National Theatre's Romeo & Juliet a Big Success Despite it Still Being So GD Stupidby Randi / April 6, 2021This is the verbatim conversation I had with my husband when I asked if he wanted to watch the new London production of “Ordinary Days” with me:
Me: Wanna watch Ordinary Days
Him: What’s that
Me: It’s the show with that sad 9/11 song
Him: As opposed to a *happy* 9/11 song?
So that’s what I knew about “Ordinary Days” going in – that it was the 2008 song-cycle-type show featuring, well, the 9/11 song, called “I’ll Be Here”. Modern composer Adam Gwon’s famous song, the big 11 o’clock number in this show, has been making the cabaret/concert rounds for several years. We knew it from Audra McDonald’s singing it in her concerts for a good 2-3 year period (obviously because we attended all of those concerts (my biggest achievement in life is that I saw Audra perform live for 15 years at least once a year (across three countries); I’m an Audra groupie)). The first time, she started singing this song and we were like ‘oh this is nice’ and then for the second half I was SOBBING like hyperventilating crying. The second time she introduced it and we were like ‘oh well at least we know what’s coming’ and yet we cried like it was the first time. The third time we just said ‘here we fucking go again’ and yep we f-ing went again. It’s that good, that expertly written that even when you know it, it breaks your heart.
While “I’ll Be Here” is the best song in the show, the show is still pretty great apart from it. “Ordinary Days” follows four New Yorkers (it’s an eight-hander), in two separate storylines that semi-connect at one point but subtly, not in a trite or hard to believe way. Jason (Will Arundell) and Claire (Nic Myers) are in an awkward stage of their relationship, moving in together but unable to really connect because Claire seems to be putting up barriers. Jason’s all ‘hey I’m just this Paul Scheer-plus-Jon-Cryer-when-he-has-a-beard-looking-mufuhka can you open up to me please so we can make this relationship work?” and Claire’s all “hey I’m just this Haley-Reinhairt-plus-my-husband’s-aunt-but-20-years-ago looking beeyotch and I have A PAST that I’M NOT READY TO TALK ABOUT.”
As the couple navigates their issues, we meet the ‘quirkier’ side characters of Deb (Bobbie Chambers), a graduate student working on a Virginia Woolf masters or something equally useless, and Warren (Joe Thompson-Oubari), a manic pixie quirky boy who wants his new friend to be more fun, I think. I like their budding friendship and the ways they push get each other, although their characterizations as written (all four’s, actually) can be a little inelegant.
Reminding me more than a few times of early Jason Robert Brown, Gwon’s music is impressive. It’s wonderful to hear a score that is so carefully honed, with smart, clever lyrics that are often laugh-out-loud funny. It’s wonderful to hear a score that I can’t describe as ‘pedestrian’ or ‘lackluster’ (no offense but it’s been a while). There are some aspects that are unclear – did Jason actually know that Claire was previously married?? that seems like something you share earlier – and some character structuring that reveals that the piece is from the 00’s. But overall, I really enjoyed it, and I’ll be listening to the score. The whole score, not just “I’ll Be Here”…well mostly that one, but not only that one. Hot damn it’s such a good song though. We listened to it five more times after the show ended and still cried.
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Operation Mincemeat at the Southwark: Best Show in Two Years!
It’s Theatre Thursday! like…for real! About a live show! in an indoor theatre! I can’t believe it either.
Last weekend, we finally saw the Southwark Playhouse’s production of the new musical Operation Mincemeat. It has had a few runs in the past few years as the creative team continues to polish it, and we were supposed to see it hmmm a VERY long time ago and it’s finally back and we finally saw and the UK will finally have another great new homegrown musical for maybe the fifth time in 20 years. Yes, we went inside a theatre to see this week’s show. Thank goodness it was so good. If I had risked Delta for a piece of shit I would be so mad.
Operation Mincemeat is not a new telling of Sweeney Todd but is instead about the secret deception mission during World War II of that name. The not-well-known-enough-but-hopefully-this-show-will-make-everyone-know-more-about-it-and-also-maybe-other-things-about-this-war-like-the-Holocaust-because-rising-numbers-don’t-know-about-it-and-that’s-insane mission involved, from what I learned in this show: a pretentious posho with impeccable comic timing, a very sweaty detail-oriented nerd, a few secretaries of varying abilities of making you sob, Ian Fleming, a dead body, a movie screenplay, Spanish doctors who aren’t vets so I don’t follow them on instagram, and a plot that just had to work.
This British mission was a plot of misinformation directed at the nazis, a fake mission they created to steer them off course and attack where they weren’t expecting it. Quite cheeky for Brits, love to see them stop being polite and start getting real. The plot required finding a dead body, creating a false identity for it as a British pilot, ‘crashing’ him off the coast of Spain, and hoping that Hitler reads all the secret documents the corpse was carrying and then changes his plans to match the (fake) plans in the docs, leading to an Allied forces party in Sicily (sounds legit). The musical tells this story so well, thanks to an incredibly fun book, some truly wonderful music, and a game cast that repeatedly impressed me with their skill. Everyone was tops, with standouts for me being Natasha Hodgson with her gutbustingly funny manner as Ewen Montagu, and Jak Malone, who was amazing in several smaller parts but had most of the audience literally weeping with his big Act II love letter song in his role as the head secretary. It was like the opposite of a man-playing-woman role as Edna in Hairspray – completely nuanced and subtle and gentle and gorgeous. Like. WTF. That whole scene and song and performance was too good.
The first solid hour of the show is so strong, it renewed my faith in British musical theatre, it made me almost glad to be out of my house, it cleared my skin. It’s not perfect — there is way too much obvious Hamilton ‘inspiration’ (and some obvious Six), amid a sea of recent works that are clearly trying to hard to capture its magic. But it’s the least embarrassing Hamspiration yet, at least, which says a lot for it considering it’s still wypipo performing the big rapping sections. I would love to see a few bits after that first hour reworked; if they kept up that momentum and quality, it would be sensational. The Act II closer was well considered, with the team’s celebration in the club juxtaposed with the the submarine’s mission. But the direction becomes overly frenetic, and the “let me die in velvet” lyrics to the club song seemed too random to be anything but a wasted opportunity. The finale’s too many moving parts had a similar chaotic energy from trying to do too much (it’s nice to talk about e.g. postwar women’s rights but that’s nothing if not a shoehorned epilogue), although I really loved reprising Act I’s sea shanty (I forking love a good sea shanty).
My only big problem was with the Act II opener. You know from, well, 600 of my previous theatre ramblings that I’m a shill for big bouncy exciting Act II openers that quickly bring the audience back into the show’s universe. This opener was big and bouncy, but it made us feel sick. It has the cast dressed in nazi uniforms doing a ‘fun’ K-pop-ish dance club-ish LET’S ALL PARTAYYYYY number, and the audience. forking. loved it. They cheered, they danced, they put their hands in the air, and we sat there. It felt so messed up, to be sitting among a packed room of people having fun WITH the nazis. It wasn’t subversive or nuanced, it was just a party. Given the very very disturbing reactions of UK audiences to anything relating to Jews or Jewish culture (which I have written about extensively, unfortunately) (and the rise of fascism, and the rise of nazis, and the quadrupling in antisemitism in London…&c) it wasn’t surprising, just upsetting. A member of the creative team reached out and said that they are still working on making that song hit the right notes instead of what it’s doing in its current form, and I really hope they figure that out. But even if the audience does stop whooping it up with and cheering for the nazis long enough to acknowledge that they are the bad guys, it still wouldn’t serve the plot. I don’t know how to turn this song around so that it’s somehow necessary while also achieving the very difficult task of making the audience have fun with the nazis and then making them feel bad about it. I don’t think enough people in the world feel bad about it anyway so this is a big ask.
But if anyone could make it work, it’s probably this team. It’s such a fun, creative show and could really be spectacular. I can’t wait to see a future iteration of it, once I’m okay with leaving my house again.
AUDIENCE
Just like old times! I think everyone will be relieved to know that audiences are back to normal behavior and all of our old favorites are back – the phone-users; the nonstop talkers; the wrapper crinklers; the person who sits behind me and kicks my seat or, with the Southwark seats, really really wants to put his feet on the seat of my chair. Plus, now we have new favorites, like not wearing a mask and coughing. Unfortunately, these new faves were a little too difficult for me to tolerate (am I supposed to?) so it’ll be another while till I try again.
INFORMATION
The Southwark seems to want everyone to wear a mask, but believes they have no power to enforce a mandate because the government lifted its mandate. I was under the impression that private businesses can make their own rules but what do I know. At least a third of the audience was unmasked, and others when drinking. The Playhouse also said in an email that ventilation has been increased, like 8 liters more air circ per person or something that sounded very promising. However, this seemed like the least ventilated room I’ve ever been in – it was insanely hot and sticky (and tightly packed) and the air was seriously nearly suffocating.
Operation Mincemeat runs at the Southwark Playhouse until September 18.
“It’s Only A Play” on Broadway: You Should Still Try Though
I hate using the word ‘starry’ to describe something that uses a lot of recognizable actors, but hell if this isn’t the starriest thing I’ve seen since those shitty “Valentine’s Day” movies. I’m okay here with making the main descriptor of “It’s Only A Play” ‘starry’ (as every other piece about the show does) because it is indeed its main selling point. And, more than that, if I don’t go with starry I’ll have to go with ‘uninspired’, or ‘disappointing’, or ‘lame’. So, yeah, starry.
Reviewing this show is a little difficult, because while it is a revival of Terrence McNally’s 1982 play, it’s chock-full of ‘culturally relevant’ updates. So which part is more responsible for the crappiness, the old stuff or the new? I guess both! Also, while I’m sure the original work was seen as cutting and important for the theatre scene, this revival feels so tired and lame and ugh too often painful.
Okay, so it’s about an opening night party after the premiere of a new play as all the integral players wait for the reviews to come out. This premise forces all the action to happen in one room, specifically the bedroom of the producer, played by Megan Mullally. Bottling everyone claustrophobically inside this room as so much goes to shit and people start fighting and turning on each other and ugh just talking too much, it will make you want to shout from your seat “JUST LEAVE! JUST WALK OUT THE DOOR AND LEAVE WTF!” As I’m sure all audience members do, I felt like Bunuel in “Midnight in Paris” when Owen Wilson explains his future film to him, and Bunuel is like “But why don’t they just leave? I don’t understand.” This show.
Megan Mullally (I’m not going to use character names because these actors were not able to escape their public personae) is the sole producer of a show for the first time, so she is nervous about the reviews, and thus spends the entire opening night party (which she’s having at her HOME, which is LUDICROUS) upstairs in her bedroom. Pseudo-friends start popping in and never leaving, including:
- Nathan Lane, a television actor who gave up the lead in this play for his now-cancelled series even though the playwright is his ‘best friend’;
- the playwright Matthew Broderick, who is the most boring milquetoast man you have ever seen and I shudder to think of poor SJP;
- the director Rupert Grint, who is saddled with the worst costume and the worst bit (infra) and will have to deal with everyone saying how his Broadway debut did not measure up to Daniel Radcliffe’s but that’s not really his fault because this show;
- the theatre critic F. Murray Abraham, who somehow works his way into the inner circle despite, um, being a critic, and is just super miscast;
- the lead of the Play, Stockard Channing, who is trying to overcome her serious drug addictions (haha so funny?) by doing many drugs onstage while wearing her ankle monitor (which she couldn’t remove during the play within the play);
- and the best part of this show, Micah Stock, stealing all his scenes as the hopeful actor working this party as the coat-check guy.
I mean. That’s a great cast. It’s just too bad the play isn’t better. But I guess that doesn’t matter, because their collective star power is allowing this pile of whatnot to break box office records left and right. Good job, producers, proving that our current society values celebrity over quality. It’s just true. Even I went to see all these actors even though I had already heard how dumb it was. I judge me too.
I don’t want to be super mean; it’s not like this is the worst show ever or even right now. It’s just that it has so much freaking potential and that makes it even worse, (like “American Hustle”). As you know, it makes me angrier when something so easily could be better than when something just sucks. It reeks of laziness and negligence when a little more attention and effort could make something great. Hence why I’m so angry about this and I didn’t say anything about “Holler If Ya Hear Me”.
Nathan Lane, bless his heart, tries so freaking hard in everything he does. You can almost see a cloud of smoke (not farts) following him around as his effort outweighs every single person ever inspired by any small engine that ever thought it could, combined. Even during my vote for #1 worst part of the show – when Nathan Lane’s character has to refer to ACTUAL PERSON NATHAN LANE/himself as a super-gay famous actor whom he would have understood being cast in something, without cursing out the entire production team for including this awful update and without throwing glass vases at all the laughing audience members who think this is somehow funny – Lane gives his all to deliver every line with all his acting prowess as though it’s the most important play ever. Bravo to him, seriously, because his giving 200% is surprisingly what lets him retain his dignity after this mess ends.
So okay, plot. Oh wait, you got it. These characters wait for the reviews to come in. And not just any reviews, but most importantly the New York Times review from Ben Brantley. This is my vote for Worst Shit #1 (tied), because Ben Brantley is a real person who actually had to review this show. And despite it being terrible, he loved it and gave it a positive review – maybe…juuuuust maybe, because the show exalts him as the most important voice in all of theatre??? You think he liked that?
Breathe. So the characters assemble, and as they wait, they kind of fight, they bicker, they drop so many names. Nathan and Matthew have a big fight because Nathan admits that he didn’t take the part because the play sucks (real Nathan wishes he followed his character’s path?), and Broderick makes big lofty speeches about how commercialized the theatre has become. Listen, I saw this show in previews, so these speeches may have been mercifully cut by opening night (though as far as I can find, they haven’t been), but Broderick’s speeches stopped the show faster and more drastically than a ton of bricks falling from the ceiling could have. It was beyond boring. His delivery copied Ben Stein doing “Bueller…Bueller?”. The actual words mirrored Bob Balaban’s end monologue in “The Lady in the Water”, just replacing ‘movies’ with ‘theatre’. I wonder if M. Night has seen this yet and been alternately thrilled and pissed.
F. Murray Abraham, that fantastic serious actor, plays a total jackwagon of a theatre critic who, despite being stuck in this room with these people, tells them how much they suck and how dumb they are. He also acts kind of like a clown, laughing maniacally and creepily, and you’re just like…how did they cast you, fearsome Dar Adal &c., in this role? I feel bad for him.
Rupert Grint gets the shit end of the stick by far when he has to act out a confrontation with his father…in front of all his work colleagues (not to mention the audience)…with…wait for it…hand puppets. That he had in his pockets. I think it was supposed to be funny, but it was sad, and embarrassing.
Stockard Channing is another Serious Actor whom I felt intense levels of fremdschamen for the entire time. Important note to producers if they find a time machine: Stockard and Mullally should have switched roles. Stockard mostly talks about drugs and drinking while doing drugs and drinking in front of us, and it’s supposed to be funny because haha addition, but it’s not funny because it’s freaking Stockard Channing and you’re like…hey…hey girl…what are ya doing? Meanwhile, Mullally found success and became super famous because of how good she is at making drugs and drinking somehow freaking hilarious. Why on earth was she playing the uber-wealthy producer instead of the crazy actress? Why?
The saving grace of the entire shebang is Micah Stock, long-lost little brother of Billy Eichner. Micah’s coat-check guy comments on all the celebrities partying downstairs with absolutely no cynicism or really knowledge, just pure sincerity, and he’s hilarious and perfect. My favorite part of the show is when he comes up with coats and says a jumble of sounds that somehow you (if you are a theatre aficionado) know is supposed to be ‘Tovah Feldshuh’. Jokes about the Kardashians and Lady Gaga are less welcome, but he does his damnedest to make you laugh. His heavier presence in the beginning is what lets this show start off with a bang, but his diminished presence later on is what lets all the air out.
Despite all this crap it’s kind of fun? I have a feeling people would compare this ‘it’s bad but you still want to watch it’ feeling to “Grease 2”, but G2 is amazing and that would be too high praise. It’s more like “Never Been Kissed”, I’d say. You cringe the entire time and you cover your eyes at most everything that comes out of Drew Barrymore’s mouth, but Michael Vartan is in it and you love him. So…see it? Maybe?
