I'm sorry Ben Brantly, but you are horribly mistaken. When you credit the new broadway production of "The Little Mermaid" as "Less then 2 dimensional" you could not be further from accurate. While the show did not blow me away completely, I still think it was a great show which I very much enjoyed.
Sierra Bogess, making her Broadway Debut, was wonderful! She captured the innocence, spontaneity, and youthfulness of Ariel perfectly and had a beautiful voice that I could not get enough of!
Sherie Rene Scott, who I have been a big fan of since Aida, and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, had the perfect balance of evil and entertaining as the large and in charge sea witch Ursela. Her Jazzy songs were excellently sung and were all followed by thunderous applause.
Norm Lewis, playing King Triton, did his part just fine, but very similarly to his last role on Broadway, Inspector Javert in Les Miserables.
Flounder, played by Brian D'Addario, was absolutely perfect, and earned the most applause after his song "She's In love"
(and I'm not just praising him because I'm friends with him and his dad)
The cast as a whole was just great, delivering this classic tale with energy, excitement, and vigor.
The set was a little bare, but I think it worked for the production. Most scenes were staged simply, and had only a few set pieces strategically placed to accentuate the action. This may have been because the cast all wore "Heeleys" (the shoes with roller blades built into them.) This was an interesting choice that I was upset with at first, but looking back on it, I think that it was the right decision. Goodness knows that Disney would have had no problem putting everyone on stage in a fly harness with their budget, but having the cast on the Heeleys was able to give some sort of gliding/floating effect without making the show into a technical spectacular that was too heavy on spectacle and in turn completely destroyed the plot (Tarzan anyone?)
The only negative thing that really stuck out to me was that the chunk of the Plot where Ursela dons Ariel's voice on as her own and takes to the shore was taken out of the Musical. Instead, Ariel's voice is heard offstage, but who is producing Ariel's voice is never actually shown.
Overall, I think the show was very well done. It is certainly not as breathtaking as Disney's "The Lion King" or "Mary Poppins," but I would definitely recommend seeing it. It's charming plot and brilliant Music, delivered by it's very talented cast is sure to make you smile.
(Ok, going back over this Blog entry, it sounds entirely too much like a review for a newspaper or something. I think that's just because I just read Brantly's article and it annoyed me.)
Anyway, here's a pic of Pammie and me hanging out at Ariel's Grotto backstage with Brian (Flounder)
