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[cody]

http://www.lestatmusical.com

[Elisabeth aus Wien]

Sunday Times January 22, 2006

Elton’s vampire musical ‘sucks’
John Harlow, Los Angeles



AMERICAN critics have sunk their fangs into Sir Elton John’s latest attempt to reinvent himself as a Broadway maestro, mocking Lestat, his vampire musical, as toothless and anaemic even before it opens.
The producers arranged a trial run of the £10m show, based on Anne Rice’s bestselling Vampire Chronicles, in San Francisco earlier this month before transferring it to New York in March.



However, excoriating reviews have sent executives from Warner Brothers, which is bankrolling the show, back to the drawing board. John has been asked to write new songs after criticism that the existing score is dreary and banal.

Rice’s books, which have sold 65m copies, tell the story of Lestat de Leoncourt, an 18th-century rake who turns first into a vampire, then a global wanderer and finally a contemporary rock star.

Elements of the saga were filmed in 1994 as Interview With the Vampire, starring Tom Cruise as Lestat and Kirsten Dunst as the child vampire Claudia, a character based on Rice’s own daughter who died of leukaemia. The stage musical stars Hugh Panaro as Lestat and Allison Fischer as Claudia.

The San Francisco Chronicle called Lestat “didactic, disjointed, oddly miscast, confusingly designed and floundering” and dismissed John’s songs as “unrelentingly saccharine, banal and virtually indistinguishable”. Bernie Taupin’s lyrics were “woodenly prosaic”.

Regional newspapers joined in. The Modesto Bee called it “laborious, vague and bloated, leaving the cast heroically emoting to little effect”, while the Press Democrat scoffed that it was “not lively enough to be called undead”. Another concluded: “Lestat sucks.”

The producers are putting on a brave face. “Everyone prefers to hear how wonderful they are, but we know there are things that need fixing,” admitted Gregg Maday, Warner’s top producer on the show.

The problem may not be quantity, but quality. While Taupin toiled for weeks on his lyrics locked in a Las Vegas hotel room, John is reported to have spent far less time writing the music. He is playing a long series of concerts in Les Vegas while also working on a television comedy and films such as Gnomeo and Juliet, an animated tale of lovestruck gnomes.

However, the 58-year-old who “married” his boyfriend David Furnish in a civil partnership last month, has made no secret of his ambition to stamp his mark on Broadway again. He achieved huge success with The Lion King, written with Sir Tim Rice, but stumbled with Aida, his second show, and has been trying to make up ground ever since.

He may have more luck with the stage adaptation of Billy Elliot, which has been nominated for nine Laurence Olivier awards. The producers are hoping to open on Broadway later this year.

Vampires have traditionally flourished on film — this weekend Kate Beckinsale returns as a leather-clad undead killer in Underworld: Evolution — but sometimes they struggle on stage.

Dance of the Vampires undermined Michael Crawford’s Broadway career and last year’s musical Dracula closed after months of half-empty theatres.

Last week John seemed upbeat about his prospects. “It took a while to get Aida right, but it worked in the end,” said a spokesman. “And if Lestat does not explode, which we think it will, then he still has Billy Elliot going to Broadway.

“One way or another, Sir Elton will have his name up in lights again along the Great White Way.”

[skooter]

Hey cody,
das ist eigentlich eine Fanseite.
Die Ofizielle Seite ist hier.

http://www.lestat.com/

Allerdings bekommt man dort lange nicht so viele Informationen.

[oli]

wow, jeder der 3 songs klingen echt gut auch wenn lestat laut kritik "sucks". da ich momentan meine nächste new york reise plane, wird wohl ein latest besuch unausweichlich werden.

[skooter]

Ich hoffe auch dass sie das Stück bis zur Broadway Premiere verbessern.
Ich habe Karten für April.