Ten Little Chances to be Free (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
tenlittlebullets) wrote2007-04-30 11:06 pm
tenlittlebullets) wrote2007-04-30 11:06 pm
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Can this be true? I don't believe what I see.
Okay, I promised myself I would not write a LJ post about yesterday until I got a few things out of the way. Now that they're done, here is the whole post of OMGWTF.
So yes, I went to New York again. I'd heard that Doug Kreeger would be on as Marius and I went up to see him, and the trip up was extremely uneventful until *drumroll* I saw the understudy board. Doug Kreeger on for Marius. Stephen Trafton on for Doug's track. Q. Smith on for Marya Grandy's track. Matt Clemens on for Drew Sa--wait, what?!
Yes, that's right, boys and girls, Drew was on as Javert.
I immediately called![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lady_iphigeneia and flipped out, and she said she'd been trying to call me all morning because Drew had been on Saturday too. We exchanged a few "omg"s and she read me part of mmebahorel's review of Drewvert, and then I went in to my nice, shiny, second-row seat. And found that two seats down from me was a girl who had gotten a call from Drew himself that morning to say "I'm Javert today, see if you can get a ticket!" and who had seen the revival about as many times as I had. So we fangirled at each other before the show and at intermission. Account of intermission will follow the reviews, I just wanted to mention her before I plunged in because we talked quite a bit and the notes we exchanged at intermission did have an impact on my impressions of the new cast members.
Drew Sarich as Javert - Wow. After his trainwreck of an Enjolras, I was expecting to snicker and flinch whenever he was on stage, but he was actually really good. He had a lot working against him--he looked far too young for the role, and he was really straining for some of his low notes--and I am honestly not sure why they made him Javert understudy, but I'm glad they did, because his acting was superb. As Javert he was quite fierce, but also dignified, commanding, condescending, and basically everything his Enjolras should have been but wasn't. He could get pretty violent and looked utterly psychotic when he was angry, but unlike, say, Rob Hunt, his Javert isn't angry all the time, so it works. He does have a number of very distinctive Drew-ish mannerisms that he can't shake, and I kept seeing flashes of Drewjolras--the mannerisms came out more plainly in the Suicide, after the haughty police inspector fell apart, and it didn't really help that he had the standard Javert wig and I swear to god he looked like a girl when he took it out of the ponytail on the bridge. The gray wig really helped him not look so young, but only when it was tied back. In Act I, with the brown wig, the girl beside me and I eventually decided he looked like "A very fierce twelve-year-old chasing Valjean around the stage." Vocally his low notes often sounded strained, but he did have them, except maybe "cha-aaaain." The review is probably sounding quite mixed at this point, but I did like him a lot--more than Norm, who is a bit soft around the edges, and could never quite make it past stiff. Drew's Javert is nice and sharp and biting, and he has stage presence. The most problematic aspects of his Javert are things he can't really help--his age, his vocal range, and a certain amount of his essential Drew-ness.
Not to mention he had a lot of really nice moments and little touches. The pure disgust when Fantine reaches out to grab his hand and he yanks it away, his little sardonic laugh when Gavroche says "Good evening, dear Inspector," the way he smacked someone's gun aside when they were about to shoot him, as if to say "Put that thing down, you idiot." And the way he sat there when he thought Valjean was about to stab him--perfectly still and composed, but you could tell by the way he jumped when Alex untied him that he was nervous as hell.
So, yeah. When I got to the theater I was thinking "Oh, hey, it'll be painfully funny and save me a trip up to see him on the 13th." But now I'm considering going up on the 13th anyway to see him again.
Doug Kreeger as Marius - His headshot looks nothing like him. As Marius, he actually bore this bizarre physical resemblance to Hayden Tee, which had me scratching my head all through Look Down wondering who he looked like. Then we got to Red and Black, where he is quite vehement, and I went "Aaaah, that's it." Resemblance pretty much ended there, though--his Marius is actually a little bit of a pansy. He's not a weak actor, but his interpretation of the role isn't as forceful as Adam's. His voice also isn't as loud; it was nice to have someone who didn't bray whenever he held out a note more than two beats, but he sounded like he had a bit of vocal strain by the end of ECAET.
Mandy Bruno as Eponine - Well, at least she has a sort of scruffy charm until she opens her mouth. A lot of people have complained that her voice is too bright and poppy, and that she doesn't have the vocal strength she needs for the role, but I wasn't paying too much attention to that because I was too busy freaking out over her being Eppie-Sue yanked straight out of bad fanfiction and onto the Broadway stage. Think spunky, sensitive, sympathetic Eponine and then infect her with Diana Kaarina's smiling disease. Think perky and irritating. I have to give her some credit for acting during OMO instead of just standing there and singing it, but the acting itself was ewww, and by ALFOR we had moved beyond acting, blown straight past overacting, and settled happily in scenery-chewing land. I want Celia back, dammit!
Max von Essen as Enjolras - Easily the best of the replacements (besides Ben Davis, whom I haven't seen yet), but still nothing to write home about. He has a good voice, not exactly a vocal powerhouse but very clear and ringing on his high notes. His "they will come when we call" wasn't as vibrato-choked as Aaron's, and, well, it rang. It was nice. He sounded like he wanted to take the high note in the final battle but thought better of it at the last moment. But the problem is that he's boring. Oh, he doesn't do anything wrong, but he has about as much charisma in his whole body as Aaron does in his left sock. Perhaps it's cruel to compare him to Aaron, since I am shameless in my fangirliness, but Max's Enjolras is such a nonentity, and Aaron's dominated the stage so much, that the comparisons kept rushing into my head during the show purely to fill the vacuum. (It didn't help that Max's wig looked about how Aaron's hair would--if he grew it out into a mullet and didn't wash it for two weeks. What crack is the costuming department on?)
Ann Harada as Mme Thénardier - She's not funny. I'm not saying that purely because she can't compare to Jenny, I'm saying that because she's not funny. She might have been able to make Mme T work as sickly-sweet with a nasty edge, and that's what she seems to be going for, but since she doesn't have the nasty edge, the whole thing falls apart. She also uses this weird "cutesy voice" to threaten Cosette with, and it was so close to her Christmas Eve voice that I could only stare in horrified fascination. I didn't get any sense of her and Gary working together; Gary and Jenny's interpretations might have conflicted a bit, but at least they really seemed like partners in crime. Ann is just sort of... there. I've seen a couple of Mme T understudies, and my usual complaint for them is "not mean enough," but I would prefer them to Ann.
-
It is a really bad sign when all the understudies you saw were better than the replacements. Eurgh.
The show was mad-crazy though. Lea is still swearing at Dan, and in the scene where Valjean lets Javert go, Alex hissed "You son of a bitch" at Drew!Javert right before he shoved him up against the wall. As if that weren't enough fun, Zach Rand is apparently taking his cues from Gary, because he missed his entrance at the end of Red and Black. "Give me brandy on my breath and I'll breathe them all to death," and the music stopped, and Gavroche wasn't there. And still wasn't there. And the boys tried to look like they were still plotting a revolution instead of standing there awkwardly, and one of them said, "So, what are we going to doooo...", and then there was more silence, and finally Gavroche made it into the café to tell them Lamarque was dead. He wasn't actually that late; if the "At Saint-Antoine they're with us to a man" part had still been there as a safety, he might have made it. But it wasn't, so everyone just sort of stood around. Ahahah. Speaking of Red and Black, Nehal has been switching it up a bit; he no longer yells "You ass!" after Grantaire knocks his drink into his lap, he stands up, all friendly and I-forgive-you like, then when R gets closer he lunges at him and tries to smack him. Haha. I'll have to keep an eye on him again next week to see if he does that with Drew or if it's just with Matt.
Intermission was fucking hilarious. I was, as I said, two seats down from a friend of Drew's; in between us were these two ladies who had seen the show a few times back in the glory days of the '90s, you know, back before they started "putting all these Orientals in the lead roles." Yeah, back in 1993 they were way too sensible to do anything like that! Silly casting people.
Anyway, yeah, we fangirled at each other before the show, across these poor ladies who "thought I was bad for seeing the show five times," and then at intermission we chatted a bit more. She seemed quite interested in my opinion of Drew's Javert even though, or perhaps because, I didn't like his Enjolras, and called a friend during intermission to give her a full report. "Yeah, I'm here at--well, yes he does look like a beanstalk with that giant hat, he's already tall enough--and I was right about him looking like a twelve-year-old." (Me: *whisper whisper*) "A very fierce twelve-year-old, the girl next to me adds. Yeah, she likes his Javert too, and she didn't like his Enjolras so she's not as biased as we are--"
Lots of fun. I missed Aaron being there at the stage door, though I talked a bit to Dan and Chip about the new cast and Drew's Javert and about Dan going on next weekend. I also managed to say something garbled and fangirly to Drew, before he was snatched away by a pair of Drewbies so they could babble about TKTS and the understudy board. Sigh. Trip home was uneventful.
And if you didn't want to slog through everything behind the LJ-cut--or as a reward for slogging through, if you did--have a couple of my souvenirs:
Lea swearing at Dan. I'm amused by how clearly this came out.
Alex calling Drew a a son of a bitch. Quiet, but I'm amused that it came out at all.
So yes, I went to New York again. I'd heard that Doug Kreeger would be on as Marius and I went up to see him, and the trip up was extremely uneventful until *drumroll* I saw the understudy board. Doug Kreeger on for Marius. Stephen Trafton on for Doug's track. Q. Smith on for Marya Grandy's track. Matt Clemens on for Drew Sa--wait, what?!
Yes, that's right, boys and girls, Drew was on as Javert.
I immediately called
lady_iphigeneia and flipped out, and she said she'd been trying to call me all morning because Drew had been on Saturday too. We exchanged a few "omg"s and she read me part of mmebahorel's review of Drewvert, and then I went in to my nice, shiny, second-row seat. And found that two seats down from me was a girl who had gotten a call from Drew himself that morning to say "I'm Javert today, see if you can get a ticket!" and who had seen the revival about as many times as I had. So we fangirled at each other before the show and at intermission. Account of intermission will follow the reviews, I just wanted to mention her before I plunged in because we talked quite a bit and the notes we exchanged at intermission did have an impact on my impressions of the new cast members.Drew Sarich as Javert - Wow. After his trainwreck of an Enjolras, I was expecting to snicker and flinch whenever he was on stage, but he was actually really good. He had a lot working against him--he looked far too young for the role, and he was really straining for some of his low notes--and I am honestly not sure why they made him Javert understudy, but I'm glad they did, because his acting was superb. As Javert he was quite fierce, but also dignified, commanding, condescending, and basically everything his Enjolras should have been but wasn't. He could get pretty violent and looked utterly psychotic when he was angry, but unlike, say, Rob Hunt, his Javert isn't angry all the time, so it works. He does have a number of very distinctive Drew-ish mannerisms that he can't shake, and I kept seeing flashes of Drewjolras--the mannerisms came out more plainly in the Suicide, after the haughty police inspector fell apart, and it didn't really help that he had the standard Javert wig and I swear to god he looked like a girl when he took it out of the ponytail on the bridge. The gray wig really helped him not look so young, but only when it was tied back. In Act I, with the brown wig, the girl beside me and I eventually decided he looked like "A very fierce twelve-year-old chasing Valjean around the stage." Vocally his low notes often sounded strained, but he did have them, except maybe "cha-aaaain." The review is probably sounding quite mixed at this point, but I did like him a lot--more than Norm, who is a bit soft around the edges, and could never quite make it past stiff. Drew's Javert is nice and sharp and biting, and he has stage presence. The most problematic aspects of his Javert are things he can't really help--his age, his vocal range, and a certain amount of his essential Drew-ness.
Not to mention he had a lot of really nice moments and little touches. The pure disgust when Fantine reaches out to grab his hand and he yanks it away, his little sardonic laugh when Gavroche says "Good evening, dear Inspector," the way he smacked someone's gun aside when they were about to shoot him, as if to say "Put that thing down, you idiot." And the way he sat there when he thought Valjean was about to stab him--perfectly still and composed, but you could tell by the way he jumped when Alex untied him that he was nervous as hell.
So, yeah. When I got to the theater I was thinking "Oh, hey, it'll be painfully funny and save me a trip up to see him on the 13th." But now I'm considering going up on the 13th anyway to see him again.
Doug Kreeger as Marius - His headshot looks nothing like him. As Marius, he actually bore this bizarre physical resemblance to Hayden Tee, which had me scratching my head all through Look Down wondering who he looked like. Then we got to Red and Black, where he is quite vehement, and I went "Aaaah, that's it." Resemblance pretty much ended there, though--his Marius is actually a little bit of a pansy. He's not a weak actor, but his interpretation of the role isn't as forceful as Adam's. His voice also isn't as loud; it was nice to have someone who didn't bray whenever he held out a note more than two beats, but he sounded like he had a bit of vocal strain by the end of ECAET.
Mandy Bruno as Eponine - Well, at least she has a sort of scruffy charm until she opens her mouth. A lot of people have complained that her voice is too bright and poppy, and that she doesn't have the vocal strength she needs for the role, but I wasn't paying too much attention to that because I was too busy freaking out over her being Eppie-Sue yanked straight out of bad fanfiction and onto the Broadway stage. Think spunky, sensitive, sympathetic Eponine and then infect her with Diana Kaarina's smiling disease. Think perky and irritating. I have to give her some credit for acting during OMO instead of just standing there and singing it, but the acting itself was ewww, and by ALFOR we had moved beyond acting, blown straight past overacting, and settled happily in scenery-chewing land. I want Celia back, dammit!
Max von Essen as Enjolras - Easily the best of the replacements (besides Ben Davis, whom I haven't seen yet), but still nothing to write home about. He has a good voice, not exactly a vocal powerhouse but very clear and ringing on his high notes. His "they will come when we call" wasn't as vibrato-choked as Aaron's, and, well, it rang. It was nice. He sounded like he wanted to take the high note in the final battle but thought better of it at the last moment. But the problem is that he's boring. Oh, he doesn't do anything wrong, but he has about as much charisma in his whole body as Aaron does in his left sock. Perhaps it's cruel to compare him to Aaron, since I am shameless in my fangirliness, but Max's Enjolras is such a nonentity, and Aaron's dominated the stage so much, that the comparisons kept rushing into my head during the show purely to fill the vacuum. (It didn't help that Max's wig looked about how Aaron's hair would--if he grew it out into a mullet and didn't wash it for two weeks. What crack is the costuming department on?)
Ann Harada as Mme Thénardier - She's not funny. I'm not saying that purely because she can't compare to Jenny, I'm saying that because she's not funny. She might have been able to make Mme T work as sickly-sweet with a nasty edge, and that's what she seems to be going for, but since she doesn't have the nasty edge, the whole thing falls apart. She also uses this weird "cutesy voice" to threaten Cosette with, and it was so close to her Christmas Eve voice that I could only stare in horrified fascination. I didn't get any sense of her and Gary working together; Gary and Jenny's interpretations might have conflicted a bit, but at least they really seemed like partners in crime. Ann is just sort of... there. I've seen a couple of Mme T understudies, and my usual complaint for them is "not mean enough," but I would prefer them to Ann.
-
It is a really bad sign when all the understudies you saw were better than the replacements. Eurgh.
The show was mad-crazy though. Lea is still swearing at Dan, and in the scene where Valjean lets Javert go, Alex hissed "You son of a bitch" at Drew!Javert right before he shoved him up against the wall. As if that weren't enough fun, Zach Rand is apparently taking his cues from Gary, because he missed his entrance at the end of Red and Black. "Give me brandy on my breath and I'll breathe them all to death," and the music stopped, and Gavroche wasn't there. And still wasn't there. And the boys tried to look like they were still plotting a revolution instead of standing there awkwardly, and one of them said, "So, what are we going to doooo...", and then there was more silence, and finally Gavroche made it into the café to tell them Lamarque was dead. He wasn't actually that late; if the "At Saint-Antoine they're with us to a man" part had still been there as a safety, he might have made it. But it wasn't, so everyone just sort of stood around. Ahahah. Speaking of Red and Black, Nehal has been switching it up a bit; he no longer yells "You ass!" after Grantaire knocks his drink into his lap, he stands up, all friendly and I-forgive-you like, then when R gets closer he lunges at him and tries to smack him. Haha. I'll have to keep an eye on him again next week to see if he does that with Drew or if it's just with Matt.
Intermission was fucking hilarious. I was, as I said, two seats down from a friend of Drew's; in between us were these two ladies who had seen the show a few times back in the glory days of the '90s, you know, back before they started "putting all these Orientals in the lead roles." Yeah, back in 1993 they were way too sensible to do anything like that! Silly casting people.
Anyway, yeah, we fangirled at each other before the show, across these poor ladies who "thought I was bad for seeing the show five times," and then at intermission we chatted a bit more. She seemed quite interested in my opinion of Drew's Javert even though, or perhaps because, I didn't like his Enjolras, and called a friend during intermission to give her a full report. "Yeah, I'm here at--well, yes he does look like a beanstalk with that giant hat, he's already tall enough--and I was right about him looking like a twelve-year-old." (Me: *whisper whisper*) "A very fierce twelve-year-old, the girl next to me adds. Yeah, she likes his Javert too, and she didn't like his Enjolras so she's not as biased as we are--"
Lots of fun. I missed Aaron being there at the stage door, though I talked a bit to Dan and Chip about the new cast and Drew's Javert and about Dan going on next weekend. I also managed to say something garbled and fangirly to Drew, before he was snatched away by a pair of Drewbies so they could babble about TKTS and the understudy board. Sigh. Trip home was uneventful.
And if you didn't want to slog through everything behind the LJ-cut--or as a reward for slogging through, if you did--have a couple of my souvenirs:
Lea swearing at Dan. I'm amused by how clearly this came out.
Alex calling Drew a a son of a bitch. Quiet, but I'm amused that it came out at all.