| re: BTW what was the original London production like? | |
| Last Edit: Delvino 08:54 am EDT 07/12/24 | |
| Posted by: Delvino 08:51 am EDT 07/12/24 | |
| In reply to: re: BTW what was the original London production like? - bway1430 03:41 am EDT 07/12/24 | |
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| I was a fan of the concept album, and stayed abreast of the London production. Though I didn't see it, two friends did who explained the hybrid - between Bennett and Nunn - that it ended up. Not one vision, or even two, but a newish iteration that could work atop the design, focus the score, and push through a version of an only implied story. That's always been the problem with the piece: it's structurally entirely situational, a couple of world championships in contrasting locales, with most plot points tangential, i.e. the Russian's defection and the rather forced romantic triangle. Rather than enhance the original book, such as it was, Richard Nelson was hired to write a libretto that could pin down the score's revelations. I saw it twice at the Imperial: it was intelligent, earnest, and yet deadly dull. You still waited for the songs. All of the cold war stuff was too familiar, too hard to refresh. Nelson was determined to instruct us in the history of chess, the history of Hungary, and the underlying causes of the loss of identity ache in defection. But we were only moved when the actors sang. The book scenes didn't make the songs' content more complex. And changes had the whiff of desperation. I remember coming back to find "The Arbiter's Song" - one of the concept album's small treasures - cut. You could feel the effort to streamline. But the show's problem wasn't just attenuation; it was moment-to-moment stakes. | |
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