The splashy, big-budget, supposedly Broadway-bound musical version of Anne Rice’s bestselling vampire novels has run squarely into a wall of critical derision in its tryout run in San Francisco. “The creative team has nearly driven a wooden stake through the heart of author Anne Rice’s much-loved Vampire Chronicles,” says one Bay Area daily, and that’s one of the kinder reviews. San Francisco’s largest daily summed up the brickbats nicely: “Didactic, disjointed, oddly miscast, confusingly designed and floundering in an almost unrelentingly saccharine score by Elton John, Lestat opened Sunday as the latest ill-conceived Broadway hopeful.”
Tag: 01.11.06
Is The Director Sinking Lestat?
“Theater people are whispering that [Lestat director Rob Jess Roth] has to be replaced by a stronger and more imaginative director if [the show] is going to have a chance in New York… Roth has a poor track record on Broadway. He directed Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, a third-rate production that no one will confuse with Julie Taymor’s great staging of The Lion King. He was given a shot at directing Aida, but was fired after his production opened to poor reviews out of town. His third musical — The Opposite of Sex — was aborted out of town, also because of poor notices.”
Prickly Pinchas
Pinchas Zukerman is having an unusually newsworthy season, even for him. Always an outspoken critic of people and music he sees as “mediocre” (don’t get him started on the period performance movement), Zukerman has been taking some heat of his own lately for his decision to pull out of what remains of his obligations as music director of the Ottawa-based National Arts Centre Orchestra’s 2005-06 season. Zukerman calls the journalists questioning his decision “mediocrities,” but he admits to what has long been rumored within the industry: that his NACO is not a happy place at the moment. “In every orchestra, in every institution that has climbed to prominence quickly there’s always going to be a few rotten apples. And they have created an atmosphere that has to be eradicated, quite frankly.”
New Team In Place At SF Opera
The new general director of the San Francisco Opera, David Gockley, has moved quickly to bring in his own administrative staff, appointing to two high positions men he had worked with in his last job at the Houston Grand Opera. Gockley took over the directorship from industry icon Pamela Rosenberg late last year. Rosenberg has moved on to a job with the Berlin Philharmonic.
Donor Rescues Audubon Quartet Members
An anonymous donor has come forward with $200,000 to help members of the Audubon String Quartet pay a judgment against them and avoid having to sell their instruments. Former quartet member David Ehrlich won the judgment last year: “Why am I settling at this point? It’s bothersome to me. I don’t want them to lose every little thing that they had. If they can come out of this with something, then I would feel better about it too.” He has said he never wanted the other members to lose their instruments but needed the funds from the judgment to pay lawyers.
Drawing Center Lands In Fish Market
New York’s Drawing Center was to be part of the World Trade center project until controversy torpedoed the deal. Since then the center has been hunting for a home. “Scouring abandoned buildings, vacant parking lots and high-rises, they fell in love with some locations and flatly rejected others, while learning the perils of what its president calls a ‘lack of nimbleness’ by losing out to quick bidders.” Now a home has been found – in the old Fulton Fish Market.
Publisher: Memoir Isn’t Necessarily Fact
James Frey’s publisher says it doesn’t matter if some of the author’s work isn’t true. “Memoir is a personal history whose aim is to illuminate, by way of example, events and issues of broader social consequence. By definition, it is highly personal. In the case of Mr. Frey, we decided ‘A Million Little Pieces’ was his story, told in his own way, and he represented to us that his version of events was true to his recollections. Recent accusations against him notwithstanding, the power of the overall reading experience is such that the book remains a deeply inspiring and redemptive story for millions of readers.”