OK, back from four hours of OKLAHOMA! with all those endless pledge breaks featuring people who try to sound learned about Broadway musicals and OKLAHOMA in particular and merely end up showing their ignorance. One of the hosts, commenting on all the wonderful songs in the show, explained how much she enjoyed "Poor Jude Is Dead." She must have been thinking of the Beatles cover version.
Well, I have to say I did like the production an awful lot. Hugh Jackman is a real star, has magnetism to spare, great looks, body, and voice which makes poor Josefina Gabrielle that much more uninteresting opposite him. She's talented, but for me at least totally without charm. Shuler Hensley should be booking a major revival of SWEENEY TODD because his talent could certainly carry it.
Yes, the book drags badly toward the end when you just want the show to end for goodness sakes, but the production numbers were very well put together.
My major objection to the video production was the unnecessary need to try to fool the viewer into thinking he was seeing a live stage performance when it was nothing of the kind. The show was prerecorded and the actors were performing away from the theater where the show originated. The cutaways to the audience were filmed and cut in at appropriate moments after numbers, scenes, or acts, but it was totally unneeded, especially since nary a joke gets a laugh either in speech or song (there are also continuity lapses cutting between the theater and the soundstage where the show is being performed).
Still, I will be adding this to my collection. Jackman is more than worth the purchase price and so is the marvelous dancing.
