1 month ago
Beaches, that tearjerking ’80s communicative of female relationship beloved by some, snubbed by others and mostly remembered for Bette Midler’s rendition of nan soaring taxable opus “Wind Beneath My Wings,” has had a agelong roadworthy to nan stage, and nan hold has done it nary favors. Whatever charms nan 1988 movie had – and they were flimsy if soggy – person been washed distant for illustration truthful overmuch soil erosion, leaving nan shape cluttered pinch nan flotsom of animation characters, broadly drawn performances and immoderate chintzy-looking sets.
Opening coming connected Broadway, Beaches, A New Musical, arsenic nan afloat title has it, is simply a mostly forgettable endeavor, and that, sadly, includes a people that will not apt takes its spot successful nan treasured bequest of its composer, nan awesome stone & rotation songwriter Mike Stoller.
By nan clip “Wind Beneath My Wings,” nan Grammy-winning AOR deed written by Jeff Silbar and Larry Henley, makes its inevitable end-of-show entrance, immoderate nostalgia remains is solely for Midler and her signature capacity of nan song. The caller Beaches is astir charitably viewed arsenic an oldies enactment for a movie.
The premise, for anyone who needs reminding, is an overseas mates lifelong relationship that survives domineering mothers, agelong distances, polar other personalities, men and misunderstandings, each until a terminal illness does nan separating that a agelong database of erstwhile crippled devices couldn’t.
We first meet CeeCee and Bertie (named Hillary successful nan movie that starred Midler and Barbara Hershey) connected an Atlantic City formation erstwhile nan girls are children, or, much accurately here, mini adults pinch each nan characteristics they’d return done life. CeeCee (a segment stealing, for amended and sometimes worse, Samantha Schwartz, directed to transmission some Midler and Mae West) is already thing of a boardwalk star, performing successful a agleam reddish bustier-style get-up and fishnet stockings, sassing her arsenic brassy mom (whom she calls by first sanction Leona) and encouraging milquetoast Bertie to disregard her ain stuffy mom’s instructions by dipping a toed aliases 2 successful nan surf. Challenge accepted, relationship born.
The girls spell their abstracted ways astatine summer’s end, but their pen-palship continues done their teens and into adulthood. When they reunite arsenic adults they haven’t missed a beat.
The musical’s book by Iris Rainer Dart (who wrote nan original 1985 novel) and Thom Thomas takes a vaguely snapshot approach, pinch speedy scenes from nan women’s lives – Love Letters-style passages, introductions to nan men they emotion and conflict over, and glimpses of CeeCee’s show business emergence (she grows up, apparently, not truthful overmuch to beryllium Bette Midler’s Beaches characteristic but much nan Divine Miss M herself, astatine 1 constituent performing astatine a cheery bathhouse and later making variety-show appearances successful Midler’s signature ’70s trash-with-flash style beneath an detonation of reddish hair.
As nan big CeeCee, Jessica Vosk, a good powerhouse singer, chooses – aliases is directed to take – an over-the-top style that draws heavily, people enough, from Midler (the outré style, nan Merman-esque measurement and chanteuse vulnerability). There’s immoderate Streisand, too, and a large dose of Andrea Martin, specifically Martin’s signature SCTV characteristic Edith Prickley, that bawdy, gawdy ham pinch each nan bravado of a Catskills clown. Standard wisecrack: “I look for illustration nan woman adjacent door…to a kibbutz!”
Kelli Barrett, arsenic nan big Bertie, is suitably prim and proper, sounded to a much quality level than CeeCee but not importantly much convincing. We tin only ideate what each of these characters sees successful nan different speech from crippled mandates, pinch an audience’s consciousness of ’80s nostalgia required to do immoderate very dense lifting.
The men successful nan formed – Ben Jacoby and Brent Thiessen – are suitably smarmy successful their stick-thin roles, pinch nan supporting big actresses – Sarah Bockel and Lael Van Keuren – playing nan mothers pinch caricature zeal. Zurin Villanueva, arsenic a late-in-the-show hospice caretaker, has a refreshing earthy easiness hinting astatine a sturdier Beaches that mightiness person been.
Title: Beaches
Venue: Broadway’s Majestic Theatre
Director: Lonny Price and Matt Cowart
Book: Iris Rainer Dart & Thom Thomas
Music: Mike Stoller, pinch Lyrics by Dart
Cast: Jessica Vosk, Kelli Barrett, Samantha Schwartz, Zeya Grace, Bailey Ryon, Emma Ogea, Ben Jacoby, Brent Thiessen, Sarah Bockel, Lael Van Keuren, Zurin Villanueva, Harper Burns
Running time: 2 hrs 30 min (including intermission)
