- JANE EYRE (Sony Classical SK 89482)
-
- - The Americans grasp the opportunities of Charlotte
Bronte's everlasting masterpiece in a new Broadway show - with
a score that lives on its nerves … its heroine in need of
a warm glass of milk and an early night
-
- Book and additional lyrics by John Caird, based on the novel
by Charlotte Bronte. Music and lyrics by Paul Gordon.
Original Broadway cast: Marla Schaffel, James Barbour, Don Richard,
Marguerite MacIntyre, Gina Ferrall, Jayne Patterson, Bonnie Gleicher,
Mary Stout, Bruce Dow, Andrea Bowen, Elizabeth DeGrazia, Stephen
Buntrock
-
- Songs: The Orphan; Children of God; Forgiveness; The Graveyard;
Sweet Liberty; Secrets of the House; Perfectly Nice; As Good
As You; Secret Soul; The Finer Things; The Pledge; Sirens; Things
Beyond This Earth; Painting Her Portrait; In The Light of the
Virgin Morning; The Gypsy; The Proposal; Slip of a Girl; Farewell,
Good Angel; My Maker; Rain; The Voice Across the Moors; Poor
Sister; Brave Enough For Love
 Well,
brave old Jane finally got to strut her stuff on Broadway. It
was bound to happen. The best thing that can be said about this
event is that Charlotte Bronte's novel will go on unaffected
when this bedraggled attempt to make a musical of it is packed
up and forgotten.
-
- I snapped the disc up, eager to tear off the wrapping and
get to the heart of it. It looked promising. The cover has a
gloomy Jane against a gloomy backdrop, and one felt confident
that inside was a gloomy new work that caught the general air
of gloom and foreboding and - gloom. Alas, this show seems on
the edge of a nervous breakdown, with every nerve stretched until
the emotions threaten to explode. Most of the characters sound
in need of a nice warm glass of milk and an early night. The
material they are given is portentous, with tum-te-tum lyrics
forcing the composer in to a musical corset. The ill-matched
words clatter along to unmemorable music. It might be bearable
if it were not so boring.
-
- Marla Schaffel's Jane Eyre has a hard edge that in other
circumstances might be praiseworthy, but this Jane sounds much
too mature; much too tough a nut to go through the churning indecision
she seems plagued with. She is involved in endless introspection,
but the writers don't bother with anything as incidental as characterisation,
and it all ends up as so much wind. As this is a show that specialises
in emotional flatulence, that may not be a bad thing. There is
a strikingly handsome Rochester from James Barbour, but when
he gets to sing, he too gets breathless and starts trembling
with unconvincing emotion. So much heart-tugging cancels sympathy.
When they duet, as in 'Deep Within My Secret Soul', you will
want to start searching for that lost knitting that's fallen
down a crack in the sofa.
-
- Among the other characters, there is a good deal of cardboard.
Nothing is unexpected. Some relief may be had from Mary Stout's
supporting performance as Mrs Fairfax, making the most of a weak
comedy number, 'Perfectly Nice'. Stout sounds uncannily like
Celeste Holm in 'The Utter Glory of Morrissey Hall', and there's
nothing to complain of in that. On any other recording, this
performance would hardly merit a second look, but here it almost
stands out.
-
- But there is an audience for this sort of show. That's fine,
so long as I don't have to be part of it. To me it sounds one
hundred per cent bogus, and - damn it all - it's one of those
occasions when writers have spoilt the game by getting a show
done that someone else might have done so much better. A bit
of good taste wouldn't have come amiss. Writers that make their
characters constantly tear themselves to tatters might have done
better to exercise some restraint. If they had done that, this
show might have had some claim to be taken seriously.
RETURN TO CD REVIEWS
|
