I love the show, love the score, and loved seeing it again tonight. Very polished for a one performance benefit.
Hearing the score again was like finding manna in the desert. The joy of it, the charm of it, the loveliness of it. I was transported, enraptured, and more than once, could not stay a tear. So many memories, memories fondly remembered of when I first heard these songs, and feelings from way back when now relived anew.
"Maria," "My Favorite Things," "Sixteen Going on Seventeen, " "So Long, Farewell," "Climb Every Mountain"... Inimitable. Incomparable.
The cast was excellent. Laura Osnes was fresh, winning, and sang beautifully. Tony Goldwyn made the captain more human than usual, and sang well. Brooke Shields, ageless and resplendent, handled her part with grace and charm, and received deserved applause on her final exit. Patrick Page got all the humor from his part, and then some. Stephanie Blythe delivered "Climb Every Mountain" majestically.
Projections were used very effectively to indicate the various settings.
Bob Fisher did a good job conducting. The music sounded wonderful in the hall.
I was there. It was pretty great. After a gorgeous overture, the chorus of nuns appeared throughout the hall with the whole room only lit by their candles. Gorgeous. So great to hear that wonderful score with such a huge orchestra. Laura did a great job, I thought. I don't understand, though, why they wouldn't hire the best singers when clearly this concert is about hearing the music. Why couldn't they have gotten better singers than Tony Goldwyn and Brooke Shields? Also, I know it was a concert presentation, and I'm very attached to the movie adaptation, but is the book always so slight in the stage version? Overall, though, I was moved many times. There were projections of different Salzburg landscapes and other images to set the scene on the back wall and I thought those were lovely.
Laura Osnes was wonderful. With a concert hall full of people who have have the performances of Mary Martin and Julie Andrews memorized from the recordings and the movie, she sang and acted the part perfectly and won everyone over.
Tony Goldwyn cut a very handsome figure as Captain Von Trapp and his singing was surprisingly strong.
Brooke Shields played Elsa with appropriate glamour, but the part as written in the show suffers in comparison to the way it's written in the movie, and the two songs she has in the show are tough to get right. Patrick Page and Veanne Cox were excellent.
The realm thrill of the night was opera star Stephanie Blythe as the Mother Abbess. She brought her Wagnerian vocal power to "Climb Every Mountain," and it was a knockout.
Gary Griffin and Joshua Bergasse staged it perfectly--not too little and not too much. They had a wonderful effect with the opening nuns' chorus: there were nuns holding (battery-operated) candles, singing in the darkness onstage, in the aisles and up in the boxes. It was quite beautiful. Bergasse did some nice little dances for the children (who were adorable) and for Liesl and Rolf to do in "Sixteen Going on Seventeen."
I'm now an official Laura Osnes fan, but Stephanie Blythe...wow.
Seems like everyone else liked Goldwyn more than I did. I admit it, I'm attached to Christopher Plummer, and I was sitting too far back to judge his acting. Overall, I thought he was fine, just not great singing-wise. And when he sang "Edelweiss" (my favorite song in the show), he bugged me with the way he sang the word "blossom." Did anyone else find that odd and a little laughable? "Bl-----ssom of snow..." I can be too nitpicky at times, but that was my issue.
Wow, great reviews! Thank you so much guys! I really wish I was there, but oh well.
They had an overture? That's awesome! First time, right? The show usually just starts with the preludium.
Yea, the original book dialogue is sort of dated, but Ernest Lehman did a great job adapting the dialogue for the screen version. I'm still shocked he didn't receive an Oscar nomination. I think Robert Wise even told him back then that he was robbed.
Tony Goldwyn has been impressing me lately on ABC's Scandal. I had no idea he could sing. And, I can totally see Brooke Shields as Elsa. Unfortunately, the stage Elsa is not as bitchy as the movie Elsa, but it is still a great part and How Can Love Survive? is an awesome song to sing.
Happy for Laura! Can't wait to see how Cinderella goes for her!
Oh, and how were Daniel Truhitte, Nicholas Hammond, Heather Menzies, and Kym Karath in their cameo roles?
Laura was amazing. It's not my favorite musical, but it is my favorite movie, and I was expecting to have to lower the bar a bit from Julie Andrews - but I didn't. Laura was just delightful, as was Patrick Page.
Count me in the camp of why Tony Goldwyn and Brooke Shields for a concert. They weren't terrible, but the singing was distracting compared to the big guns on stage. I didn't think Tony Goldwyn 'got' the Captain at all. He was just another man in love. And yes, that 'bl---ossom' was an unfortunate choice!
Although I really enjoyed the whole night, I think the highlight was the opening number with the choir and soloists scattered throughout the concert hall, in the dark, with candles. They set the tone of the abbey better than I've ever seen it done. I also thought it was neat the way they handled 'costumes' - the Mother Abbess had a long black 'cardigan' of sorts with white trim, and when Maria was in the abbey, her gorgeous blue evening gown was partially covered with a gauzy overlay. Her white dress for the second act was stunning.
I can't remember all the cameos off the top of my head, but several were really just walk-ons as the trio that wins 3rd prize at the festival - they walked on, bowed, walked off.
Goldwyn is a good actor, but obviously not the actor Plummer is. But I don't think he is expected to deliver as fully fleshed-out a performance for a one night benefit after brief rehearsal time.
And yet, I thought his take in the role was better than Plummer's. Goldwyn humanized the character to a greater degree.
His singing was good, and his "b-lossom" didn't bother me at all.
I echo all of the kudos for Laura Osnes. She was just beautiful in the role.
CockeyedOptimist, I do agree with you about the way Tony Goldwyn sang the word 'blo-ssom'. It caught my ear. But, I did enjoy his performance, and felt he had a wonderful rapport with Laura Osnes.
Just hearing that gorgeous music played by the orchestra in that 'music hall' was worth the price of admission. The staging, effects (loved the nuns at the beginning and the projections), and costume selections served the performance perfectly.
Stephanie Blythe was... as PalJoey said: WOW!
I've been humming and singing the music since leaving Carnegie last night. What a joy!
AfterEight, I totally agree that a concert doesn't require the same kind of characterization. That's why it was still overall so positive for me, even given that I had a different impression of Goldwyn. It really could be a relational thing - I enjoyed Laura Osnes (and Patrick Page, and Veanne Cox, too, actually) so much that it made perfectly adequate performances by others pale in comparison.
After watching (in awe) last night, I believe that nobody is more suited to sing this material than Laura Osnes. It was an effortless performance that was perfectly nuanced (as much as it can be for Carnegie Hall). The rest of the cast was strong in their own ways, but at the end of the evening everyone was buzzing about Osnes--as well they should have been.
Pal Joey, the one reason I am sorry to have missed this was Stephanie Blythe. I have been a huge fan of hers for over a decade. If you haven't seen it, watch the Il Tritico from the MET which is available on DVD, She does three parts and each one is a gem.
Tony Goldwyn has been impressing me lately on ABC's Scandal. I had no idea he could sing.
Apparently you missed him in the 2010 Broadway revival of PROMISES, PROMISES where, as Sheldrake, he sang a quite effective "Wanting Things" as well as "Our Little Secret" along with Sean Hayes.
aaahhh The Sound of Music...brings back fond memories of the last Broadway revival of the show. For some reason my cousin and I would always be walking past the Martin Beck as people were milling about outside during intermission. As we were passing the families with children one of us would blurt out in a loud voice..."wow nice crowd considering that they added the nude scene in the second act." Always made us laugh hysterically as those that overheard the comment would start to buzz to each other in horror. Too bad we didn't pass by Carnegie Hall last night at intermission.
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Posted: 4/24/12 at 06:45pm