Poor Debbie Allen! I thought she was a wonderful Anita in the early 1980s revival of WEST SIDE STORY and I enjoyed her performance as Charity in SWEET CHARITY, but being a talented performer doesn't mean you've got the talent to create for others. She really does suck as a director/choreographer. I can still remember the horror that was CARRIE: THE MUSICAL all too clearly. DR Jose, you never have anything bad to say so I was floored!
Also, DR Jose! safe travel vibes today!
DR elmore - Well... I'll just put it this way:
-4 hour audition call.
-I arrived on time. She moseyed in eventually.
-40 singers were called. All of them had appointments.
-She knew the first singer. So that audition started off with 20 minutes of "sistah talk", and then, "Oh, I know you can sing chile! I'll just have them call you back later."
-Since we were now running late right for some "unknown reason", she decided to take a break to regroup so that she could figure out how to proceed with the rest of the afternoon.
-After a 20 minute break... She decided to call all of the singers back in to see how they "moved". -Note: This was for a "stand behind music stands and sing" concert presentation.
-She had them move - which included some stuff on the floor. Note: none of the singers were told to "come prepared to move".
-She did not want any music during the movement portion.
-After 20 minutes of "interpretative" movement, she sent all of the singers back into the hallway. Again, remember, these singers had appointments, so, consequently, some of them were showing up "late", even when they weren't.
-Then she took a break since she was supposedly was expecting to get a call from "Denzel" and/or "Oprah".
-I finally played the piano for the first time about two hours after the audition call was originally scheduled to start.
-And then when another "old friend" walked into the room, there was another 10 minutes of "sistah talk"...
-And not once did she acknowledge me or say "Thank You" at the end of the day.
And so and so forth. So, since she not only wasted my time that day, well... Alas, I worked in close "proximity" to her for a few years after that. I was not a part of those projects, but the complaints from everyone involved in those projects were in a very similar vein. Alas, it looks like nothing has changed.
