figure necessarily cannot sing, need to be a musical at all, much less one that suggests a late-run Simpsons parody?”

[Record: Broadway Theatre; book by Jack Thorne; music by Marius de Vries with songs by Eddie Perfect; based on the classic 1933 film; directed and choreographed by Drew McOnie; Special Tony Award for Puppet Design, plus four more nominations.]

[25] Diana[, T]he Musical

Book writer Joe DiPietro and composer David Bryan offered a campy, dishy pop-rock clip job of tabloid moments from the life of Diana, Princess of Wales, who died in a car accident in 1997.

Opening date: November 17, 2021 [closed: 19 December 2021]

Performances: 34

From Adam Feldman’s review: “The gobsmacking unseriousness that characterizes Diana’s approach to the late princess is also what makes it bearable to watch in a way that a more earnest version would probably never have been. For collectors of flop shows, Diana is a keeper: It goes for broke, and achieves it.”   

[Record: Longacre Theatre; book by Joe DiPietro; music by David Bryan; lyrics by Bryan and DiPietro; directed by Christopher Ashley; choreographed by Kelly Devine; one Tony nomination, no awards.

[The Broadway production of Diana, The Musical was recorded in the summer of 2020. This video, directed by Ashley, was released on Netflix on 1 October 2021. The recording received nine nominations at the 42nd Golden Raspberry Awards, winning for Worst Picture, Worst Director, and Worst Screenplay, among other categories.]