Pretty Woman – August 2018

Vivian’s (Samantha Barks’) body looks like Jessica Rabbit here and it annoys me to no end.

Random thoughts about Pretty Woman, now in previews at the Nederlander Theatre.

  • Andy Karl is insanely charismatic. He’s talented, absolutely, but I bet he’s one of those people who can get away with absolutely anything in life because he will charm the pants right off of you. I am an unabashed Andy Karl fan.
  • Samantha Barks is very talented but she’s no Julia Roberts. (Which is a lousy thing to say, I know. Years ago Donnie Osmond was in Little Johnny Jones, a show panned in Boston before it even made it to Broadway, and the biggest criticism was that he wasn’t James Cagney. It’s a bullshit excuse for not liking someone’s performance – their not being someone else – but in a show that is practically a carbon copy of the movie, it’s extremely difficult to not make the comparison.)
  • Orfeh’s voice is to absolutely die for and if this show does well at the very LEAST Eric Anderson should be getting a Tony nomination for his performance.
  • I only wish I enjoyed the music as much as I enjoyed the actors. I didn’t. A lot of the songs sounded the same and NONE of them, not one, stuck in my head. I enjoy schlocky 80s music more than anyone you know so I thought Bryan Adams writing these songs would work for me…it did not.
  • My biggest problem with the show, I think, is that it’s so close to the movie (the lines, the outfits for Vivian) that the more I think about it the more I wonder what the point is. Why spend the money on a night at the theater when you can just rent the movie?
  • My friend loved it. Really enjoyed the entire show. So when we left the theater I wasn’t thinking “I hated this” I was thinking “Well, it could have been worse.” But the more I think about it, the more I realize that I really didn’t like it. Which, given my absolute fangirlish adoration of Andy Karl, really disappoints me.

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