I saw this and it was heaven. Backstage, Ernie Sabella started singing Hakuna Matata (for a kid's birthday) and Nathan gave me the side-eye. I could have happily died at that moment.
Interesting little fact here. The role of Pseudolus which Nathan Lane played in this show was originally played on Broadway by Zero Mostel. in 2001 Lane was cast as Max Bialystock in the new musical version of Mel Brooks's 1967 movie The Producers in which the role of Bialystock was played by none other than... Zero Mostel. Also the role of Leo Bloom in that production was played by Matthew Broderick who played Simba opposite Lane in The Lion King.
It seems like the peak for this show. Would be wonderful if there was full filmed version of this production. I love all the little additions they made like the legs going up with the curtain, the “tragedy tomorrow” jokes, etc., and a spectacular cast on top of it. I would even love to see the full show during Whoopi’s run.
First Guys and Dolls now this! I keep finding Timon and Pumba in the strangest of Broadway classics. Back in 2011, my high school did this musical as its spring production.
Fantastic actor, he's so awesome in every genre he plays (A Funny Thing In Happened and the way to the Forum, The Birdcage, Mouse Hunt, The Iceman Cometh, The Nance, The Good Wife, Angels In Ameria or Penny Dreadful City Of Angels). Is so Underrated in Hollywood (movie or tv show), shame Hollywood, shame !
When he says “she plays Madea later this week” can someone explain the joke? My 21st century brain automatically thinks of Tyler Perry lmao, but what is the joke in 1960s context?
I liked it better with the original Broadway cast soundtrack when it was the late John Carradine as Marcus Lycus - and who had a lovely deep voice - singing the line "baritones and basses", not Domina. And it was Gymnasia who was originally singled out as playing Medea later this week, not Domina, though I must admit that was funnier.
It's a great song but this staging is right out of a high school production. I know the tone of the show is vaudeville, but this is bad. And the support performers from the original show leave this for dead. They were witty, and these guys aren't.
Have you done much research? The staging is almost exact to the original Jerome Robbins staging from the first "Forum." It was choreographed by Rob Marshall - do we know who he is? In addition, this production was staged by Jerry Zaks, a multiple Tony-award winner, who also directed the brilliant 1992 "Guys & Dolls," as well as a host of other enormous Broadway hits. To say the staging is right out of a high school production is insulting and frankly, ignorant.
@@jasonmarks80 You are both right.... this is a great piece of theater history - but it opened in 1962. Just 2 years before this, The Sound of Music opened - and instead of panoramic back-projected views of the Alps, Mary Martin sang the title song in front of a dinky painted scrim... The sweeping, dynamic visual spectacle of Dreamgirls, Sweeney Todd, Les Mis and Phantom of the Opera were still to come. Theater technology has improved greatly, and a big push has been made to compete with film and large-format TV for spectacle and visual effects... which has changed modern tastes. It's true that they were going for a vaudeville/commedia del'arte broadness - but by modern standards it's very simple. OTOH that is the appeal of live theater - the human scale of real actors (which is sometimes lost in today's mega-productions).
Nathan Lane is always wonderful of course, and I'm sure this was a great show. But it's interesting how videos of stage productions hardly ever work. There's a distancing effect and somehow the actors look smaller than life in this format.
He was fabulous in real life. I was one of the courtesans in a very-off-Broadway production of A Funny Thing in 1975; he was Pseudolus. He was about 20, and such a gifted clown! It was terrific to work with him.
