Gettin' the Band Back Together

[edjames]

The first of the newest offerings for the fall season on Broadway.

Can't say I was overwhelmed, in fact, we left at intermission.

Loud heavy metal rock music. The cast is Ok, and for a first preview everything seemed to go smoothly.

The audience was heavily "papered" (that means free or deeply discounted seats). I saw a lot of Audience Extras.

Perhaps some else will see it and last through the entire show, and until then I'll await the critics reviews.

Opens August 13.

 

 

http://gettinthebandbacktogether.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/home-grouplogolockup.jpg

[edjames]

Dismal review from NYTimes columnist Jesse Green. My instinct to bolt at intermission was probably a good idea. I didn't stick around.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/13/theater/review-gettin-the-band-back-together-broadway.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Ftheater&action=click&contentCollection=theater®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=sectionfront

 

Review: Familiar Rock Dreams in ‘Gettin’ the Band Back Together’

When a Broadway show needs a preshow warm-up, what follows is likely half-baked.

At least that’s the case with “Gettin’ the Band Back Together,” the empty-headed entertainment that opened on Monday at the Belasco Theater. In a scripted welcome before the curtain, Ken Davenport, the lead producer and a co-author of the book, delivers a supercharged spiel that bodes ill — and begins with a whopper. “What you’re about to see is one of those rare things on Broadway these days,” he says. “A totally original musical.”

To the extent that “Gettin’ the Band Back Together” is not based on a specific pre-existing property, he’s technically right. But originality isn’t novelty, and the show is such a calculated rehash of a million tired tropes that it can best be described with Broadway math: “School of Rock” plus “The Fully Monty” divided by “The Wedding Singer” — and multiplied by zero.

Like “The Full Monty,” it concerns a bunch of middle-aged men trying to revive their flagging spirits by putting on a show. In this case, the men are former members of a garage band called Juggernaut, whose high school dreams of rock superstardom have dissolved into careerism and slackerdom.

Mitch, once Juggernaut’s lead singer, is a stockbroker so bad at his job that he gets fired on his 40th birthday. When he slinks back to New Jersey to live with his mother, he discovers that her home has been threatened with foreclosure by Tygen Billows, the once and forever frontman of Juggernaut’s old nemesis, Mouthfeel. (How he came to own “73 percent of the real estate” in town is a mystery barely acknowledged.) To rescue the house and his self-esteem, Mitch agrees to a rematch of the epochal battle of the bands that Mouthfeel lost years earlier.

The redemptive competition is a vigorous nod to “School of Rock,” and so is the sequence in which Mitch (Mitchell Jarvis) reassembles his players. They include Bart Vickers (Jay Klaitz), a shlubby math teacher with a secret crush; Sully Sullivan (Paul Whitty), a police officer with Broadway dreams; and Rummesh Patel (Manu Narayan), a nerd who wanted to be a pediatrician but was instead pressured into entering his father’s dermatology practice — and, imminently, an arranged marriage.

Because more clichés can still be accommodated, a fifth member of Juggernaut must be recruited to replace one who has conveniently died in the interim; cue the audition sequence lifted from “The Full Monty.” Naturally the new kid, Ricky Bling (Sawyer Nunes), saves the day at the reconstituted band’s first gig. At an Orthodox Jewish wedding he delivers a “comical” rap (including the immortal line “make a ruckus with your tuchis”) closely patterned on the one in the “The Wedding Singer.”

Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery but in a musical it cancels the possibility of surprise. Here the obviousness of the characters and the outcome of the plot give the songs almost nothing to do, and here I’m able to say that Mark Allen, who wrote the music and lyrics, is equal to the task. His tunes are so rote they’re textureless, and his lyrics make about as much sense as random phrases sent through several passes of Google Translate.

“I took the safe road / to a life of stocks and bonds,” Mitch sings. “And bonded years / the same day reloaded / and hindsight crystal clear.” So true.

 

Still, the lyrics are not as fuzzy as the book, which Mr. Davenport wrote with an improv comedy collective called The Grundleshotz. There are 12 Grundleshotzes, one of whom, Sarah Saltzberg, also provided “additional material.” (I wish it had been subtractional.) With its slapdash aesthetic, the result has the mouthfeel of mystery stew: old ingredients randomly cooked.

Even that could work, in the manner of a witty, loose-limbed revue like “Spamalot,” but the jokes here are just New Jersey burns and “that’s what she said” groaners. (Mitch’s mother, a piano teacher in yoga pants played winningly by Marilu Henner, calls a “hedge fund” a “shrub fund.”) What’s left is a show that makes fun of the conventions of musical theater while trying desperately to adhere to them.

As such, the characters are barely even archetypes. Tygen (Brandon Williams) is a hair metal narcissist who can’t finish a sentence; his entourage are vamps and half-wits. In general, the women are groupies, dim blondes or foxy single moms raising teenage angst-machines; the men of Juggernaut are heart-of-gold sad sacks. By the time several cast members “break” in a clearly scripted eruption of supposed hilarity, you begin to feel that the show, in its mania to please, has crossed a line from silly to clammy. You want its hands off you.

With such icky material, a clean production like the one the director John Rando delivers can make matters worse. (It looks and moves like a real musical; why doesn’t it feel like one?) The scenic design by Derek McLane and costume design by Emily Rebholz are suitably cartoony, but the lighting, by Ken Billington, goes too far into rock concert fantasy. Likewise, Chris Bailey’s choreography leans heavily on mimed air-guitar licks and high-five exuberance.

The cast, too, sells the show as hard as it can, which is not a pleasant sensation when it’s clear enough that no one is buying. (Well, the town of Sayreville, N.J., where the story is set, is buying; it has signed on as a co-producer.) Still, I admired the band members playing their own instruments, and the quick-sketch confidence of Tamika Lawrence and Ryan Duncan in utterly beside-the-point bits.

But when the digressions are more engaging than the main story, something’s fatally wrong. In “Gettin’ the Band Back Together,” the problems likely started in the improv room, where a necessary atmosphere of supportive encouragement can lead to least-common-denominator results. Nor were those problems resolved during the show’s 2013 tryout in New Jersey.

Maybe, in hindsight crystal clear, the title’s annoying apostrophe should have been a clue to its ambitions. The show aims so low that all it achieves is a ruckus in the tuchis.

[bnm73]

There's nothing quite like reading a really bitchy theater review.....

[bostonman]

I would say there are also a lot of parallels to last season's Bandstand - a show that I finally got to see in its recent moviecast version. (It was the first of the 4 "Band" shows on Broadway in recent seasons - the other musical being the Tony-winning and deserving The Band's Visit, which is very different from the other 2 musicals in content, and of course the play The Boys In The Band.)

 

But - unlike the assessment of Gettin' The Band above, I feel that Bandstand had a surprisingly clever score and smart lyrics, and even if I found the show's final plot twist to be rather non-credible, I really enjoyed the journey the piece took me on. Plus, its essential theme of WWII vets struggling to make something of their lives through music resonates much stronger than this "let's revisit our high school dreams" type theme, IMO. (Anyone remember Glory Days???)

 

Bandstand ultimately did not do well. Some may say that this show could do better because it's lighter than Bandstand, which did have some heavy, dark themes to sell to the audience. I'm not a fan of seeing any show close - not only for all the effort and money it takes to put up a show, but also for the jobs lost once it closes - but I tend to wonder if word-of-mouth from satisfied audiences will be enough to keep this open, as the reviews don't seem positive. (Yet, any number of shows have stayed afloat despite their reviews.)

 

Just, please, no more shows with "band" in the title (or about bands) for a while, ok???

[bnm73]

 

Bandstand ultimately did not do well. Some may say that this show could do better because it's lighter than Bandstand, which did have some heavy, dark themes to sell to the audience. I'm not a fan of seeing any show close - not only for all the effort and money it takes to put up a show, but also for the jobs lost once it closes - but I tend to wonder if word-of-mouth from satisfied audiences will be enough to keep this open, as the reviews don't seem positive. (Yet, any number of shows have stayed afloat despite their reviews.)

 

 

That depends in large part on whether the producers and publicists have done enough to build up a significant "advance sale." If not, then not enough people will see the show early, and that word-of-mouth won't start to circulate fast enough to counterbalance bad reviews.

[bostonman]

This is a very eye-popping article on the show's finances and one hell of a boo-boo...

 

http://observer.com/2018/07/gettin-the-band-back-together-telecharge-error/

[bnm73]

This is a very eye-popping article on the show's finances and one hell of a boo-boo...

 

http://observer.com/2018/07/gettin-the-band-back-together-telecharge-error/

It's capitalized at 12.5 million? I can think of one possible reason, because it does not sound like it's a production that would cost tons of money to get off the ground.

 

With a significant amount in the bank, you can run the show at a loss for a little while in the beginning because you know that you're going to get a critical drubbing. Then you can hope for good word-of-mouth.

 

Or maybe they're being produced by Bialystock and Bloom.

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

I just can't with Marilu Henner. I still have nightmares of her Roxie Hart in Chicago.

 

Jesse Green (NYT) is a capable reviewer and can be fun to read when he's feeling pithy. Ben Brantley, however, is in a league of his own when he doesn't like a production.

 

Frank Rich, in his heyday, was a butcher. A funny, mostly spot-on butcher.

[bnm73]

(Anyone remember Glory Days???)

 

 

The one-night wonder? The first to open and close on the same night in 17 years? The one with lyrics such as "we've got girls by the balls?"

 

I not only remember it, I have an audio recording of its opening/closing night performance.

Edited August 16, 2018 by bnm73

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

Anyone remember Moose Murders?

[bnm73]

Anyone remember Moose Murders?

I happen to have an audio recording of that, as well.

[bostonman]

Anyone remember Moose Murders?

 

Moose Murders is one of those legendary shows that someone must have seen, but I've never known anyone who has admitted they did, lol.

 

Though to clarify, my mention of Glory Days was because of the "going back to high school after high school" theme it shares with Gettin' The Band.

[bnm73]

Though to clarify, my mention of Glory Days was because of the "going back to high school after high school" theme it shares with Gettin' The Band.

 

And not because one was a flop and the other is going to be one?

[bostonman]

And not because one was a flop and the other is going to be one?

 

Perhaps if you actually went back to read my post you'd get the reference, lol.

 

But you're in the ballpark - my point was that I'm not sure if the "ordinary schlubs trying to build on their old high school dreams" theme is all that appealing/original. In this case, compared to the more compelling reason why the band in Bandstand is formed.

[edjames]

And to no one's surprise this announcement...

 

‘Gettin’ the Band Back Together’ to Close Sept. 16

“Gettin’ the Band Back Together,” a new Broadway musical comedy about a group of middle-aged New Jersey men who decide to try reforming their high school band as a response to dissatisfaction with the course of their lives, will close Sept. 16.

 

The show’s lead producer, Ken Davenport, announced Friday night the abrupt end to the show, which opened Aug. 13. At the time of its closing, it will have run 30 previews and 40 regular performances.

 

Mr. Davenport, for whom the show had been a longtime passion project, wrote a blog post in which he called the decision to close “heart-crushing,” but said that “we can’t get the sales traction we need as fast as we need it.”

 

 

The show has been selling quite poorly — during the week that ended Aug. 26, it grossed $181,549, which is just 23 percent of its potential; it sold just 60 percent of the seats at the Belasco Theater, with a very low average ticket price of $39, according to the Broadway League.

 

Many reviews were negative, with Jesse Green, a New York Times critic, calling it “empty-headed entertainment.”

 

Mr. Davenport cited the reviews as one factor in the closing. “I never expected to get rave reviews with this type of show (even though we got good ones out of town), I just didn’t expect so many of them to be so … well … mean,” he wrote.

 

The show, directed by John Rando, features music and lyrics by Mark Allen and a book by Mr. Davenport and The Grundleshotz, with additional material by Sarah Saltzberg. It had an initial production in 2013 at the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, N.J.

 

It was capitalized for $12.5 million, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission; that money will be lost

[+ BenjaminNicholas]

Yikes.

 

Davenport is trying to garner some sympathy with some of those quotes, but frankly, any Broadway producer needs to have a thick skin when investing in this world.

[bnm73]

Flop floppily flop flop flop.

[bostonman]

Like any producer, Davenport has had his hits and misses. While this show is closing, he still has Kinky Boots and Once On This Island. He also produced the critically acclaimed recent revival of Spring Awakening.

 

But the Times article quoted above sounds about right to me - that this was a "passion project" for Mr. Davenport. Now, "passion projects" can be wonderful, but they can also mean that you're so close to the piece that you can't see how to properly make it as exciting for the audience. In other word, "passion project" really means "vanity project." So much so, that I understand he gave a big curtain speech before the show each night. Instant turn-off for me. Get off the stage, Mr. Producer...let the actors handle that part.

 

And gee - a producer who can't handle the slings and arrows of a critic's sometimes truly poison pen? I think the Davenport doth protest too much...