Britney Spears Musical – Deadline

Matthew Murphy

bad cinderella It may have been the poisoned apple that destroyed revisionist fairy tales once and for all, but Britney Spears and Once Upon A One More Time, the opening of tonight’s new Broadway musical full of hits and high spirits, has come to deliver as much happiness as it enchants. Smart, funny, good looking and with a danceable beat, this tribute to the Brothers Grimm, the 2nd Wave sisters and above all the indomitable Ms. Spears is a delight.

Director-choreographers Keone and Mari Madrid collaborated with bookwriter John Hartmere to come up with Technicolor treats. Clever enough to play silly at times, dizzying enough to make a few points along the way, and execute it admirably, apparently from the fictional magical land of Broadway, beauties, princesses, charming A collection of people, mermaids, seems to have arrived fully formed. If you look closely, you can see that some of them are familiar, such as Justin Guarini. american idol It made a name for itself here, and numerous stage productions made the leap to Broadway stardom.

Let’s talk about Britney first. She’s not featured or mentioned here (although production notes state the song is “fully authorized and licensed by her successor, Britney”), but her spirit Not to mention persistence is important as a music catalog for many people. Perhaps the audience will get a gift they didn’t know they wanted. Conceived by talented Brooklyn-based artist Daniel Wurtzel, the dazzling “air sculpture” glitter bombs and fireflies are interspersed throughout the piece. Once Upon A One More Time Like a floating wine glass or a shape-shifting birdie in the forest, it’s dotted with lovely moments that arrive and then quickly disappear.

To tell the truth, this premise is nothing Broadway audiences have seen. A group of fairy tale heavyweights – Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, Princess with Pea, Little Mermaid, Evil Stepmother and her two selfish daughters, Fairy Godmother and, of course, Perfection. Any number of too many princes is enough to appear in any of the five Into episodes. woodAnd you get the spirit that the sisters are doing it for themselves. Six, it came through Evil.

But wish come true Once Upon A One More Time It’s about lifting it up without apologizing and blushing a little. Hartmere and Madley took the best of those shows and sprinkled their own personalities throughout those shows. Yes we’ve seen these characters – not the original characters revisionist Characters – There used to be a more sensible, modern interpretation of Grimm’s version, more feminist, more amorous, and more open to LGBTQ+ sympathies than any Golden Age Disney character.what six do it for tudor england Once Upon A One More Time This is the case with long, interrupted fairy tales.

But as any wise but very bad wizard might say, no, he’s not here – there’s one thing these shows are missing: Betty Friedan. Hartmia’s biggest inspiration is magical introductions. female mystery, with a 60s feminist bible added to the mix. The good girls from Fairyland, including Snow and Shin, Rapp and Pea, meet weekly at the ‘Scroll Club’. This is the predecessor of Oprah’s Book Club long before I’ve actually seen a book. They are deliberately left uneducated and uninformed by an all-knowing, oppressive and grossly sexist narrator. Lehman BrothersAdam Godley).

Remain curious and complacent – that’s also true of the vain and dumb prince – they’re content enough to relive their own stories that are well remembered and well replayed, with only the slightest change or change. I am always nervous and alert to failure. You could be banished to the terrifying land of ‘the end of the story’, and even for a lovely little girl, things kick in every day when she starts reading her favorite story.

Cinderella (a brilliant Briga Heeran in her Broadway debut) slowly begins to doubt that these age-old tales might not only be very wholesome for today’s little girls, and for themselves. She begins to feel vaguely unsatisfied. This is the kind of emptiness that many American women felt in the 1950s. And just as she began to question herself, she really did go shoeless every night when the clock struck twelve, chased by a heartless stranger who was himself his greatest lover. Do you want to live while limping to the – She was visited by the legendary OFG – the Original Fairy Godmother – who had long been banished. Excited to have a non-fabric wish granted, yes, he offered Shin her book. It’s not just a book, it’s a Friedan feminist classic.

Eventually, Shin’s intellectual curiosity and frustration spread to the other women of Fairyland, and through a brazen act of breaking the rules, the heroines discover that Prince Charming, Prince Faithful, and Prince are in fact the same person. When I did, the change was sealed. (“Oops!…I did it again,” Guarini sings as he raises the jig).

It would be unfair to spoil the plot any further, even if most of the twists and turns can be expected to occur, or at least the overall storyline can be predicted. Of course, happiness will continue after that, and it will match his 21st century sensibilities. But it even reveals something more, including who sings which Spears song – among them are “Toxic,” “Baby One More Time,” “Lucky,” and “I Wanna.” Go,” “Crazy,” and “If I’m Dancing.” “Passengers” and “Work Bitch” would ruin a lot of the little fun in musicals. OK, stepmothers become “toxic” and “work bitches,” but you probably already figured it out.

The adventure features Anna Freischl’s minimalistic set, Kenneth Posner’s pulsating lights, Sven Ortell’s picture book video projection, classic fairy-tale style (and Disney like Snow’s blue-and-yellow dress). iconography), beautifully augmented and expanded by Lauren Elstein’s witty costume and hair design. White) has the flash of post-Spice Girl and the sound anyone wants in an Andrew Keister-designed dance club. Madrid’s crisp choreography updates the stylized movements of classic Spears videos and boy his band routines with athletic vigor and unexpected grace.

These creative elements are compelling, but without a cast as good as this, the project would be doomed. Heeran’s “Cinderella,” to name just a few, is a down-to-earth center, with Aisha Jackson playing her best friend Snow White brilliantly, Guarini perfectly princely, and Godley maxing out his somewhat ambiguous narrator. Leveraging it, Jennifer Simard steals scene after scene as a tasty villain. stepmother.

Simard, who recently committed a similar welcome theft companyis a great singer with perfect comical timing, and as the original Fairy Godmother, comedienne Brooke Dillman challenged in the laughter department, giving a stunning and extensive comical performance as the original Fairy Godmother. , a turn that pays homage to the spirit of the classic supporting (but very valuable) funny woman. Mary Wicks and Jane Withers are as much groundbreaking feminist icons as freely quoted here. Near the end, it’s her OFG that delivers one of the show’s nicest little surprises, the rendition of a rendition that has already won our hearts.

title: Once Upon A One More Time
venue: Marquis Theater on Broadway
Director & Choreographer: Kione & Mari Madrid
Book: John Hartmere
music: britney spears hits
Main cast: Briga Heeran, Justin Guarini, Aisha Jackson, Jennifer Simard, Adam Godley, Brooke Dillman, Amy Hilner Larsen, Tess Soltau, Gabriel Beckford, Ashley Chiu, Nathan Levy, Ryan Steele , Morgan Whitley, Lauren Zachrin, Mira Weir
Execution time: 2 hours 30 minutes (including breaks)