in which I don't know my Broadway history
Aug. 18th, 2019 09:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessFosse/Verdon 1.4 Glory
This mostly ran chronologically, with some mini-flashbacks, delusions and fantasy sequences for Fosse. He was rehearsing Pippin, oh, and Cabaret was snowballing into a commercial and artistic success. She was rehearsing her straight play Children, Children, and when she asked Fosse to help before opening night, he was too busy swaggering around like the director of Cabaret, which involved sleeping his way through dancers, even if it didn’t seem to be making him happier. So, when he asked for help with the ending of Pippin, which was apparently about whether the hero chose success and death, or life and the humdrum, Verdon didn’t. But he got Tonys for it anyway.
Professionally speaking, the rights to Chicago got mentioned – so that would be to turn the musical into a film, yes?
One more professional point, one of the title cards showed that it was a long time (Nicole’s lifetime and more) since Verdon had last won a Tony.
On the personal front, one of the gut punches came in a hospital bed conversation between Gwen and Joan, who we’d gathered was dying, and Gwen was faithfully visiting (Bobby never did). When Joan asked Gwen to promise one thing, I thought it was to look out for Joan’s child, so did Gwen, I think (although we’d ever seen this child, she might be dead, but let’s stick to Occam’s Razor). Instead, Joan asked Gwen to look out for her own daughter.
Ouch.
To her credit, Gwen listened, coming to spend time with Nicole, instead of brushing her off (although I don’t think that lying about Joan’s prognosis is great parenting, better to prepare her appropriately for the inevitable). Up til then, she had been dragging her around – and look, I don’t think that taking bath over watching TV you don’t like with your kid on your first night off is terrible parenting on its own.
This was a very daughter-centric episode, the fallout to the marriage and her parents’ issues – like being witness to your dad having been slightly duffed up by your mum’s new boyfriend. I mean, Bobby was the most unreasonable here: you don’t creep into your ex-wife’s home and bed in the middle of the night.
But then we’d seen he had issues with invitations and consent before. The cynicism of ‘bad dancer/bad lay’ didn’t ameliorate the screwed up dynamics. It was basically sexual exploitation of employees desperate to keep their jobs.*
I didn’t catch the name of the dancer who was good enough that she could turn him down. Did she become a star?
I didn’t love the shorthand of dancer after dancer apparently being pleasured (yes, it’s stylised, and yes, maybe the drug-dependant Lothario always managed it) though it got its point across. I didn’t think the montage involving dancing at the disco was particularly effective, though I can take or leave montages.
But the closing sequence!!! After all the repeated fantasy leaps, the way Fosse’s issues all got expressed in a version of that finale that had been bothering him was brill. The lead singer was great when he got going, and the chorus of dancers, stalwart friend and Gwen herself urging Bobby to kill himself chilling but effective. And then, in non-showy counterpoint, little Nicole – and her lyrics about his failings as a father were vicious and true (because, being more together, Gwen was better at making sure that her daughter was fed, watered and safeguarded effectively, even if taking care means more). And so he woke up at a treatment facility – it’s hard to tell if he’d really rung 911.
*Phrasing may be influenced by the Beeb advertising a documentary about Weinstein with victim testimony after the episode ended.
This mostly ran chronologically, with some mini-flashbacks, delusions and fantasy sequences for Fosse. He was rehearsing Pippin, oh, and Cabaret was snowballing into a commercial and artistic success. She was rehearsing her straight play Children, Children, and when she asked Fosse to help before opening night, he was too busy swaggering around like the director of Cabaret, which involved sleeping his way through dancers, even if it didn’t seem to be making him happier. So, when he asked for help with the ending of Pippin, which was apparently about whether the hero chose success and death, or life and the humdrum, Verdon didn’t. But he got Tonys for it anyway.
Professionally speaking, the rights to Chicago got mentioned – so that would be to turn the musical into a film, yes?
One more professional point, one of the title cards showed that it was a long time (Nicole’s lifetime and more) since Verdon had last won a Tony.
On the personal front, one of the gut punches came in a hospital bed conversation between Gwen and Joan, who we’d gathered was dying, and Gwen was faithfully visiting (Bobby never did). When Joan asked Gwen to promise one thing, I thought it was to look out for Joan’s child, so did Gwen, I think (although we’d ever seen this child, she might be dead, but let’s stick to Occam’s Razor). Instead, Joan asked Gwen to look out for her own daughter.
Ouch.
To her credit, Gwen listened, coming to spend time with Nicole, instead of brushing her off (although I don’t think that lying about Joan’s prognosis is great parenting, better to prepare her appropriately for the inevitable). Up til then, she had been dragging her around – and look, I don’t think that taking bath over watching TV you don’t like with your kid on your first night off is terrible parenting on its own.
This was a very daughter-centric episode, the fallout to the marriage and her parents’ issues – like being witness to your dad having been slightly duffed up by your mum’s new boyfriend. I mean, Bobby was the most unreasonable here: you don’t creep into your ex-wife’s home and bed in the middle of the night.
But then we’d seen he had issues with invitations and consent before. The cynicism of ‘bad dancer/bad lay’ didn’t ameliorate the screwed up dynamics. It was basically sexual exploitation of employees desperate to keep their jobs.*
I didn’t catch the name of the dancer who was good enough that she could turn him down. Did she become a star?
I didn’t love the shorthand of dancer after dancer apparently being pleasured (yes, it’s stylised, and yes, maybe the drug-dependant Lothario always managed it) though it got its point across. I didn’t think the montage involving dancing at the disco was particularly effective, though I can take or leave montages.
But the closing sequence!!! After all the repeated fantasy leaps, the way Fosse’s issues all got expressed in a version of that finale that had been bothering him was brill. The lead singer was great when he got going, and the chorus of dancers, stalwart friend and Gwen herself urging Bobby to kill himself chilling but effective. And then, in non-showy counterpoint, little Nicole – and her lyrics about his failings as a father were vicious and true (because, being more together, Gwen was better at making sure that her daughter was fed, watered and safeguarded effectively, even if taking care means more). And so he woke up at a treatment facility – it’s hard to tell if he’d really rung 911.
*Phrasing may be influenced by the Beeb advertising a documentary about Weinstein with victim testimony after the episode ended.
