CROYDEN'S CORNER
by Margaret Croyden
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| Margaret Croyden is a theater reviewer and essayist for the New York Theatre Wire. | |
Les Miserables, the Musical
Based on the novel by Victor Hugo
Music by Claude-Michel Schonberg, Lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer
Directed by Trevor Nunn and John Caird
Associate Director Shaun Kerrison
Produced by Cameron Mackintosh
The Broadhurst Theater
235 West 44th Street
Reviewed January 3, 2007 by Margaret Croyden
Cameron Mackintosh, the program says, has produced "hundreds of productions."
His well known "Cats," "The Phantom of the Opera," "Les
Miserables" (the first) were the three longest running musicals in Broadway
history. It may be more than fifteen years since the original "Les Mis"
(as is commonly known) hit Broadway and resulted in millions of dollars that
Mackintosh and his associates have garnished from these enterprises. Mackintosh
has still another production on Broadway, "Mary Poppins" that had
already been playing in London for some time and undoubtedly will reap more
profits. So what does Cameron Mackintosh want? More.
And More he got (and more we got) with this revival of "Les Mis"
including bad reviews, bad publicity, and a bad production. Not that he cut
the show down in any way. It is still cluttered, still filled with a large
company of singers, dozens of extras--and the enormous set. Still the production
proved boring all the same. Why?
Take the opening number, which must set the energy and the pace for the entire
show. If the opening number doesn't work, the rest will fall flat. So the
first thing we see is the ensemble dressed in rags and smeared with dirt,
dragging on to their assigned places in a chorus lineup. We got the point
immediately; it was telegraphed only too clearly. Look at us, they said, we
are the wretched ones of France. From then on, we got more of the same: overplayed
characterizations, repeated scenes, more dirty faces, more ragged costumes,
more shouting, more posturing. Whores, pimps, scoundrels, thieves, wretches
of every sort, all overplayed, all similar looking, all there to remind us
that soon the revolution will come--if we could sit there for three hours.
But deja vue set in quickly as predictability and repetition haunted every
scene, until the production seemed like a nineteenth century melodrama, an
updated "Little Nell" about to be sent to the orphanage by her cruel
guardians.
Though the director used every theatrical trick he could think of--huge scaffolds
rising above the proscenium, gigantic sets slowly moving in and rising before
one's eyes, dark impressionistic lighting, clever ensemble positions for the
large cast--he could not put new life into an old production. That is, if
director Trevor Nunn even bothered to direct this new company though his name
is in the program. It is hard to believe that Nunn, known for his brilliant
talent and superb work with the Royal Shakespeare Company, really had a hand
in this revival. An associate director is listed. Could it be....?
Now for the singers. I will say this for them. They were actually articulate;
their diction was distinct and very clear. so that unfortunately the banality
of the lyrics became all too plain. Victor Hugo wrote in French, the text
needed translating into English and adapted for the stage; then the music
and English lyrics needed to match the French tone. Which was sadly missing.
Nothing resembled Victor Hugo's "Les Miserables;" it just became
a Broadway musical determined be lavish, massive and imposing.
One of the drawbacks was the actor-singers' inability to express genuine feeling;
emotions were indicated, telegraphed as it were. Performers resorted to stereotypes
as they tried to create whores, pimps, crones, workers, villains, policemen.
The little orphan girl and the wicked innkeeper and his wife were recognizable--right
out of Trevor Nunn's old "Nicholas Nickleby" production, or a PBS
Masterpiece theater. But PBS does it much better.
Extravaganzas are the stock and trade of Cameron Mackintosh's productions.
His loves the grandiose, the spectacular, the shocking. He loves to put airplanes,
cars, massive chandeliers, and huge sets on stage. And the public seems to
enjoy this. Nonetheless it cheapens musicals and reduces them to a Las Vegas
asthetic if an asthetic is there in the first place. But the public doesn't
seem to mind. These revivals sell out. So can we expect More ? Ugh...
Margaret Croyden's most recent book is "Conversations With Peter
Brook, 1970-2000" published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
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