Chess

[Phantom of London]

I saw an excellent amateur production of 'Chess' tonight and saw the show also on Wednesday, I love the show, it has some sublime music and lyrics and IMHO 'Endgame' is as good as it gets in musical theatre, but I was distressed when the show played Broadway there was no love for the show, it received some horrific reviews and it managed to play just over a month.

So was 'Chess' just loathed by the public, critic and theatre aficionados (you)? Or am I wrong and there are people on this board who liked, enjoyed and loved the show?

[SporkGoddess]

I like the music but really none of the characters are likable. I've heard similar opinions from others here, as well.

[Jonwo]

The music is great but the book's a mess given how much tinkering they've done, I think it'd be easier for someone just to do a new book but keep the music but I'm not sure if Tim Rice or Benny and Bjorn would allow it.

[CATSNYrevival]

Which version did they perform? It's tough to say that I like the show without specifying which version. I was relatively happy with the recent concert version and the Danish production from 2001(?) I think. I believe the show was initially successful in London? I don't remember. The Broadway version had a new book and was a complete mess which is why it received such terrible reviews and that "reputation" seems to have followed the show around ever since regardless of which version is performed.

[broadwayjim42]

It's always been a great score in search of a decent book. I thought the first act of the Broadway incarnation was actually quite good, but the second was a chore to get through.

David Carroll's "Anthem" is one for the ages though.

[Owen22]

I loved the Broadway "Chess", book, score, actors and (mostly) direction. I saw it three times and go to Lincoln Center Library every six or seven years to see it again. I found the characters, if not completely likable, fascinating and interesting and (for the time) quite modern. Sure, there are some wrong-headed choices in book and score (in Act One Florence bemoans she "knows him so well" but in Act Two decides "maybe its best to love a stranger, well that's what I've done...") but I'll take that over some of today's more...cohesive if antiseptic shows. I am so in the minority on this musical (then and now) but I will love Judy Kuhn, David Carroll, Phillip Casnoff and the characters they played and the songs they sang in Broadway's "Chess" forever.

[lizzieshername]

This is my favorite score of all time. One can only hope this gem will find a book worthy of the score and make a successful return to Broadway one day.

[tazber]

Great score but it simply doesn't work as a staged production. It's best appreciated as a concept album.

[bobs3]

I agree it's a great score but the book in its many incarnations has never worked. The original London production was a success but primarily because of a brilliant set (which was not replicated in the Broadway production). Look for photos of the London set on Google. You will be amazed. Also, the London production had two box office stars -- Elaine Paige and Murray Head. The role of Florence was written by Tim Rice for Paige who was his girlfriend at the time. The London production was created by Michael Bennett but he dropped out during rehearsals due to his illness and Trevor Nunn took over direction completing Bennett's vision. When the show moved to Broadway, Nunn wanted to make the show his own and dropped the sets and the original London cast and the book was revised. The best way to listen to the show is the original concept recording which is flawless.

[Phantom of London]

Even though Frank Rich hated the show, The New York Times gave the concept album a rave, "a sumptuously recorded...grandiose pastiche that touches half a dozen bases, from Gilbert and Sullivan to late Rodgers and Hammerstein, from Italian opera to trendy synthesizer-based pop, all of it lavishly arranged for the London Symphony Orchestra with splashy electronic embellishments", the was long before Chess opened on Broadway.

[CATSNYrevival]

I'd be interested to see how the revised/concert script would play on Broadway. It mostly follows the original London production which I think was the most coherent version. I guess the "time" for that sort of musical has passed, but it would be neat to see something closer to the original play in New York. The show itself isn't perfect, few shows are, but it really needs a brilliant design and a brilliant director to pull it all together.

[best12bars]

I agree that you have one of the best scores of the past 50 years, but the characters are almost impossible to embrace (sounds like I'm talking about "Follies" as well) and the plot sort of resolves in a gray "whatever" way.

I think the recent concert version with Pascal, Menzel, and Groban is very likely as good as it gets.

(and it was very, very good)

[henrikegerman]

I don't believe people loathed it. I had the feeling that the audience at large and I were in agreement. The score was exciting and smart, the singing excellent, but the book was a contrived blend of stretched allegory, melodramatic politics rehashed from standard cold war pulp, flat romance, and manipulative faux-poignant father/daughter backstory - you left the theater thinking there was a great show there somewhere, but this wasn't it.

[broadwaybabytn]

I agree that the Royal Albert Hall concert may be the best it can get.
(Except for that cheerleading number...)

[EponineAmneris]

What best12bars said.... as always

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the show, the score, the concept... but I can not say I even LIKE any of the characters... except Freddie on a very good day.

One of my all time favorites.

A great topic for the 24th Anniversary weekend as it were

[Owen22]

Please, the Albert Hall "Chess" was horrible, except for Groban. Pascal and (especially) Idina were horrible. The Albert Hall reflected the original London version and they were both just bad storytelling. Look how the show starts: We get all these (fun and melodic but) superficial songs ("Merano", "The Story of Chess", "The Merchandisers", "The Arbiter's Song") that crowd and choke the few character songs that the leads have. In the original Florence doesn't have an "I Want" song ("Someone Else's Story" was written for Broadway) and her first real character song, "Nobody's Side", is the SEVENTEENTH song in Act One). The show keeps starting and starting and starting again, giving voice to characters no one cares about or situations that have little impact on the plot. Richard Nelson's book gives depth, a solid backstory and, most importantly, a structure to Chess. I will admit that perhaps I am so in love with the actors in the Broadway version that I might be shortsighted on its overall quality (but I might also argue that I might NOT be) but there is no way in Great White Hell that its worse than the atrocity that was the PBS Albert Hall version.

[best12bars]

Pascal and (especially) Idina were horrible.

Can't agree with you there. At all.

EDIT:

I will say this, too. You need a giant TV with a killer sound system. If you have one, "Chess" just might reduce you to tears (yeah, for all the right reasons).

[Phantom of London]

I saw Chess the Broadway version, last year at the library of the public arts, which I expected to be a hot mess, but it blew me away and saw the DVD of the Royal Albert Hall version again enjoyed this too, but I am obviously very biased.

Maybe the abject failure of 'Chess' might not be the book, but how the book is translated, which in short I mean by poor direction, a show can fail just on poor direction alone, as if this wasn't the case, every version of 'Hamlet' would be a hit.

[broadwayjim42]

I was so looking forward to the Royal Albert Hall taping and CD and sorry, Idina killed it for me. Coming after Elaine, Judy, Carolee Carmello (1990 tour), I found her voice all wrong for the show.

I couldn't finishing watching or listening.

[Mister Matt]

I really didn't care for the Broadway book and score revisions which turned a more thought-provoking story into a contrived soap opera. What I loved about the original first act and its parade of introductory music was that it played up the varied cultures involved in the story which provided the foundation for the highly political background to a story set during the Cold War and unfolding on foreign soil. I thought it was pure genius. The concept recording has to be one of the best recordings in musical theatre in the last 30 years.

The only worthwhile contribution the Broadway production made was the addition of Someone Else's Story for Florence.

(in Act One Florence bemoans she "knows him so well" but in Act Two decides "maybe its best to love a stranger, well that's what I've done...")

Huh? I've never seen or heard the show with I Know Him So Well in Act One. Heaven Help My Heart almost always precedes I Know Him So Well in the second act (except in the Danish tour and Albert Hall concerts where Heaven Help My Heart is near the end of the first act and I Know Him So Well is in Act 2).

[MrMidwest]

Carolee Carmello - Someone Else's Story

[Idiot]

Saw the original in London. The stagecraft was outstanding.... and boy did it need to be, to make up for a story that you couldn't care much about no matter how hard you tried.

[tmbyru]

I absolutely love "I Know Him So Well" it was covered by a pop band in the UK called STEPS. Heard the song well before I ever heard of the show.

[Mister Matt]

I love STEPS!! LOVE THEM!! I have every CD and single. They are the absolute pinnacle of cheesy pop.

Baby, please
This heart's on the line
Don't waste this precious time
Say you'll be mine

*sigh*



STEPS performing I Know Him So Well

[Mister Matt]

But I have to say my favorite version of the song is John Barrowman and Daniel Boys which give me chills every time I hear it.

John Barrowman and Daniel Boys - I Know Him So Well

[fingerlakessinger]

After seeing the RAH Concert, I fell in love with the show. At least the music. And the book that the concert was based off I think is pretty strong. If they just expand on that, then I think it would be great.
And yes...I think Menzel was a great Florence. Crucify me.