When Shows Change

[DisneyFanatic]

ZHave you ever had a changing show experience? By this I mean, you see a shopw once and then see it again a few years later only to notice multiple changes? I just had such an experience, I've had the Seussical CD since it's release in 2001 and I *thought* I was quite familiar with the show, but when I saw a nearby community production last week there seemed to be changes in the score, plot and structure.....it confused me. So....can anyone explain this to me? I've also notice several continueity differences between the Little Shop of Horrors Original Cast Recording and some recent productions.....any infpormation on that? I realize this is a somewhat pointless post, but I'm just curious. Thanks!

[stars in the sky]

When shows get redone, directors often take creative license, especially when you get on smaller scales. At schools, for instance, profanity and the like is often cut. When we did Fame this year at my school, the directors mixed in songs and such from the movie into the musical script, and added a number of scenes so more kids could have parts. Also, look at any Shakespeare play-- those are almost never performed with the full script, and they're regularly set in time periods ranging from the Elizabethan era to modern times and beyond. Beyond, of course, being the African grassplains (read: The Lion King).

[Twisted]

Little Shop hasn't been changed too much (and has always been different from the movie). Mostly Twoey has changed because the Creature Shop got better at making a behemoth artichoke/venus flytrap hybrid. But they also had to take some of the references that people wouldn't get out of it (sadly, I always got them -_-) but when I saw it about a month ago, it was similar to the off-broadway cast with Ellen Greene.

And for shows that change...Phantom of the Opera is one...Wicked's changed, but in a good way (now everything's the same for the most part, but I saw previews, too). And Cats. But ALW likes to play with his work so it's to be expected of him.

[stars in the sky]

Well, part of the purpose of previews and out-of-town tryouts for shows is to iron out the kinks in the show. Take Wicked, for instance-- the San Francisco version featured different costumes (Kristin wore a blue dress instead of pink in Popular; they tried the blue diamond thing on Norbert), different songs and lyrics (an extra verse in "No Good Deed"; "Which Way is the Party/We Deserve Each Other" instead of "Dancing Through Life"), and even different cast members (Robert someone instead of Joel Grey as the Wizard). Plus, like Twisted said, shows sometimes have to keep current or at least make sense (ask me if you want the Rent examples, llam).

[galindafiedgirl215]

Wait, they actually did blue diamonds of Norbert? Are there pics?

[stars in the sky]

If there are pics, I haven't seen them and I really want to! I know they did them-- I've read a couple interviews and stuff where Norbert was saying that they'd tried it (so as to stay more faithful to the book), but beyond the first couple rows of the theater, they looked like bruises, so the look was cut.

[Twisted]

starsinthesky said:

If there are pics, I haven't seen them and I really want to! I know they did them-- I've read a couple interviews and stuff where Norbert was saying that they'd tried it (so as to stay more faithful to the book), but beyond the first couple rows of the theater, they looked like bruises, so the look was cut.

Yeah, I wish I could find pictures...I don't know, my cousin and I were talking about those randomly one day, and we were wondering what they'd actually look like, especially on Norbert, as he has very fair skin.

[imperfectly_green]

I heard that, too. It would be fun to see what that'd look like.

Anyway, when my school did its production of Little Shop, they had six urchins instead of three and some numbers were transformed into large chorus productions so we could fit in a-erm-large chorus. Things like that are done in some school productions to include more people.

[stars in the sky]

Just to make yet another post here and add more of my two cents, we did Little Shop at camp one summer, and the plants were two girls (one for little Audrey II and one for big, and then they teamed up for the finale) dressed in and painted green, with green yarn in their hair. Worked pretty well.

For the record, we had only two or three guys in the entire show. The Dentist was played by a girl.

[imperfectly_green]

Wait...that's wierd...one summer at my camp they did LSOH, and there weren't many boys in the show at all, maybe 3, and the plant was played by a girl dressed in green. That year I wasn't in it, though, so I don't know all that much about it. The Dentist may have been played by a girl. Strange.

[stars in the sky]

Weird coincidence, that. You weren't at Camp Tevya by chance, were you? Because it'd be way too weird if I randomly met up with someone I went to camp in NH with in like seventh grade...

[StageFiyero]

Replying to your example of Seussical, DisneyFanatic, the show actually contains a whole subplot not included on the CD, as well as a couple short reprises. The subplot is basically that JoJo gets sent off to war and is MIA and his parents think he's dead. That's kind of what Solla Sollew is all about. They find JoJo of course, and he saves Who from being boiled in the "hot steeming kettle of beazlenut oil."

The only thing that has ever surprised me going into a show that I knew well was "Wicked Witch of the East" in Wicked.

[Twisted]

princefiyero said:

The only thing that has ever surprised me going into a show that I knew well was "Wicked Witch of the East" in Wicked.

I knew about Witch of the East when I went to see it, but I knew it as a reprise of We Deserve Each Other, because my da has a copy of the orchestration.

[jade]

Well, I saw Rent in the West End and then I saw the UK Tour and the two productions were completely different. I was expecting the changes, though: The West End version was the same as on Broadway but the the UK Tour was produced by a completely different company which, I think, only had the rights to the songs. The costumes, set and choreography were all completely different.

Starlight Express changed pretty dramatically at some point - didn't it become The All New Starlight Express or something? The plot was simplified, a couple of major characters were cut out, songs were changed or removed and new songs added. I was really shocked when I heard the CD of the original at how different it was.

[DisneyFanatic]

Thanks for the surplus of replies. What majorly surprised me about Seussical was that on the CD and the booklet that came with the CD it said the Cat appears in a votrex and starts to sing "Oh The Thinks You Can Think" and when I saw it the show started with a random boy walking onstage, finding the hat and then the cat just appeared and guided him through the story...and then the boy turned into Jojo, it was actually a really nice surprise because I didn't anticipate Jojo to play such a major role. I was also surprised at the omission of A Day For The Cat....still, it was a great show. On a tangent, I've seen Fame twice and it seemed like a lot of stuff got changed plot-wise....still an enjoyable show. On another side note: Blue diamonds?!?! I'd really like to see a picture of that....OFF TO GOOGLE!