Forbidden Broadway, Vol. 8 - Special Victims Unit
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Free Music Notes for Forbidden Broadway, Vol. 8 - Special Victims Unit
Free Music Review: ONLY for Long-Time Broadway Dorks
Hit: 3 Stars
The songs are hit-and-miss, and I sincerely suggest getting the cd from the library or buying specific songs that pertain to shows you like and know well. The jokes are all very...obvious, I guess would be the word. It's funny, but if I hadn't listened to twenty Stephen Sondheim musicals beforehand, I would've found "Forbidden Assassins" extremely boring. Most people should like the Mel Brooks parody "Das Mel Brooks Song" and a few others, but it's really a "what's your taste" thing.
It's sort of like how the horror movie "Scream" was a smart parody of the slasher flicks, and then movies like "Scary Movie" started parodying "Scream"--when parodies start being parodied...you wonder if they've run out of ideas...
I do have to admit though, that at the beginning of "Julie Andrews hosts PBS..." where the acterss states that "there's nothing like a PBS special to announce the death of an art form", I couldn't help but laugh and think, "that, and a show like Forbidden Broadway."
Free Music Review: Not just "La Cage" AW FUL
Hit: 3 Stars
Having been a fan of this series since the first album, and having seen numerous productions of the show, I was eagerly awaiting this release. Better luck next time. The targets are soft, the rhymes and gags are recycled, and worst of all the impersonations are lousy, with the possible/passable exceptions of Bernadette and the "Wicked" gals. With all the devastating success achieved in earlier editions skewering Patti Lupone, Julie Andrews, and others, why trot them out again when this recording's singers aren't recognizable as these stars, either as imitation or parody? The only real fun was had whenever the inspired Christine Pedi joined in. I'd recommend this only for completists.Free Music Review: Need to go to Broadway
Hit: 3 Stars
This CD is very funny and does poke fun at many things about the theatre industry. However much of the material depends on the person having been physically to Broadway, and not must be a fan of musicals, or theatre.
I have never been to Broadway in person, and was lost on some of the humor. I got many of the references, but have to wounder if this is because I am a Theatre Educaiton major, and do have some of the knowlege from my courses. I would recommend this CD though and will look in to buying the previous 7 volumes at some time.
Free Music Review: A few good laughs
Hit: 2 Stars
As with all the previous editions of "Forbidden Broadway," there are some hearty guffaws to be had. Unfortunately, whereas the first several albums were virtually wall-to-wall laughs, this edition's really meaty material is doled out in small portions -- and one has to suffer through some bland fare in between.
Mr. Alessandrini's brilliance in the past was two-fold: 1) The lyric spoofing was so vivid that the listener could conjure visuals even if they hadn't seen the revue live, and 2) the humor was just the right length -- it got the job done, and often left one wanting more. Much of the current material is not up to Mr. Alessandrini's usual standards, for it's difficult to figure out what's going on, and some of the segments are much too long [especially the opening crime scene sketch and the "'night Mother" parody -- the latter of which I gave up on after a couple of minutes]. Some of the contexts are much too obtuse to have any general comic appeal [the "Wicked" leads being friends; "Fiddler" ostensibly having no Jews in the cast]. Some of the titles promised more comic riches than were actually mined -- Julie Andrews presenting the next hundred years of the American musical could have been a cavalcade of wacky ideas of further trash that might be foisted on the public, but instead it's just some blathering about how more mediocrity is on the way.
The performers have a lot of energy, but they largely lack the vividness of Mr. Alessandrini's previous longtime rep artists. Part of this may be due to the fact that although the current artists have the requisite vocal chops to handle the material, their diction is less-than-ideal at times. [People have groused about previous recordings not having lyrics, but they weren't needed in the past.] On the plus side, these newest artists are very good at mimicking stars; indeed, the Bernadette Peters impression makes this CD actually worth the purchase price -- it is perfect and hilarious, from the Peters-specific line reading styles [the curious ascending pitch at the ends of some lines] to swallowing the same vowel sounds that Miss Peters does. [This performance really is quite brilliant!] Other highlights of this recording are the commentary on the trend toward puppets and unwieldy production designs in "Avenue Q" and "Lion King," the manic perkiness of "Thoroughly Modern Millie," the love song to Sondheim that pokes fun at the difficulty in singing some of his music, and the on-target skewering of how gay the Tony Awards have become. And the wacky quasi-Eastern chorus vocals in the "Bombay Dreams" send-up are Mr. Alessandrini at his finest -- like all great comedy, they are completely unexpected and thereby chortle-inducing.
This recording is only for completists like me [after only two listenings, I now have a short list of tracks I'll play]; anyone unfamiliar with "Forbidden Broadway" should check out the first three editions as a better introduction to this often brilliant series [the original "Les Miserables" sequence is still one of my all-time favorite comedic sketches].
P.S. Please, Mr. Alessandrini -- no more perfunctory Patti Lupone riffs and PLEASE no more rehashes of 'I'm 30 years old tomorrow' from "Annie" -- oy!
P.P.S. And even the Ethel Merman shtick is starting to grow stale. After the hilariously sublime "Swell! Now, how'd ya like to hear ME sing a duet?" years ago, everything subsequent has paled in comparison.
Free Music Review: A victim of his own parody
Hit: 2 Stars
The most difficult part of swallowing this ongoing gag is that it's become it's own parody. Even as Gerard Alessandrini is "mutilating" Broadway shows, he's run out of ideas, making Volume 8 in the FB series about as bland and predicatble as the very shows he mocks. Certainly there are some witty moments, and Alessandrini's spark with lyric parody here and there shines through the murk, but the vast majority this volume simply suffers from predictability. How many times can he recycle Merman, Channing and Lupone, or worse-- the fight for the Tony-- when, to quote an earlier volume, "I know I've heard this song before?" The sad irony is that this wink-nudge Boroadway insider show has fallen victim to the same mediocrity afflicting the rest of the Great White Way. Alessandrini knows this, but he continues to rely on his own stale formula, and simply roll out the yuk-yuks that worked so well before. He's done far better in earlier volumes, when his wordcraft was in fine form. Now it seems like he can't be bothered. Sort of like the 10 square blocks he mocks. Part of the problem here is also the performers, who simply aren't up to previous standard. Imitating the stylisms of Bway performers requires a certain level of mastery, which is not to be found on this recording-- particularly compared to previous ones. A brief moment of great Garland parody gives way to 3 horrific minutes of Edie Falco singing "That's Amore" to the background plot of "'night mother." A decent pan of the "Wicked" witches only leads to yet another pointlessly recycled ode to Patti Lupone (what, no "Meadowlark," Gerard?) And whereas "The Producers" could have taken up most of the second act (as "Rent" closed much of Vol. 4), it only wararnts a witty spoof that lasts a regrettable 1:16-- and these are some of the most inspired lyrics of the volume. Volumes 4 and 5 saw Alessandrini at the top oif his form. Brilliant at times, scathing and risky. Here, he goes straight for vanilla, and it ends up shoddy. The show that wants to cut closes with hardly a scratch. Alessandrini can do far better than this, and he knows it. So here's hoping he frees himself from the same mediocrity that has typified the last five years on Broadway. And just as Alessandrini closes with his inevitably upbeat, hopeful promise to Broadway's future, I'll look forward to Volume 9, and a new FB that does the author justice.