January 19, 2023
The Cast & Cameos of Tick, Tick...Boom! and Why You Know Them (or Should)by Randi / November 23, 2021It’s so strange to think that Stephen Sondheim is no longer on this earth when the earth has so often felt like simply a platform for his work to exist. Everything that happens and everywhere I go and every word that every person says reminds me of some truth he shared with the world that we were lucky enough to hear and understand and connect with emotionally. No one was more honest about the complexities of human emotion and the depths of human frailty, and applying that honesty to musical theatre elevated it as an art form and reinforced that it’s deserving of respect. Look at what musical theatre can achieve, he said. Look at how we need musical theatre to truly express our humanity. That’s why we love him so much.
I’m not foolish enough to think that I can eulogize him better than others have (except the Guardian of course) or discuss the brilliance of his works in detail like theatre historians. I just wanted to take a few minutes to think about how important his creations are to me personally. Unfortunately I’m not able to do what everyone loves doing (and you can’t really fault them for doing it), which is to share a photo of me and the deceased, because I never had the opportunity to meet him. While part of me is of course sorry that that will never happen, part of me is glad because I can go on imagining him as more than an ordinary man. For me and for most of us who love theatre, he was this sort of holy figure, whose genius necessitated that he must be more than human, despite understanding and expressing humanity on such unparalleled levels.
This past weekend, I was without power and cell service for a few days due to the storm, and while that experience was one of the worst, it let me have a few extra days of believing I actually shared a planet with him, this great figure. That we existed in the same era and in the same universe is a miracle to me, and not just because it’s Chanukah and he was Jewish and I’m primed to be thinking all miracley anyway. He would be the last person to think of himself in such laudatory terms as we all do, as he was just a man (a NJB really), but his genius made him seem superhuman, despite that very genius being grounded in humanity.
On a personal level, his works form important touchstones for so many parts of my life. One of my earliest memories is watching the PBS airing of ‘Sunday in the Park with George’ over and over with my mom. She had taped it (VHS baby) so she would put it on frequently for years after. I remember it was even on when she was drying her hair one morning, and I was just staring at the small screen. Mandy Patinkin quickly became my mom’s favorite non-family (maybe even including family who knows) person in the world, and I loved everything about it, this woman in the dress with the poofy butt (who know one day I would work with her) and the colors and all these characters and above all the sound of this perfect music that I was too young to understand but knew was beautiful and important. As a teenager, I was obsessed with the dark twists of ‘Into the Woods’ and the lessons it taught about consequences and the ramifications of wishes, especially as someone raised on Disney princesses. But, I was also raised on ‘West Side Story’ and with it my dad’s favorite story of his single line: ‘COPS!’ And I’m not saying I married a man because he appreciates and loves how insanely ingenious ‘Assassins’ is but it’s not not why. I can’t imagine what life looks like without his shows helping us understand it.
It doesn’t matter that he was 91 or that we’ve been fearing this moment since his big 80th celebration. Genius of that sort is rare and now we are without his. But we have his work, his brilliant creations, each of them special and so many of them continually surprising in their truth and beauty. We are so lucky that his works keep getting produced and we can keep experiencing them, and in new ways, even if we will never get that fabled next show from him.
His genius was in peeling away layers to reveal raw human truths that seem so simple and clear but are so complicated, and doing that to incredible music. He seemed to so often be drawn to extremely niche situations for his settings — not e.g. a basic family drama that everyone could relate to but instead a group of aging former performers confronting their pasts in a closing dilapidated theatre, or a beloved painting brought to life through the backstory of its creator and muse, or a group of historical assassins detailing their exploits and commenting on the current state of politics (current at any time, another aspect of his brilliance). Even the situations that don’t seem too rare or extreme, like the single man deliberating his singledom, were novel and innovative at the time. Instead of writing characters as every day people we would immediately relate to, he made it so we related to people we didn’t automatically see ourselves in. We weren’t always reflected outwardly but we would soon feel emotionally connected and reflected due to the honesty and depth of his words and how the music enhanced their meaning. He found emotional truths in this nuance and showed them so clearly that the shadows seemed like daybreak. His legacy for me is how he let audiences easily see themselves in characters that aren’t clearly similar to them, or see truth in situations that don’t look like their normal lives, which more easily lets people connect with those different from them in real life. I believe he did this, and since being able to connect in those ways increases empathy, with his art he thus made the world a better place.
When loved ones die, Jewish people say may their memory be a blessing. To remember Stephen Sondheim is to remember his genius and how that genius manifested in the creation of these lasting works of emotional truth and humanity. His memory is a blessing, and will always be a blessing, as his life was, as his art was.
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City of Angels at the Garrick: Nearly Superb Production of a Nearly Great Show
It’s Theatre Thursday! Today’s show is City of Angels, playing at London’s Garrick Theatre after a transfer from the Donmar Warehouse.
The 1989 musical City of Angels may feel just like a 1940s noir film, but the intrigue and twists are all in cheeky good fun. And the new production in London’s West End is definitely good fun. While the great Cy Coleman’s score is less than great, this well directed, inventive production betters even the less exciting parts. The cast seems to delight in Larry Gelbart’s funny, clever book, and it’s all around a great time – if you have the right seat, in a theatre where at least half the seats are garbage.
City of Angels tells the story of a LA writer named Stine (a fantastic Hadley Fraser my goodness) who is working on the film adaptation of his acclaimed novel. As he writes in real life and deals with a wife he cheats on but it’s NBD and a girl he has affairs with but it’s NBD and a Hollywood producer who’s an ass and it’s a BD, we also see the pages he’s writing come to life, with his characters acting out the plot as Stine works on it (with hilarious effect when he deletes and redoes something). Despite being in his imagination, the characters in his story feel real, and the barrier between real life and fiction break down when Stine interacts with his leading man, Stone (a great Theo James, yes that one, such stage presence, very wow), in the most fun parts of this show.
With this super clever, original premise comes tons of humor and creativity, and this production is probably the best we’ll see of this show. The direction is almost flawless (see below) and everything feels purposeful. I never really call out the lighting in a show, but the lighting design here is everything. Stine’s real Los Angeles life is lit in color, whereas the scenes from his script are mainly in black and white, an effect that was impressive as hell when both worlds would share the stage simultaneously, and extraordinary as Stone and Stine toy with the barrier between them. Those clashes between the two S men play out to pretty much the only big song in the show, “You’re Nothing Without Me”, overused a bit as it closes both acts but when it’s the main theme as well as the only strong song for our leading men – and lets Fraser do his main job in this show, which is belting and holding big final notes to impress you and distract you and it works because man alive he is some shit – you can’t fault that use too much.
And yes, while the clever book mostly delights, the score somewhat pales in comparison. There are some strong songs in addition to the aforementioned, like Stine’s wife’s “It Needs Work”, a clever almost patter sort of song that Rosalie Craig does brilliantly. (Craig only plays characters named Bobbi I guess now, and this underwritten one is as satisfying as the previous. (That sounds like a huge compliment since everyone and their mother loved the famous gender-flipped Company but recall that I did not.)) It shows off her acting ability fantastically, but like a lot of the score (save for Hadley’s big belted notes) it doesn’t allow for showing off vocal ability. The only real chance for that comes from Rebecca Trehearn’s “You Can Always Count on Me”. Accustomed to stealing shows, Trehearn’s performance is a highlight.
But there are also some duds that fail the ‘does-this-need-to-be-a-song-and-if-not-is-it-at-least-worth-it’ test. I don’t even recall the underused Vanessa Williams (yes, that Vanessa Williams) singing, which is odd for someone who famously can sing well, but I know she did. (She also gets a cringeworthy line about ‘saving the best for last’. I cannot imagine that was in the original script, so the addition is so corny. But if it original, I will eat my words – but if it WAS is that why they cast her??? Honestly that would make me love everything about this production even more, that’s some baller move for one stupid joke, and I respect that.) For a character as vibrant as Stine’s producer, Jimmy Powers (a good Jonathan Slinger in a JK Simmons role) really should have stronger songs. And Bobbie’s cabaret sections just seem awkward.
Some of the performances left me cold as well. Nicola Roberts, from the pop group Girls Aloud, is not well suited to her one big song, which sounded like when our Kim McAfee in high school started rehearsal without warming up. And the Angel City 4, the ensemble that kind of narrates sometimes, and acts as a Greek chorus sometimes, and serves as the producer Jimmy Powers’ backup singers sometimes, sounded insanely off key all the times. I was literally making Chrissy-Tiegen-at-the-Globes gif face whenever they sang, which is super rude, but I couldn’t help it because holy wow those were some wrong ass notes! Fortunately, they don’t ruin another strong number, Munoz’s (Marc Elliott’s) fun “All Ya Have to Do is Wait”, although I don’t think there was any Hispanic representation in this show which is bad when there are some real yikesy slurs used.
All my endless raving about how well designed and directed this show is does actually have an end, though, and it’s now: This show is staged for 40% of the audience. The Garrick has notoriously horrible sightlines from too many seats, and pillars blocking the view for many of the rest. Add in a narrower-seeming stalls and stage than most, a mezzanine overhang that seems to start at the stage, and a chaotic wackiness to the seating plan, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. That knowledge should make the director and crew more careful with what they are doing, but instead, here, they seemed to go ‘you know what, fuck it, let’s stage everything in that one top stage right corner even when it’s completely unnecessary, just to be dicks about it.’ There is so much happening at that spot that literally no one around us could see, and we had good seats. Given the overhang and sightlines, I am sure no one behind row M could see a good portion of the action, which is bullshit. If you’re lucky enough to be in that 40%, you’re going to have a phenomenal time. Otherwise, your resentment is going to color your experience, which is unfair both to you and this great production.
INFORMATION
For a 7:30 curtain, Act I ended at 9pm and the show ended at 10:28, which is about 15 minutes longer than it should be; there were issues at front of house before starting. Yes I really had to pee.
The Garrick Theatre is another stalls-in-the-basement one, so if you want to be at street level, sit in the circle. Also, the ladies bathrooms for the house left side of the stalls are upstairs anyway.
It is one of the smokiest shows in London right now, which is saying something since creators really love to keep those with respiratory problems and asthma away. Even for a 1940s noir show, smoking added nothing to the ambience they created with lights, performances, costumes, and sets. I am still waiting for someone to defend the use of smoking in the theatre to me.
The show is running until September 5, but the cast is changing several times (names this starry don’t do long runs anymore I guess).
STAGEDOOR
Everyone but Trehearn ran or snuck out a different entrance (as is their right yes but darn). The setup is nonexistent, so expect a mosh pit on the busiest sidewalk in London and a guard who doesn’t receive any information.
The Inheritance Part 1: A Provocative, Poignant Epic for Modern Times
It’s Theatre Thursday! Today’s show is The Inheritance, Part 1, which has transferred from the Young Vic to the West End’s Noel Coward Theatre, playing there until January 19.
I have put off seeing The Inheritance for actual years now. It’s not that I didn’t want to see it, but Matthew Lopez’s two-part, sweeping look at today’s culture of gay men, and how they grapple with their position in life compared to the generation that came before them and paved the way, is…long. It’s really long. And it’s in two parts, so you have to go back to the theatre another night to finish the story. And I got things to do! So I put it off. If I’m going to sit through two plays at nearly four hours each, I said to myself, about gay men and AIDs and stuff, I’m going to see Angels in America. (It might sound pretty narrow-minded to compare to the two works, like ‘oh they’re both about gay men so you’re going to compare them, you bigot’ but please, tell me of another eight-hour play in two parts, I’ll wait.) Also, the hype was ludicrous. I assumed there was no way this is ‘the best play of the year, and of next year too, probably’, to quote a mainstream critic (one of those). But I finally decided to bite the bullet and start this epic journey into hours and hours of theatre, and you know what? It’s probably the best play of the year, and of next year too.
I have put off seeing The Inheritance for actual years now. It’s not that I didn’t want to see it, but Matthew Lopez’s two-part, sweeping look at today’s culture of gay men, and how they grapple with their position in life compared to the generation that came before them and paved the way, is…long. It’s really long. And it’s in two parts, so you have to go back to the theatre another night to finish the story. And I got things to do! So I put it off. If I’m going to sit through two plays at nearly four hours each, I said to myself, about gay men and AIDs and stuff, I’m going to see Angels in America. (It might sound pretty narrow-minded to compare to the two works, like ‘oh they’re both about gay men so you’re going to compare them, you bigot’ but please, tell me of another eight-hour play in two parts, I’ll wait.) Also, the hype was ludicrous. I assumed there was no way this is ‘the best play of the year, and of next year too, probably’, to quote a mainstream critic (one of those). But I finally decided to bite the bullet and start this epic journey into hours and hours of theatre, and you know what? It’s probably the best play of the year, and of next year too.
Granted, I have only seen Part 1 so far. You can see both parts in one day if you want, but ain’t nobody got time for that. (Or energy. How do the actors do it? are they spidermen?) I’m really glad I scheduled this extra time in between so I can sit with and think about Part 1 and give it the due it deserves. As a standalone play, Part 1 was sensational, and I’m honestly wowed. I really can’t believe that I would be willing to see it again. For the first time in my life, I bought the script of the play instead of the programme. It’s that good. I made a sort-of joke about Angels in America above, but The Inheritance is truly the clear successor to Angels, not just because they are about the same demographic, but – and gird your loins, people who hate tautologies – because it is a successor to Angels. That’s what it’s about – what gay men living today have inherited from the generation before and what they have to do to honor their memory and their sacrifice. So REALLY, it’s like a four-part 16 hour play. Just kidding. But it’s important to know where gay men of the previous generation have been in order to understand what these gay men of our generation are thinking about when they think about honoring those who came before them. Both plays bear crucial witness to the gay culture of their time.
The idea of honoring the past without getting trapped by it runs through all the multiple layers and character arcs in this play. Not only are there so many vibrant layers to the story that all seem compelling in their own right, there’s also an homage to the novel Howards End woven into the frame of the show. It begins with a group of male writing students bouncing ideas off of each other, guided by their teacher Morgan, a representation of Howards End author E.M. Forster (the M was for Morgan), who hid his homosexuality from the public (his famous works about homosexual themes were published after his death). Morgan and the students brainstorm ways to start the story, eventually focusing on one student’s idea and snowballing. As an opening gimmick, this kind of annoyed me at first, but it really does pay off. We delve into the story and just when you forget that it’s anything but real, it returns to Morgan leading the writing process.
The story being written tells of Eric Glass (Kyle Soller, wonderful) and Toby Darling (Andrew Burnap, my choice for a supporting actor Olivier), a gay couple living in New York in Eric’s Holocaust-surviving grandparents’ great apartment. If you take that central idea and think of it like a small glass sphere, the play is like taking a hammer to that glass and watching all the thousands of shards shower away from it. There is so much happening and it all is part of the same whole, all kinds of side stories you think maybe should have been cut for time, until you realize they are all necessary to add to this realistic, vivid world they’re creating onstage. Eric is an actually decent guy, the kind you root for even without knowing him too well. He’s a better person than he believes himself to be, a sensitive, thoughtful soul. Toby is vivacious, hilarious, and altogether Too Much. He’s written a well-known book that is getting transformed into a Broadway play, because his head needs to get bigger. A chance meeting with a younger gay man, Adam (Samuel Levine, responsible for the ‘male nudity’ warning), throws a wrench into Eric and Toby’s happy life together, especially when Adam is cast in Toby’s play.
While Adam and Toby workshop the play out of town, Eric befriends Walter, an older gay man who was previously an acquaintance but becomes one of the most important people in Eric’s life. Walter lived through the ‘80s AIDs epidemic and tells Eric, in probably the longest (and most moving) monologue in theatre history, what it was like. And not just ‘what it was like’ like ‘oh, it was awful,’ but opening up and really showing the history to Eric like it’s a tangible thing you can hold and show someone. In a brilliant move, Walter is played by the same actor as Morgan (Paul Hilton), guiding the young men and helping them as much as he can. At the end of Act 1, Walter explains to Eric that his partner, the billionaire Henry Wilcox (John Benjamin Hickey, one of my faves), wanted to run away from the city during the epidemic and ignore it, along with their friends. But Walter in his kindness and empathy couldn’t, and so while Henry traveled, Walter opened up their country house to let their friends, and friends of friends and whoever needed to, have a serene place to die.
Walter’s friendship, guidance, and memories clearly make Eric even more thoughtful and considerate of (to quote another of this year’s ‘best of’(TV Edition)) what we owe to each other, and what we owe to the past and to the future. The inheritance of the title is that recognition of the importance of memory and respect in the culture. In a whole new layer to the story, it also refers to a Howards-End inspired deathbed bequeathment of important property that, like in its source material, gets infuriatingly disregarded. And as part of that property, it refers to the responsibility that these young gay men have inherited from the previous generation, the responsibility that every demographic or culture or race owes to their forebears: to recognize their struggles and understand what they went through so that you can live the life you’re living and make things better for the next group.
I know, it sounds like a lot of heavy material. And it is, and you’ll forking SOB, especially at the final scene of Part 1. Or, if you’re like me, you’ll save your hardest cries for what’s supposed to be a kind of funny moment – Eric’s friends’ 2016 Election Returns Watch Party (sigh (too real)). But you also laugh a whole lot, especially at Toby’s lines and his incredible physicality. It’s like he’s dancing through his character’s lines while fully becoming him and it is incredible. The ensemble is wonderful, and even though most have not much to say in Part 1, the cast remains onstage the entire time. Stephen Daldry’s direction has truly never been cleverer or sharper. It’s his best work yet. There is absolutely no set, other than a raised platform in the middle. No painted backdrops, no nothing. There are barely any props (save for the frequent wine glasses, the odd chair, the Hillary balloon). Yet the stage pulsates with life. The ensemble sits around the platform and watches the action, sometimes chiming in with suggestions to the author (reminding you of the framing device, which I still don’t know how I feel about). Most importantly, the ensemble moves with the story in a way I have never seen before. When you react internally to a line reading, the ensemble will react physically in a way that makes complete sense. They seem to be constantly moving but not in a distracting way, rather in a totally natural, necessary way that adds to the import of every scene. It’s like a reminder of something, maybe that your actions affect lives around you, or that you’re never alone.
Going into Part 2, I’m eager to see more of John Benjamin Hickey’s Wilcox, who was only in Part 1 for a portion of the time, and of course I’m excited for the ‘cameo’ by Vanessa Redgrave. But even more than seeing these stars, I can’t wait to get back into this world. I’m honestly still shook by the story and anxious about where things left off. This play felt like a long book that becomes important to you as you read along, the kind where you feel it in your soul and worry about the story and the characters for life, even though you know it’s not real. That the Inheritance Part 1 accomplished that is a testament to the genius of Matthew Lopez, as well as the pitch-perfect direction and the great acting that brought me fully into their world.
INFORMATION
The Inheritance ends its run at the Noel Coward Theatre on January 19 so hurry, or wait to see it on Broadway because it is definitely going.
Tickets are pretty easy to get, especially using TodayTix (which runs their rush ticket system). I got a £15 ticket (talk about value for money) in the Royal Circle, fifth row in and on the right side of center, and it was a perfect view. Too far to the extreme sides will be okay but a little restricted. The audience was pretty good, but actually the staff was awful. I could hear them talking in the lobby really loudly, proving my opinion that Delfont Mackintosh theatres and staff have to undergo a whole rehaul.
The idea of honoring the past without getting trapped by it runs through all the multiple layers and character arcs in this play. Not only are there so many vibrant layers to the story that all seem compelling in their own right, there’s also an homage to the novel Howards End woven into the frame of the show. It begins with a group of male writing students bouncing ideas off of each other, guided by their teacher Morgan, a representation of Howards End author E.M. Forster (the M was for Morgan), who hid his homosexuality from the public (his famous works about homosexual themes were published after his death). Morgan and the students brainstorm ways to start the story, eventually focusing on one student’s idea and snowballing. As an opening gimmick, this kind of annoyed me at first, but it really does pay off. We delve into the story and just when you forget that it’s anything but real, it returns to Morgan leading the writing process.
The story being written tells of Eric Glass (Kyle Soller, wonderful) and Toby Darling (Andrew Burnap, my choice for a supporting actor Olivier), a gay couple living in New York in Eric’s Holocaust-surviving grandparents’ great apartment. If you take that central idea and think of it like a small glass sphere, the play is like taking a hammer to that glass and watching all the thousands of shards shower away from it. There is so much happening and it all is part of the same whole, all kinds of side stories you think maybe should have been cut for time, until you realize they are all necessary to add to this realistic, vivid world they’re creating onstage. Eric is an actually decent guy, the kind you root for even without knowing him too well. He’s a better person than he believes himself to be, a sensitive, thoughtful soul. Toby is vivacious, hilarious, and altogether Too Much. He’s written a well-known book that is getting transformed into a Broadway play, because his head needs to get bigger. A chance meeting with a younger gay man, Adam (Samuel Levine, responsible for the ‘male nudity’ warning), throws a wrench into Eric and Toby’s happy life together, especially when Adam is cast in Toby’s play.
While Adam and Toby workshop the play out of town, Eric befriends Walter, an older gay man who was previously an acquaintance but becomes one of the most important people in Eric’s life. Walter lived through the ‘80s AIDs epidemic and tells Eric, in probably the longest (and most moving) monologue in theatre history, what it was like. And not just ‘what it was like’ like ‘oh, it was awful,’ but opening up and really showing the history to Eric like it’s a tangible thing you can hold and show someone. In a brilliant move, Walter is played by the same actor as Morgan (Paul Hilton), guiding the young men and helping them as much as he can. At the end of Act 1, Walter explains to Eric that his partner, the billionaire Henry Wilcox (John Benjamin Hickey, one of my faves), wanted to run away from the city during the epidemic and ignore it, along with their friends. But Walter in his kindness and empathy couldn’t, and so while Henry traveled, Walter opened up their country house to let their friends, and friends of friends and whoever needed to, have a serene place to die.
Walter’s friendship, guidance, and memories clearly make Eric even more thoughtful and considerate of (to quote another of this year’s ‘best of’(TV Edition)) what we owe to each other, and what we owe to the past and to the future. The inheritance of the title is that recognition of the importance of memory and respect in the culture. In a whole new layer to the story, it also refers to a Howards-End inspired deathbed bequeathment of important property that, like in its source material, gets infuriatingly disregarded. And as part of that property, it refers to the responsibility that these young gay men have inherited from the previous generation, the responsibility that every demographic or culture or race owes to their forebears: to recognize their struggles and understand what they went through so that you can live the life you’re living and make things better for the next group.
I know, it sounds like a lot of heavy material. And it is, and you’ll forking SOB, especially at the final scene of Part 1. Or, if you’re like me, you’ll save your hardest cries for what’s supposed to be a kind of funny moment – Eric’s friends’ 2016 Election Returns Watch Party (sigh (too real)). But you also laugh a whole lot, especially at Toby’s lines and his incredible physicality. It’s like he’s dancing through his character’s lines while fully becoming him and it is incredible. The ensemble is wonderful, and even though most have not much to say in Part 1, the cast remains onstage the entire time. Stephen Daldry’s direction has truly never been cleverer or sharper. It’s his best work yet. There is absolutely no set, other than a raised platform in the middle. No painted backdrops, no nothing. There are barely any props (save for the frequent wine glasses, the odd chair, the Hillary balloon). Yet the stage pulsates with life. The ensemble sits around the platform and watches the action, sometimes chiming in with suggestions to the author (reminding you of the framing device, which I still don’t know how I feel about). Most importantly, the ensemble moves with the story in a way I have never seen before. When you react internally to a line reading, the ensemble will react physically in a way that makes complete sense. They seem to be constantly moving but not in a distracting way, rather in a totally natural, necessary way that adds to the import of every scene. It’s like a reminder of something, maybe that your actions affect lives around you, or that you’re never alone.
Going into Part 2, I’m eager to see more of John Benjamin Hickey’s Wilcox, who was only in Part 1 for a portion of the time, and of course I’m excited for the ‘cameo’ by Vanessa Redgrave. But even more than seeing these stars, I can’t wait to get back into this world. I’m honestly still shook by the story and anxious about where things left off. This play felt like a long book that becomes important to you as you read along, the kind where you feel it in your soul and worry about the story and the characters for life, even though you know it’s not real. That the Inheritance Part 1 accomplished that is a testament to the genius of Matthew Lopez, as well as the pitch-perfect direction and the great acting that brought me fully into their world.
INFORMATION
The Inheritance ends its run at the Noel Coward Theatre on January 19 so hurry, or wait to see it on Broadway because it is definitely going.
Tickets are pretty easy to get, especially using TodayTix (which runs their rush ticket system). I got a £15 ticket (talk about value for money) in the Royal Circle, fifth row in and on the right side of center, and it was a perfect view. Too far to the extreme sides will be okay but a little restricted. The audience was pretty good, but actually the staff was awful. I could hear them talking in the lobby really loudly, proving my opinion that Delfont Mackintosh theatres and staff have to undergo a whole rehaul.
