I cannot begin to tell you how many times I have begged for someone, anyone to stop Debbie Allen. Doesn't anybody get it? The woman is not a gifted director/choreographer of musical shows. She's an embarrassment. Worse, she's boring.
What's really bad and unfortunate about her "work" is that if anyone gives it a bad review, then she and her supporters starting claiming, "You just can't identify with it since you're not an African-American". Even The Washington Post basically gave up giving her Kennedy Center shows less-than-favorable reviews since "no one who would really get the show" would care about it anyway. Sadly, I believe she's fully aware that she works the whole race and racial identity and pride card, and, worse, she passes it on stealthily to her cast. There are ways to genuinely make an audience laugh without resorting to the lowest common denominator. There are also ways to move them without manufacturing pathos.
Tonight's show was formulaic, condescending, insulting, bland and manipulative. I would always rather walk away from the theatre feeling disappointed and un-entertained rather than mad and pissed off like I was tonight. -I could even tell that the reps from the theatre who were sitting behind me knew that they could not really do anything to shape the project. For better or for worse, it is what it is.
