#macbeth on broadway | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wromwood · 2 years

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So, earlier this month, I stopped working at one of my part-time jobs. While I still believe it was the best choice, considering how the job’s responsibilities changed since most Broadway theaters stopped requiring vax card checks, I will miss one of the big perks that the job offered: the opportunity to watch Broadway shows for free after shifts.

Now that it’s over, I think it’s time to share the full list of shows that I had the opportunity to see, ranked in order of how much I enjoyed them, from least to most. However, keep in mind that I didn’t think ANY of these plays were necessarily bad, nor did I hate any of them.

Take a moment to remind yourself that this is ranked based on pure enjoyment, and here we go!

Macbeth

Yeahhhh, sorry Daniel Craig, but this production of the Scottish Play definitely made the bottom of the list. (Or top, since we’re going from least to most.)

Again, I didn’t HATE this production, but this show confused me the most, and not in a good way. I’ve read Macbeth before, and I still found this production hard to follow. The staging was simple and vaguely modern, meaning that context and furniture were the main clues as to where any of the characters were at any time. Combine this with frequent double-roles for a lot of the actors, and I often couldn’t place who was speaking, where, and why.

This show was also the play of weird artistic choices. No matter what happened, there was almost always FOG, which worked sometimes, but just seemed to cover up lacking scenery at others. When Macbeth gets stabbed at the end, he seems to get stabbed in the crotch, and the spray of blood seems to come directly out of his butthole. When dramatic/spooky things happen, they LOUDLY blare what sounds like the Psycho knife screech, which just made those moments jarring and silly to me. Finally, at the end, when MacDuff is about to kill Macbeth, they FLASH bright white lights to slightly (but not totally) blind the audience as to what’s about to happen.

... then all the characters, dead and alive, sit by the wall, nursing their wounds while the last bit of the play happens. The Weird Sisters pass around bowls of soup, and they all eat while one of them sings a modern song that I don’t know well enough to understand why it connects to the scene. I know what this moment was GOING FOR, but it honestly felt like MacDuff stopped murdering Macbeth at the last minute and went “.... You know, violence isn’t going to solve anything. We all made mistakes. Let’s just call it off, apologize, and eat soup.”

There was one side character who, during the performance I saw, spoke into a handheld mic for no reason (with popping P audio to boot, which annoyed me), dressed in a Steve Jobs turtleneck, and spoke with a tone of voice that just seemed flippant and not totally immersed in the drama. I can’t even relate to being confused by this character to other coworkers who saw the show, since they remember a totally different actor (apparently one of them used a wheelchair), or at least a portrayal who didn’t use a handheld mic.

That leads into another aspect of the show that doesn’t help my rating: not only does it have a limited engagement, it was technically still in previews when I saw it, so it was always changing. However, every time I heard of the changes, they never really seemed to be for the better. The core flaws always remain.

Daniel Craig’s performance was OK. He’s a good actor, and he wasn’t bad in the role. However, he also wasn’t great. I’ve seen more engaging Macbeths. I put this down to direction, though. The same could be said for Ruth Negga as Lady Macbeth, although I believe her performance was a little stronger.

Finally: points off for causing undue stress on me and my coworkers, who had to avoid saying the name of the show while we were working in different theaters. Bad luck did legit happen after people said it. Also, both times I worked at this theater, it rained and made my job harder.

Now for a couple moments of positivity: I thought the porter scene was super funny and that the actor did it well. Props for that!

Also, since I had to stand in the balcony, I did not see that what I thought was the back wall of theater (a brick wall with piping) was actually the set itself. This meant that when, at the end of the show, the wall MOVED FORWARD, limiting Macbeth’s space, forcing him into conflict, and making him feel that there’s nowhere to run from MacDuff seeking his revenge, I was LEGIT SCARED. THE WALL WAS MOVING, WALLS SHOULDN’T MOVE, WTF

Anyway. Next show!

The Phantom of the Opera

Ah, Phantom. Phantom, Phantom, Phantom. Not gonna lie, you’re so low down partly because your theater is hell to work at. So many tourists, and so many of them angry.

But this show is also farther down partly because the specific performance I saw felt off. I saw this show during the period where so many Broadway actors were coming down with COVID that they had to rely on all the understudies at their disposal. As a result, nearly the entire cast were understudies, and I think it showed. The show felt a little bit offbeat, especially in regards to the Phantom himself. His performance felt more silly than dramatic in some parts, although the show itself doesn’t help in that regard. Christine was good acting wise, but her voice just wasn’t strong enough during a few numbers. Eric also could’ve used a singing boost. It’s not a good sign when your performance of Phantom needs stronger singing.

I want to make one thing clear: I LIKE Phantom of the Opera. (i’m so sorry, best friend who hates it) I don’t love it, but I do like it. I think the music is good, and I find the dramatic shenanigans to be NUTS, yet entertaining. Maybe that’s why this performance felt off to me. I’ve seen a version of the show that I like better in the past, and have my own thoughts on how the show should be done. The performance I attended just didn’t satisfy that itch. Maybe later non-understudy performances were better! Who can say.

Still. It was Phantom of the Opera at the Majestic theater. The sets and effects were still amazing, and the acting was still good. It was a net positive overall, but it could’ve been better.

To Kill A Mockingbird

Ah, now we TRULY get to the proof that this list isn’t so much “worst to best” as “least fun to most fun.” I honestly wish this show wasn’t so far down the list, as I really did like it. It’s a great adaptation of the book, with great actors, sets, and direction. If you’ve read the book or seen the movie To Kill A Mockingbird, you know what this is about, and you know what happens in it. But it’s still a good story, and it makes for a good show. I remember that for being a Mockingbird adaptation, and dealing with some pretty heavy stuff, this show managed to still have a lot of humor in it. I laughed a surprising amount during the show, but fortunately, it still knew when to keep things serious and solemn.

The show DID add a few new elements. While the play utilized Scout’s recollection of the past as the main narrative force, there were a couple scenes that Scout couldn’t have witnessed, such as Atticus Finch convincing Tom Robinson to let Atticus be his lawyer for the case. This is a cool moment to see, as this is Atticus and Tom Robinson’s first interaction with each other. However, it’s interesting that Atticus learns that Tom felt sorry for Mayella beforehand, and warns him not to say that in court. It feels like they wanted it to be foreshadowing, or at least a setup so that when Tom says it later, the audience KNOWS that the trial is essentially lost, or that Tom really felt pressured into telling the absolute truth of the matter. However, since we didn’t get (or NEED) that kind of setup in the book or the movie, it feels a little extraneous. Still, it wasn’t bad at all, so I’m fine with its presence in the show.

Jeff Daniels was great as Atticus Finch. As someone who mainly knew him from Dumb and Dumber, a film that I don’t really find entertaining, I was pleasantly surprised to see him excellently play this intelligent, (mostly) soft-spoken, and principled man. When he put Bob Ewell in a headlock, despite having to stand the whole time, I was so pumped that I stood on my tiptoes to watch.

The other actors also do their roles justice. They cast young-looking adults as the kids, no child actors here, and they were great at embodying the characters. All three “kids” actually have their own moments of “narrating” and recounting the events of the story.

The actor who plays the man who pretends to be a drunk (a review of the show says that Sorkin combined three characters into one for his play: Link Deas, Reverend Sykes, and Dolphus Raymond) was not only the same actor for Boo Radley, but he was also the one deaf actor in the show. This worked very well. Not only is the “drunk” man an outcast for being deaf AS WELL AS for having had a mixed kid with a black woman, but also Boo has another dimension to him for his own silence and outcast status. Scout even signs “thank you” to him shortly before the very end of the play.

Also. I gotta give props to this play for making Scout’s big old ham costume. I was waiting for that and it delivered. Bravo.

Despite not being closer to the top, this show was still great, and I’ll fondly remember watching it. (although I won’t fondly remember how an usher pressured me to sit in a seat that someone had already bought a ticket for, how I tripped and fell flat on my face getting back out, and how another usher SHUSHED me after SHE ASKED ME to explain what had happened)

Chicago

Ah, now we’re getting to the fun stuff! I went into this pretty much blind and had a great time. I honestly don’t have much criticism. It was just real good. I think the cast was mostly comprised of understudies, since I saw it during the period where so many Broadway actors were coming down with COVID that they had to rely on all the understudies at their disposal, but if so, they did an excellent job. The singing and choreography were phenomenal, the content was FUN, and I had a good time.

Also, I love that both the male and female chorus members wore sexy outfits.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child

If there’s any show I’m glad my job let me watch for free, it’s Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. This way, I didn’t give J.K. Rowling my money, and I supported the people I DO care about: Broadway actors.

While it’s true that the show’s script wasn’t personally penned by Rowling, she DID essentially give it her blessing. She was present when the writers formed the story, and even answered questions that they had. There’s no uncertainty that she at least contributed to this, so I still consider this partially her responsibility.

This show is most convoluted thing I’ve ever seen in my goddamned life.

This definitely isn’t helped by the fact that this is the TRIMMED version. At least for NYC, they changed the show from two separate two-and-a-half hour performances to one three-and-a-half hour performance. As a result, it feels like the “Summer Once Again” episode of The Goes Wrong Show... in reverse. Before intermission, the show runs at a breakneck pace, with little room to breathe, let alone establish ANYTHING. It’s only after intermission that things finally run at a human speed again. Or maybe I was just used to it. Either way, it took over an hour for things to feel normal.

The plot’s still a MESS. The protagonists’/antagonists’ kids angle can’t help but make it feel like a direct-to-DVD Disney sequel, or a child OC fanfic, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I never really got into Albus (unsure why. I think it felt like he was just complaining after a while), while I unexpectedly grew more on Scorpius as the show went on. He was a bit annoying to me at first, but then he just became sweet and fun. I wish him the best.

The Voldemort’s daughter thing is, of course, ridiculous. And with how little the character is “set up” (she’s hiding as someone else for a while), it just kinda feels like she came out of nowhere. This show’s biggest fault is that it’s trying to tell a Harry Potter years-long story in one Broadway show. There’s just too much to cram into one viewing, or maybe even two. I’m not saying the answer is to make one show for each school year, though. That would make no sense. I also don’t think you NEED to limit the story to just one school year, although that would make things simpler. I think, overall, it needs to be presented in a more concise and better paced way. Preferably after scrapping the time travel plot, or at least making the time travel more like how it occurred in Prisoner of Azkaban.

SPEAKING OF WHICH. I don’t like how this show utterly throws out how the Time Turner is set up in Prisoner of Azkaban. Despite technically creating paradoxes, I like how the Time Turner is used in that book/movie. It establishes that while you can use it to mess about in time and do the right thing, there’s still a degree of certainty to the true timeline. All the things that the characters try to fix end up resulting in what they already experienced. This creates a few bootstrap paradoxes, but it shows that while their actions are useful, they can’t really CHANGE anything. This made the timeline feel secure, and prevented the time travel from being too powerful. I always respected that about the Time Turner, even when I was younger and loved the idea of changing the past to affect the future.

.... and then they go in a totally different direction for Cursed Child. It turns out that you CAN change the past, and that you CAN create a totally different future, and that if you do the wrong thing, whoopsie! Now Hogwarts is run by Headmaster Umbridge, is guarded by Dementors, and you’re late to celebrating Voldemort Day.

Yes, all that happens in one of the alternate futures of this show. Yes, I did actually laugh at the reveal.

So. After all the faults I just listed (and more I didn’t list), why is this show here on my list? How did it beat Phantom, Mockingbird, and even Chicago?

Partly, this is due to the effects. Whenever I asked someone how Cursed Child was, they replied with “Oh, the effects are GREAT!” Which... may not have been a good sign for the story, but it turned out to be absolutely true. The effects are, indeed, astounding. The crew took the challenge of representing magic on a Broadway stage and answered it phenomenally. There were moments that took my breath away in how real they looked, especially in regards to the Dementors.

Another reason this show is here on the lists is.... well, I had a fun time.

I DID have a fun time in a way the show didn’t intend, though. Now that I care less about the Harry Potter series overall, I was able to laugh at this show a lot more than I would have as a kid . It was definitely FUN to see how this story is a convoluted mess. Also, the acting is still good, so there were still good performances.

Also, there were some parts of the show that successfully hit the little parts of the Harry Potter fan that still reside in me, or at least the Potter fan of the past. The Dementors made me feel like a scared kid again. Seeing magic and hearing the familiar spells thrilled me. I feel like if I was a stronger fan, I’d dislike how some characters were done dirty. But I’d also like an excuse to see other characters return and give one last hurrah.

Finally. One shout-out to the moment that legit felt like it could have been from a Potter book or movie. While most of the show felt like new Rowling stuff, stuff that’s weak or weird or just extraneous, there was ONE moment that wowed me in effects, execution, and nostalgia:

The trolley lady.

There’s a moment in the show where Albus and Scorpius climb on the roof of the Hogwarts Express to leap off before they reach school. However, as they do, the trolley lady suddenly appears, perfectly balanced, even her trolley full of snacks.

Then she reveals herself to be an eternal aspect of the train who helps to ensure that every student REMAINS on the train. She even says the Marauders couldn’t escape her. She turns into a monster, her fingertips ELONGATING before our very eyes into claws, as she roars at the two boys escaping.

That was NUTS. My heart was pounding in my chest, and for the first time in years, I felt like a true Potter fan experiencing more genuine Harry Potter.

Still, I’m glad I didn’t pay for it. And I’ll continue my boycott of anything J.K. Rowling. I haven’t seen the new Fantastic Beasts, nor do I intend to. PLEASE don’t give any money to Rowling, as she’s done so much harm to the trans community.

But credit where credit is due. I did enjoy this Broadway experience, even as I scratched my head at it. If you have an opportunity to see it for free (no money to J.K. involved), then take it.

The Little Prince

Ahh, now onto another head scratcher! This show delves into the artsy abstract, with lots of dancing, maneuvering on aerial straps, and projected animated landscapes. While there IS a narrator onstage recounting the story, they do not physically resemble the Aviator, and they also speak aloud the “dialogue” that the other characters would be saying.

It didn’t help that I went into the show totally blind, not knowing what it would be like. I hadn’t even read the BOOK before. For most of the show, my reaction was that one Krusty GIF:

However. This show grew on me, and eventually won me over. It might look overly artsy at first, but it really is beautiful. The music and choreography are just gorgeous. Every part was fascinating, even if I didn’t know what was going on. I was confused, but also intrigued, thoughtful, and entertained; these emotional states lasted all the way until the end, when they showered us in red paper petals shaped like hearts.

Also, there was a part after the bows where someone went on the aerial straps and actually swung OVER the crowd like Spiderman. That was cool. :3

Now that I’ve read the book, the show makes a lot more sense, and I appreciate it as an adaptation in retrospect. Even if the vain main was adapted into a clown-looking dude who uses a smartphone. I truly wish I could see this again with my newfound knowledge of the book in mind.

Plaza Suite

Now onto the rich person play! This is what I and a few other coworkers called it because 1) it’s at a very fancy looking theater and 2) the crowds that came to see it were typically (but not always) rich New Yorkers and tourists. Half of them acted SO privileged, and the Mask Up folks were even told to be more lenient with them. While we still had to tell them to keep their masks up, we were also advised to not be as “forceful” or “commanding” as we would be at other theaters, which left a sour taste in my mouth every time I heard it.

However, the show itself is great, and definitely gets better the more it goes on. Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker act very well in it, and they understandably have incredible chemistry together. Broderick especially surprised me with the amount of physical comedy that he does in the second and third parts of the play. He’s a bit of a hit or miss actor in most of the things I’ve seen him in, but this play is a hit. Plaza Suite is also just a very clever play overall, with the humor only getting better with each part, so the actors have wonderful material to work with.

Also, the play takes advantage of the fact that there are no set changes. The set looks AMAZING. It looks just like a fancy expensive plaza suite was chopped out of a building and plopped onto the stage. The special effects (the few times they were necessary) were also great! When the rainstorm happened outside the windows in the third part, it looked and sounded pretty real!

Overall, despite attracting grumpy privileged rich people, it was a fun time!

A Strange Loop

Ohhhh, talk about FUN. Almost all of my coworkers were scrambling to get their hands on a shift for this show. I came in mostly blind, but I knew a few important things: 1) It’s the tenth musical to win the Pulitzer Prize, 2) it's the first musical to win a Pulitzer written by a black person to win, 3) it’s the first musical to win a Pulitzer without first having a Broadway run, and 4) it’s unabashedly black and queer.

Not only was I able to watch the show after my only shift there, but I was also extremely lucky to get a ticket in the third row of the orchestra. (Someone just gave the ticket back to the theater; I guess they had to cancel? Unsure) Anyway, I had a CLEAR view of this wild, meta, and heart wrenching show. Everybody in the cast is so talented, and I was surprised to learn this is Jaquel Spivey’s Broadway debut. He plays Usher, the lead, and he does it wonderfully.

Honestly, there’s not much else I have to say here. The music is great, the acting’s phenomenal, the emotions are powerful, and the bare cheeks of the chorus member who stood on my side of the stage during “Exile in Gayville” are tight.

Also, the crowd for this show was definitely the most understanding and mask-wearing crowd I had ever worked with. Loved that.

Company

This was a blast. Company was another show I went into mostly blind, and I’m glad I did for this production. In fact, I’m curious about the effects of going into this one blind, as this production of Company has some big gender swaps. The male lead Bobby is now a woman (Bobbie), the bride-to-be with cold feet Amy is now an anxious gay groom named Jamie, and the three girls that Bobby dates are now three men. The only time the genderswap feels noticeable is a moment late in the play where Patti Lupone’s character proposes that Bobbie should sleep with her husband. In the original, she proposes that she should sleep with Bobby. I think the original works better tonally. Aside from that, everything else felt so natural that, if you hadn’t told me there was a genderswap at all, I don’t think I would’ve guessed.

Genderswap or not, this was a great time. I’m usually not the biggest fan of abstract staging; it’s gotta be done well for me to really be on board. This production does it super well! From the big neon letters, to hiding the number 35 in various places, to changing prop sizes, all the ways the staging plays with Bobbie’s psyche are both entertaining and thought provoking.

Since I came into Company blind, I was legit surprised by the power of the show’s comedy. Company could have achieved a high place on this list through laugh-power alone.

The acting and singing are, of course, amazing, and I’m so glad I got to see Patti Lupone in a Broadway show. She may not have too major a role, but she performs it so well. She just has a dazzling presence to her, and a beautiful voice to boot.

The rest of the cast are great too! My favorite number was Jamie’s “I Am Not Getting Married Today.” His performance was wildly entertaining, as was the random priest popping out of the fridge and freaking him out. Comedy gold.

Come From Away

I’m surprised that I was able to watch this show totally blind. I didn’t know a THING about it until a couple of days before my first shift there. The one thing I learned before I saw it?

“It’s about 9/11.″

That definitely gave me the wrong idea of what this show would be like. I came into it expecting a consistently dark, somber, and mournful story. However, while it does center around a tragic event, and it touches on some of the paranoia, stress, and xenophobia that people felt during/after 9/11, the show surprised me with lots of fun music, warmth, and goodwill. It even taught me about part of the aftermath of 9/11 that I never knew about- that after US airspace was closed, 38 international aircraft were forced to reroute and land in Gander, Newfoundland. Luckily, the town of Gander welcomed the hundreds of new people, provided them with food and shelter over the next week, and stayed in touch with their new friends in the years afterward. It’s such an interesting and heartwarming story, and as I watched from standing room, I was bouncing to the tune of the music all the way through.

(Also, thank you for being under 2 hours. It’s nice to watch a Broadway show that’s the length of a movie.)

The Music Man

Now for the show that so many people are dying to see and willing to spend hundreds of dollars on tickets for- The Music Man, starring Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster. While I knew the basic story of The Music Man beforehand, I still hadn’t actually watched it before, so I had a fun time watching this partially blind. The story’s silly, and parts are clearly old fashioned, but I thought it was very entertaining. The music is great, and it was nice to hear an official (yet slightly changed for modern audiences) version of “Shipoopi” after being so familiar with the Family Guy rendition.

The two aspects that really blew me away, though, were the look of the show and the acting.

This show was fun just to watch. The sets and costumes are all gorgeous. Also, during “The Wells Fargo Wagon”, they did a couple of neat things with the horse-drawn wagon. First, they had little moving cutouts of the horse galloping with the wagon in tow in the “distance”, which was fun. Then they had the “horse” (people in a really great horse costume) come out on stage, which was so impressive.

And as for the acting? It’s Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster, of COURSE it was amazing. This was actually my first real experience seeing Hugh Jackman sing and dance, and he’s excellent at both. The rest of the cast is great too; everyone was full of energy and immensely talented.

This show might’ve given me a couple tough crowds to work with, but being able to watch it was worth it.

Hangmen

I couldn’t help but love Hangmen. I loved it so much that it was the only show I saw twice during my old Broadway job. Sadly, both times, I had to miss the first ten minutes, in which (as far as I could piece together) the main character condemns to death the man who sets the whole plot in motion. I went into the show mostly blind, knowing only that it took place in the 1960s, after hanging is abolished in the UK, and that it was written by Martin McDonagh. (He created The Pillowman)

This play is a great dark comedy. Despite the dark subject matter and the attitudes of some of the characters, nearly every joke landed. Even if the laughs were sometimes surprised or slightly uncomfortable, the jokes WORKED. There’s so much great setup and payoff, and I was always invested in what was going on.

The sets are also wonderful. While I couldn’t really appreciate the first set (jail room), I loved looking at the detail of the later pub set. Like the plaza suite in Plaza Suite, it truly looked like they carved out a real location (in this case, a 60s British pub) and put in on a Broadway stage. Also, there’s a short scene in a cafe that was stage marvelously, literally taking place ABOVE the pub set. It was practically hidden up there, only revealed when it had to be, and it still looked realistic, with a THUNDERSTORM visibly happening outside its windows. So cool.

Alfie Allen of Game of Thrones fame is in this production, and he’s marvelous. Even before I knew he was in Game of Thrones (I did not watch it), I thought he was one of the strongest actors in Hangmen. He just has this ENERGY of great acting ability on that stage. Then I learned what he’s been in, and I thought “Oh, that makes sense.”

Without going into spoilers, I will say that the hanging in Hangmen (that I did see, at least) is chilling to watch. I had to keep telling myself that there had to be a harness, that there were precautions in place, that they wouldn’t risk the life of an actor. Great acting combined with great effects equal legit fear that someone’s gonna die.

Finally, I really liked the excuse to listen to Northern accents for a couple hours. It’s just nice. Reminded me of when I was studying in Manchester, even though Hangmen takes place in Lancashire. Speaking of which, I was super amused to hear the hometown of one of my friends, Burnley, get name-dropped a half-dozen times over the course of the show. I don’t hear about it much outside of him and football, so that was a nice surprise.

And that concludes my thoughts of all the Broadway shows I saw during my old job. I did get a NEW job working on Broadway, but it won’t provide the same show-watching opportunities that the old one did. (Fortunately, people will be WAY more polite to me because I’m not working COVID safety anymore) Still, I’ll always be grateful for this period in which I saw what is probably nearly a thousand dollars worth of Broadway shows.

Thanks for sticking around to read all this! If you’ve seen these shows, lemme know your thoughts. :3

#Broadway #This is me #on the job #Hangmen #The Music Man #Come From Away #Company #A Strange Loop #Plaza Suite #The Little Prince #Chicago #To Kill A Mockingbird #The Phantom of the Opera #Macbeth

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