floragord wrote:Some years ago a Swiss friend took a group of us to the theatre in London to see
ANYTHING GOES (the Cole Porter musical that's been running in the West End for aeons)!
I am not sure about your 'aeons' - its last West End appearance was at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and it closed in January 2004, 11 years ago!!
Ooops, shows I've been away from west end theatreland for too long , thanks, Tony for updating me, I won't embarrass myself by a future enthusiastic recommendation to a non-existent show...
I loved The Wizard of Oz, The Sound of Music and Into the Woods. Les Miserables was pretty good too. Of course I've only seen them as movies but some day I would really like to see The Lion King on Broadway. I agree, Anita, about the change from monochrome to colour in TWOO - it just changed the tone of the movie entirely! I loved it, and I knew right then that the adventures were about to begin.
Thought I might as well put a plug in for our Musical Society, The Arcadians, who perform at The Crescent Theatre in Birmingham. This May we are doing 'Sister Act' - based on the Whoopie Goldberg movie. May 5 - 9 2015. I'm in the chorus and also a cop.
'Oh voice of Spring of Youth
hearts mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I'll warm me with your echoes
through the night.'
Did anyone see The Sound of Music Live which was broadcast on ITV about ten days ago? It was based on Rodgers and Hammerstein's stage version, rather than on the 1965 film which had altered a few things (including some of the songs). I enjoyed it very much. I hadn't seen Kara Tointon in anything before but I thought she made a sensitive, radiant Maria. I also watched the "making of" programme and was impressed by the attention to detail and the stamina of the actors who had to run across a car park from set to set, often arriving with seconds to spare before having to burst into song. Obviously stage/studio versions of The Sound of Music don't have the majestic scenery and versatility of the film, but when all the focus is on the songs and the relationships between the characters you can fully appreciate the music and storyline.
"Heyho for a starry night and a heathery bed!" - Jack, The Secret Island.
"There is no bond like the bond of having read and liked the same books."
- E. Nesbit, The Wonderful Garden.
Yes, I watched them both, Anita. Thought they were fab. It was great to see the making of the S of M, live performance and the count down to it being aired.
Fabulous, and a great cast.
Last edited by Julie2owlsdene on 30 Dec 2015, 10:47, edited 1 time in total.
Julian gave an exclamation and nudged George.
"See that? It's the black Bentley again. KMF 102!"
We recorded it but haven't watched it yet. We did start to see a film about Salzburg, and how the film hardly features amongst locals. Most have never heard of it!
I once stayed in a youth hostel in Salzburg and they showed The Sound of Music on a screen there every night, but of course that was for the benefit of tourists like us. My friend and I didn't watch it as we knew the film well enough already and we preferred to spend our evenings strolling round the town and having a snack in the market square.
"Heyho for a starry night and a heathery bed!" - Jack, The Secret Island.
"There is no bond like the bond of having read and liked the same books."
- E. Nesbit, The Wonderful Garden.
I saw Sound Of Music Live and thought it was very well done. Its always harder to just sit back and enjoy things when you've performed in the play you're watching (I was Franz the butler - very small part! - two years ago!) but I thought they did a very good job. The one person I thought had an awful voice was Mother Abbess - I was quite shocked, as the actress who played her was great in other recordings I have of her - but Climb Every Mountain is not her song! Ours was much better. She needed a more operatic voice.
It was also a shame they didn't finish off the song 'There's no way to stop it' -which they simply cut off half way through...maybe because the singers couldn't reach some top notes near the end?! I wasn't sure why they cut it short, but it seemed odd that they hacked one of the key songs - about the advance of the Nazis, and the fact no one can stop them but should just worry about themselves not their country - then again, they cut it completely from the film version...because Eleanor Parker who played the Duchess couldn't sing.
All in all, it was extremely well done, and I was disappointed to have missed the 'making of' programme that followed it.
'Oh voice of Spring of Youth
hearts mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I'll warm me with your echoes
through the night.'
It's interesting that 'There's No Way to Stop It' was shortened in The Sound of Music Live, Robert - I hadn't realised that.
I also hadn't known why Eleanor Parker (Baroness Schraeder) didn't sing in the 1965 film of The Sound of Music. Christopher Plummer (Captain Georg von Trapp) and Peggy Wood (Mother Abbess) were dubbed, so I wonder why Eleanor Parker couldn't have been dubbed? Maybe it was felt that some of the original songs didn't move the story along.
"Heyho for a starry night and a heathery bed!" - Jack, The Secret Island.
"There is no bond like the bond of having read and liked the same books."
- E. Nesbit, The Wonderful Garden.
I'm not sure about The Sound of Music - but quite often when people were dubbed, they weren't always completely dubbed. Maybe Eleanor Parker couldn't sing at all, or maybe, as you say, the producers simply felt that the songs they cut out didn't move the story along. I know that in My Fair Lady Audrey Hepburn's top notes were dubbed, especially in 'I Could Have Danced All Night' - but other songs were sung in her own voice. I think this was also the case with Christopher Plummer, though I'm not sure.
'Oh voice of Spring of Youth
hearts mad delight,
Sing on, sing on, and when the sun is gone
I'll warm me with your echoes
through the night.'
Actually, Audrey Hepburn sang hardly anything, only most of "Just You Wait", its reprise and single lines elsewhere. I think the dubbing in MY FAIR LADY is obvious and distracting. Warner Brothers should have cast someone who could play the part. It's incredibly rare for the substitution of one voice for another to be fully convincing; it's a technique that has compromised the integrity of many film musicals.
I've got the original stage cast recording of My Fair Lady with Julie Andrews... she could sing. I can't remember exactly, but I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that she was rejected for the film version because she wasn't famous enough at the time and had never been in a film before. Of course, the same year, Disney snapped her up for Mary Poppins, which I bet left the good people at Warner Brothers kicking themselves for a while afterwards!!
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It was a nuisance. An adventure was one thing - but an adventure without anything to eat was quite another thing. That wouldn't do at all. (The Valley of Adventure)
, thanks, Tony for updating me, I won't embarrass myself by a future enthusiastic recommendation to a non-existent show...
