Beauty and the Beast on Broadway

When my mom told me she wanted to go see Beauty and the Beast on Broadway, I had no feelings either way. Sure I'll go, but I didn't really care if I don't. I went with my mom, my sister and two of my aunts. So what did we think?

Overall Impression
Overall, it was cute. I'm glad I saw it, but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to see it again. I've been to a lot of musicals, and most the time I want to see them over and over. This one actually made me want to grab the Disney Cartoon and watch it again, but I don't want to spend 80$ again.

Here's some more detail:

Plot: In case you didn't know
The Plot of Beauty and the Beast on Broadway is EXACTLY the same as the Disney movie. Same songs, same words, I don't think much (if anything) was changed.

--If you already know the plot of the movie, you can skip this part--

If you've never seen the movie, the plot is pretty simple. Belle is an "odd" girl in a little french town that likes to read and fantasize about Princes and Adventure. She lives with her father who is also "odd". The "quotes" around odd are because they are not really that strange, but everyone in the town thinks they are odd because they like to Read, Invent, and of course they like to Think! (A dangerous past time!)

Belle is the Beauty. Yes, although she is odd, she is still considered a Beauty. So who's the Beast? Although Belle seems to think it is Gaston (a big snobby guy who's always hitting on her) , the Beast is a completely different character. We find out right at the beginning that the Beast is actually a Prince who was cursed into becoming a Beast because he was mean. The only way to break the spell would be to find true love.

There we have it... we got the Beauty, and the Beast, that's all you need to know! If you really have never seen the movie, I don't want to ruin the storyline for you.

--end Plot--

Actors: Singing and Acting in General
First you should note this was a touring cast, and your cast may be different. Obviously the same people don't perform everywhere. This was the Michigan Opera Theatre production of the story which played at the Fox. All the singing and acting was really good! When a play is based on a movie, you expect a certain voice or look for a character, and these actors fit very well.

Belle (played by Lauren Kennedy) actually sounded a whole lot like the Belle from the movie. She was excellent. She had a very 'Disney' tone to her voice and she fit well in the part. Lauren has a long history and most recently was in the Ten Commandments with Val Kilmer. That's pretty cool!

Beast (played by Alan Cambell) did a good job in the part. He showed the intensity of the Beast's emotions and did well in showing the transformation from an awful person to a decent person. Alan was nominated for a Tony for his performance in Sunset Boulevard in 1995. As his long long history shows, he's been around for a while. So you can tell he must be pretty good to make it into so many plays!

Mrs. Potts (Jeanne Lehman) was great and did all the songs and jokes well. It must have been annoying to stand in the position of a tea pot for 2 hours, but she managed very well! Jeanne has been in various musicals including the Sound of Music.

Lefou (Bryce Bermingham) was pretty good, but not nearly as funny as the cartoon version. I think it was hard to show on stage the dimensions of this character. There may have been a *tad* bit of overacting in this part. Bryce was also in Cats, Snow White, and the original cast of Beauty and the Beast.

Gaston (Jeremy Stolle) was really a good choice for this part. It was like they just pulled him out of the cartoon and put him on stage. Very good, very funny. Jeremy has been in Carousel, and played Jekyll/Hyde in Jekyll and Hyde.

Lumiere (Rob Lorey) was my favorite character in the movie AND in the play. He is good at being witty and he is the lighthearted part of the play. Rob was in the original cast for Beauty and the Beast as well as Aspects of Love, Show Boat and more.

Cogsworth (Tim Maculan) was probably my second favorite. His part was meant to be a kind of stuck-up, tight-butt character and he played it very well. Tim is currently in the HBO show Six Feet Under and was also in many tv shows such as Still Standing, Drew Carey, Friends and Dharma & Greg.

I think those are the main main characters, so as you see the acting was all very well and good. No major problems here! I'm sure even if you see a different cast you would find them just as good.

Music and Singing
The songs, being the same as the movie, were very well written and everything sounded really good. The actors kept their voices nice and loud so there was no trouble hearing it. However most the songs are slow, or only partial songs, so it wasn't very lively for the most part.

Dancing
There was not a whole lot of dancing in this show which I think is why I was semi-bored. When I go to the play, I'm usually looking for Huge productions with 20-30 dancers on stage for every dance. This play only had 2-3 major Dancing scenes, and I feel they didn't keep enough Actors on stage at the same time to keep it entertaining. Overall, this is a slower play, so not a lot of fast songs. Therefore, not a long of exciting dancing.

Costumes
The costumes were great! They fit perfectly with the little French town Belle was from. For fans of the Disney Movie, you'll notice the costumes are practically identical to what you saw on the screen. This is quite an amazing task since they had to base them on Cartoon characters.

The Cartoon characters mostly did not look very Human. Some looked like Candlesticks, some looked like Clocks, then of course there was the Beast. I didn't like the Beast costume all that much (he wasn't portrayed as HUGE as he was supposed to be). However the other 'objects' were awesome. They did this all in a pretty cool way. They had everything you expected, the dancing Plates, Brooms, Silverware, and of course the TeaPot, Candlestick and the Clock. And my favorite, the Rug.

Scenery
The set was pretty cool. There was a lot of moving parts on the stage so each place had a unique look and feel. All scenes fit in well with the Movie.

What I didn't like is when they were trying to portray movement, as in Belle running through the forest, they just had the character skip or run in circles while the set moved away. It gave me the effect that she didn't go anywhere and it was kind of weird. In most plays, the character would run offstage and then come back repeatedly at the same time as the set changes. I prefer that method because that way it looks as if they really went on a journey.

Play Mood
The play mood, although it's supposed to be somewhat happy at parts, seemed overall kind of sad. I don't know if it was because it was on stage or what, but even the happy parts seemed kind of blah, unlike the movie which feels much more upbeat.

The End
In the end, I was ok. Although the play was semi-slow and semi-boring, I wasn't tired or wishing it would end. It was kind of like watching a movie with some kids. You just watch it, and don't really concentrate on it too much. As I mentioned, once is enough for me with this play. It definitely isn't as exciting as The Lion King was! If you have kids it may be a good thing to take them to. Definitely a good way to get your kids into Broadway because they already know the story and it will be exciting for them to see the characters come to life. I had two little girls in front of me that seemed to really enjoy it, and weren't antsy or troublesome at all because they were really into it.

If you are looking to get your Husband or Boyfriend interested in Broadway, this is surely not the play for him. I saw a lot of guys half-passed out at the end of the play. I think you get the picture! It's worth seeing once, with kids or a group of girls, leave the boys at home, and don't expect to be overwhelmed with amazement!