Worst "Musical" expierences- Page 2
Worst "Musical" expierences
amasis
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/7/04
#25re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/23/04 at 10:06pm
I saw a community theatre production of "Sunday in the Park" which was just terrible. This is one of my favorite musicals, too, and I had brought some friends who were not very familiar with Sondheim, just to introduce them to his work. Big mistake. In retrospect, Sunday may not be the best choice to introduce someone to Sondheim, but this particular production in particular... *shakes head*
I also had the misfortune of seeing Ricky Martin in Les Miserables.
Updated On: 8/23/04 at 10:06 PM
MargoChanning
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/5/04
#26re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/23/04 at 10:12pm
Not to offend anyone who loves this show, but the one time I went to see "The Fantasticks" at Sullivan Street -- about 10 years ago when my parents were in town -- it was so awful that the three of us looked at each other when the lights came up for intermission and without saying a word, gratefully walked out and didn't return for Act II. The first act was so painfully and gratingly precious and over played (and not well-sung) that we couldn't wait to flee the theatre. And we weren't alone -- I counted at least a dozen folks with their coats outside trying to figure out what to do with the next hour -- OTHER than going back inside for the rest of that amateurish mess (I had spent the latter half of the first act chanting silently to myself, "I'm In Hell"... "I'm In Hell"..... "I'm In Hell" ......) .
Once outside, my mother asked me, "How on earth has THAT THING been running for the last 30 years?" I said that I figured that since it became "the longest running musical in the world" some 20 years before, longtime theatregoers (like us) from all over the world felt it necessary to make a "pilgrimmage" to see it, just to be able to say we'd seen it (my folks had been seeing and loving theatre since "South Pacific" with Mary Martin and Ezio Pinza 40 years before, but had never gotten around to it up to that point -- suffice to say, "The Fantasticks" is not one of their better theatregoing memories....... or mine).
"What a story........ everything but the bloodhounds snappin' at her rear end." -- Birdie
[http://margochanning.broadwayworld.com/]
"The Devil Be Hittin' Me" -- Whitney
Updated On: 8/23/04 at 10:12 PM
#27re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/23/04 at 10:15pm
Les Miserables! I don't know if it was the cast at the time or what but I dreaded the show. It was just horrible.
no wait....
CATS! I got the chance to work the tour (just help with the load in and load out.) and could see the show for free since i was technically working it. Yeah I walked out at intermission. Why the hell did Webber put that on Broadway? It's crap! Seriously. A bunch of people dancing around on stage. No plot line. Ick! Definitely not one of my top 10 shows.
"You can't stop someone who wants to be an artist. If they're going to do it, they're going to do it... Work as hard as you can on the things you can work on. Until it seems like there is no possible chance you're going to succeed, don't give up." ~ANDREW ASNES
avatar: me and jason gillman... in the pouring rain.
WiCkEDrOcKS
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/13/04
#28re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/23/04 at 10:23pm
Going to see Show Boat at a local high school. Awful. Just awful!!!! I honestly dont remember anything about it. It was painful. The cast stunk, the sets and costumes were so corny they actually made me laugh, and the "orchestra" was a bunch of high schoolers who couldnt play a note. I left during intermission because I was literally falling asleep.
and also
A local production of Bye Bye Birdie. The sets were cardboard. Enough said.
Plum
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/4/04
#29re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/23/04 at 10:31pmElementary school production of Schoolhouse Rock. Which isn't even a frickin' musical, as far as I'm concerned. It was awful, especially for a school that had a tradition of doing real musicals for years before.
#30re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/23/04 at 11:25pmThe worst part of that Wizard of Oz production was the guy playing Toto, crawling around on his knees. Apparently he was also a co-writer or producer or something. It was at the point where the audience members couldn't look at one another, for fear of laughing so loud, they'd drown out the musicians. I was in physical pain trying not to laugh while also maintaining a look of total horror.
"Too young to hold on and too old to just break free and run" - Jeff Buckley
#31re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:02am
"The worst part of that Wizard of Oz production was the guy playing Toto, crawling around on his knees. Apparently he was also a co-writer or producer or something. It was at the point where the audience members couldn't look at one another, for fear of laughing so loud, they'd drown out the musicians. I was in physical pain trying not to laugh while also maintaining a look of total horror."
That sounds like the audience at the painful "Blood Brothers" I saw. My friend sitting next to me had his fist crammed in his mouth and tears streaming down his face, he was trying so hard not to laugh. Our chaperone had to lecture us about keeping comments to ourselves until we left the next day, but later he burst out laughing when one of the cops screamed, in a terrible Cockney accent, "Jaysus Croist!!"
http://community.livejournal.com/ltd_brands_suck/
Corine2
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/14/03
#32re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:05am
Vincent The Musical
Boobs The Musical
Dracula
Imaginary Friends
The worst musical I have ever seen though was Jackie Mason's Musical and I saw it on Thanksgiving.
I wanted to shoot myself. IT WAS PAINFUL!
#33re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:08am
Rose, not really sure why Dorothy had to stop in the Chinese restaurant. Maybe they needed the quick MSG fix?!
And as the person that Trisky was trying not to look at in fear of cracking up, I can attest that it was truly painful on all levels. :)
LOL about your Blood Brothers experience. It sounds very similar indeed. :P
"... Still a little bit of your taste in my mouth.
Still a little bit of you laced with my doubt. Still a little hard to say what's going on..." Damien Rice
#34re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:17am
Oh, it was. More than words can convey.
And what's "Boobs The Musical"?
http://community.livejournal.com/ltd_brands_suck/
#35re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:20amThis wasn't a musical experience, but the least favorite production I ever saw was a college production of "Under Milk Wood." Ever heard of it? It's crap.
You are young, life has been kind to you. You will learn.
gustof777
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/8/04
#36re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 1:09am
TITANIC loved the music but the show was awful and its a lot for me to say its awful. I went to go see some high school do porgy and bess with only two black people and NO ONE who could sing it was the most painful thing EVER!!! I actually got kicked out by the ushers because me and my friends were laughing at them soo hard
RIP Natasha Richardson. ~You were a light on this earth ~
#37re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 4:27amMy High School did The Kind and I a few years after I left. It was terrible. The drama teacher actually wrote in new character and Lady Thiang didn't sing "Wonderful" she gave it to one of the characters she wrote.
Gypsy - Betty Buckley
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUN5XoB5vFs&feature=youtu.be
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
#38re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 9:22am
"This wasn't a musical experience, but the least favorite production I ever saw was a college production of "Under Milk Wood." Ever heard of it? It's crap."
Under Milk Wood is a VERY difficult piece... I give anyone who tries to deal with it credit. It's tough... don't give up on the show though.
popcultureboy
Broadway Legend Joined: 7/23/03
#39re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 10:18amIt's a tie between Notre Dame De Paris and The Beautiful Game.
Nothing precious, plain to see, don't make a fuss over me. Not loud, not soft, but somewhere inbetween. Say sorry, just let it be the word you mean.
jayem1968
Stand-by Joined: 6/9/04
#40re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:27pmThou Shalt Not
Everybody goes down well with beer.
Stand-by Joined: 12/31/69
#41re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 12:36pm
I have to agree with Elphaba984... the touring company of CATS was so horrible I also left at intermission.
#42re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 1:14pm
Any production of Oklahoma is painful...even with a shirtless Hugh Jackman.
Vincent was pretty awful, too.
#43re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 1:15pm
First off, what is wrong with our school systems?
"everyone was stuck up and conceded"
I think you mean "conceited". "Conceded" is the past tense of "concede" which means to yield or grant, often reluctantly.
Notre Dame de Paris and Thou Shalt Not were pretty bad, but not the WORST productions I've ever seen. The Civil War was far worse. I also walked out of the 25th anniversary national tour of Hair that had horrendous choreography and the old-fashioned wired microphpones on stands that the cast continuously tripped on or knocked over. I left before intermission.
There was also this truly awful revue I saw of songs from the movies (the name of the show escapes me, but it is published). The most current and recognizable song was "Can You Read My Mind" from Superman. The rest were songs that forgotten after World War II from films that were forgotten after World War II. The show was to feature clips from the films projected onto a screen that was to be incorporated with the set. The best they could do was someone's big-screen TV with a VHS of whatever clips they could find in various qualities poorly edited together and played on a VCR via remote control operated by the Stage Manager. It was one of the VCR's with the wonderful on-screen displays that displayed whatever the function HUGE in the center of the screen and then smaller in the corner of the screen before actually doing said function. It was the first time I ever watched a show in which the cast was so obviously embarassed to be performing. Imagine if you will...
The two-story set recycled from Hollywood/Ukraine with a big-screen TV planted firmly in the middle.
The screen turns blue and the words "PLAY" and then "play" flashes.
The last moment of the last scene you just watched followed by a bit of static and scrambling as the tracking adjusts to the new clip.
A short nonspecific clip of part of an unrecognizable scene of an unrecognizable film involving a jungle and a man in a pith helmet.
The 4-piece "orchestra" of volunteer high school students begin playing something out of tune and in various tempos.
Cardboard cutouts of palm trees and a cauldron in which there is a girl in a blonde wig singing with two men in "native" costumes dancing about. All are singing and dancing trying desperately not to make eye contact with the audience.
One guy is wearing a short wig because the theatre decided his real hair was too long (shoulder length) and might be deemed offensive.
His wig falls off two songs before the final curtain.
The shortest curtain call known to man.
The saddest cast party outside of an onstage death occuring.
If only I didn't have friends in the cast.....
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
#44re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 1:22pmthat community version of "sunday" sounds like a train wreck....i was in a "forum" with a Pseudolus who couldn't remember "comedy tonight" and smelled like entrails...as an audience member, i saw a show called "Metropolis" that was a nightmare, and "Taboo" was pretty painful in its own right--poor boy george....
#45re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 1:26pmhear hear mister matt in regard to the spelling....it is AWFUL on this site....really sad...typos are one thing, we all make them, but damn! (he wrote with bad punctuation)
tcoppola
Understudy Joined: 10/15/03
#46re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 2:04pm
Rose McS-
Somewhere in WSS is written as an off-stage solo--and the ballet is written in also. T&M sing a short reprise after the ballet, and she sings it a capella at the end while he's dying.
I don't know what you knwo of the show, unless you were comparing it to the movie, but what they did is correct--regardless of how bad it may have been.
So, they didn't "do" anything to it---they did it as written.
saddle shoe side kick
Broadway Star Joined: 6/24/04
#47re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 2:10pmWhen I saw Jesus Christ Superstar, I didn't enjoy it much and at the end I was just happy it was almost over... But then... They had to BLIND me with a giant God knows how many watt cross. I had spots in my vision coming out of the theatre because it went from so dark to so bright so fast. Uhg... -Penny
"I'm a pretty girl, mama." -Penny Lou Pingleton, Hairspray
"You like football, Ed?" "Yeah..." "Good. Me too." -Chad & 'Ed', All Shook Up
"You like football, Ed?" "Yeah..." "Good. Me too." -Chad & 'Ed', All Shook Up
HJAJtheFirst
Leading Actor Joined: 1/27/04
#49re: Worst 'Musical' expierences
Posted: 8/24/04 at 3:14pm
Trinity Rep's production of West Side Story...if those people were able to get their equity cards, why can't I.
I also stage managed a production of Little Shop. Um the director had a dance ensemble. Little Shop of Horrors with a 22 person cast!!!!!!! NO!!!!!!!!!!
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