BroadwayWorld: Madeline Ashton is the most beautiful actress (just ask her) ever to grace the stage and screen. Helen Sharp is the long-suffering author (just ask her) who lives in her shadow. They have always been the best of frenemies… until Madeline steals Helen’s fiancé away. As Helen plots revenge and Madeline clings to her rapidly fading star, their world is suddenly turned upside down by Viola Van Horn, a mysterious woman with a secret that’s to die for.
5 comments:
I was recommended to see this show on the sole account that it is a very purple show, and I am therefore contractually obligated to see it. Until reading this one paragraph blurb I had exactly zero idea of what the show is about, but I’m glad to hear that the $40 I venmoed wendy aaron seem like they will be put to good use with this visual feast for the eyes and comedic story line about arts and artists. Also, no show is complete without a strange magical potion, so I’m glad to hear that this show is utilizing that story telling technique. I didn't know that this was the first ever national tour of this show. I thought it had been some sort of revival of some other show. Whatever the case, I'm glad people around the country are going to be able to see this show that I have heard nothing but good things about.
I was lucky enough to get to see Death Becomes Her on Broadway last year, and that show was so magnificent and magical and extravagant and everything that makes theater wonderful all rolled up into one show. In my opinion, Death Becomes Her is a love letter to what musical theater is. It's big and loud and unapologetic, it's campy and while it's based on a movie, making it into a musical works so incredibly well. In this case, I think that making a musical out of a movie works incredibly well; it expands the story and is just so fun to watch. However this does make me think about the fact that many of the shows that have recently opened on Broadway are based on a movie, and that isn’t my favorite thing. I think that a movie to broadway adaptation can work in some cases, but not all the time. Death Becomes Her takes a classic movie and spins it around, creating an incredible show that is extravagant and so Broadway, but I think that not every movie needs a musical, and Broadway needs more original works.
With how successful this show has been I am not surprised at all that it is launching a tour. I see snippets all the time on social media and the movie itself is a cult classic. It also was very successful at the Tony’s and by proximity on Broadway. I think this is one of the few movie remakes on Broadway that I would actually be curious to see. It seems campy, fun, extravagant, and everything you would want to see in a show. I did a presentation on this last semester, but it was regarding the AEA rules for touring and how more and more tours are being usurped by non-union teams. Due to that I love seeing shows like this from Broadway still get their due cross country, also because it is getting more and more expensive to make it happen. I hope it comes to Pittsburgh because I would love to see it!
I absolutely loved the movie Death Becomes Her and cannot wait to see the tour when it comes to Pittsburgh. The movie had such creative ways to do special effects. I am looking forward to seeing how the goofy gore translates to the stage. I would classify this story as a body horror comedy and I don’t think we see those very often. I remember listening to and enjoying the soundtrack a while ago. I will probably end up listening to it later today to get more excited about the show. From the pictures I have seen the costumes look absolutely amazing and I am super hyped about seeing what it looks like in person. I haven’t seen enough productions recently; a big part of theater is about seeing what other people are doing and being inspired to create your own unique productions. Also, just going to see theater is fun and a worthwhile cultural experience.
I really don’t like Death Becomes Her as a show. I am very happy for the cast and creatives who get to go on tour and perform and have a job! I was also very interested to see how they do certain technical aspects on the tour versus how they do it on Broadway (which I saw). For a highschool assignment I had to do a show critique and Death Becomes Her was the show I ended up doing it on. Despite the amazing tech the show just tries so hard to be campy that it falls flat–it feels like it’s aimed for white women who like to say that they’re involved with gay culture rather than the actual community that made the movie a cult classic. I know they probably aren’t going to touch many of the projections but it would be really nice if they were able to fix how horrible the wedding crash background looks. Anyways! I’m glad the show was successful enough to have a tour and I do hope that audiences like it significantly more than I do! And shout out the Ernest song where all the furniture starts talking, that was the funniest part of the show.
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