Fond farewells: Curtain calls have become an important part of the show
BY MICHAEL SOMMERS, NEWARK STAR-LEDGER STAFF
Thursday, March 08, 2007
NEW YORK -- Not so long ago, after a show ended, performers simply returned onstage to take their bows.
It's not that easy to say goodbye anymore, especially at Broadway musicals. Many curtain calls have evolved into little shows of their own.
Once "Mamma Mia!" concludes, there comes eight minutes more of a "Dancing Queen" reprise featuring the leads sporting new disco duds. Then the entire company segues into a full-out "Waterloo."
The crew at "Monty Python's Spamalot" generates a sing-along to "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life."
The "Tarzan" bunch swings in for bows on synthetic vines. A fast-moving "Jersey Boys" brings on the cast, introduces the band, and whips through an "Oh, What a Night" encore in a speedy three minutes. "The Producers" gang bids ta-ta with a ditty aptly titled "Goodbye!" (See lyrics at right.)
Director Susan Stroman, whose 2000 staging of "The Music Man" bowed out the cast in band uniforms while playing instruments, believes such addenda can be "a natural extension" and that final impressions are crucial.
"The last image an audience takes away is something they really remember," observes Stroman. "So if you can find an idea that somehow sums it all up, that's good. Otherwise, actors should just bow and get off the stage."
Until 1993, when a revival of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" spun off a lengthy "mega-mix" encore of songs, most attractions ended with basic bows. Performers returned in the reverse order of the size of their role or billing, in a sequence briskly staged by the director and/or choreographer.
Curiously, one of the most thrilling curtain calls seen today is the mass movement created for "The Coast of Utopia," a non-musical trilogy. Each of Tom Stoppard's brainy dramas about 19th-century Russian radicals employs the same vast cast, in roles of varying importance.
Associate director Benjamin Klein says the challenge is, "How do you get a 44-member company through their bows in an equitable manner with some elegance and grace?"
Expert at staging Shakespeare and splashy musicals like "Hairspray," director Jack O'Brien devised an epic curtain call for an epic production.
As the lights come up, actors are seen grouped six rows deep at the farthest end of the Beaumont Theater's thrust stage. They walk swiftly across an impressive 54-foot distance toward viewers. Then the first two lines step forward, bow, turn on their heels and return to the back of the group, interweaving through the next two lines, which are already advancing for their bows.
After the key actors reach the front, everybody extends a leg and deeply bows -- in the classic "break-a-leg" attitude -- three more times in unison, toward the center, left, and finally to the right of the auditorium.
"It's the most ornately choreographed curtain call I've ever taken," says Martha Plimpton, who calls the "Utopia" bows an "incredibly cool" experience.
"It's the actors' only opportunity to give our thanks to the audience," she says. "I love to survey the house and look everybody in the eye."
Even more striking is when the cycle is performed on a marathon day. No bows are taken after the first two plays. When the trilogy concludes, the original curtain call template is augmented by another downstage march in three rows. Then the company bends on one knee with heads lowered and a hand over their hearts.
Plimpton notes several colleagues feared the gesture might seem "corny," but the results provoked "a massive emotional experience."
"We could finally break the membrane between actors and audience and express our appreciation for going through this with us for nine hours," says Plimpton. "The roof came off the place. We wept."
"A Chorus Line," also on Broadway, has the most integral curtain call. When the cast finally appears in its gold tuxes, performing "One," audiences applaud. But creator Michael Bennett intended the sequence to comment ironically on how its quirky characters have been uniformly ironed into a chorus line that kicks away forever.
Take a bow
Bows are an ephemeral tradition in western theater some historians date back as far as Roman times. Closing passages in Shakespeare's plays obviously are meant to elicit applause. By the late 18th century, when playhouses assumed their classic form, complete with curtains, actors began formal bows. Philadelphia's Walnut Street Theatre claims British star Edmund Kean introduced the curtain call to America on its stage in the 1820s.
The practice soon became standard. As late as the 1920s, Broadway and West End actors customarily bowed at the conclusion of each act, as well as at the end of the play. Even into the 1960s, an old-school star like Tallulah Bankhead insisted on a call that used a rising curtain to "accidentally" reveal her in a casual pose. (The film "All About Eve" recreates such a moment for Margo Channing.)
When choreographer Rob Ashford put finishing touches on bows for the new musical whodunit "Curtains," he drew from the show-within-the-show's Wild West theme. The dancing sequence features stylized black-and-white rodeo outfits for all. A reprise of the song "Show People," fitted with new lyrics, warns customers not to divulge the mystery's ending.
Ashford forged his concept with the dance arranger and presented it to director Scott Ellis and other creators. With their approval, he rehearsed the bows just prior to technical rehearsals.
"No matter how well-planned you are, teaching it should be the last-minute thing you do," says Ashford.
"It's best to be swimming in the essence of a show when you make them," agrees Stroman. For that reason, Stroman has yet to imagine what the bows for this fall's "Young Frankenstein" might be.
"I'm not that far along yet," she declares.
One more song
Here are the lyrics to the song "Goodbye!," written by Mel Brooks for the curtain call at "The Producers."
Thanks for coming to see our show.
Sad to tell you we got to go.
Grab your hat and head for the door.
In case you didn't notice,
There ain't no more!
If you like our show tell
Ev'ryone but ...
If you think it stinks
Keep your big mouth shut!
We're glad you came but we
have to shout.
Adios, au revoir, wiedersehen,
Ta-ta-ta,
Goodbye ... get lost ... get out!!!
Thursday, March 08, 2007
NEW YORK -- Not so long ago, after a show ended, performers simply returned onstage to take their bows.
It's not that easy to say goodbye anymore, especially at Broadway musicals. Many curtain calls have evolved into little shows of their own.
Once "Mamma Mia!" concludes, there comes eight minutes more of a "Dancing Queen" reprise featuring the leads sporting new disco duds. Then the entire company segues into a full-out "Waterloo."
The crew at "Monty Python's Spamalot" generates a sing-along to "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life."
The "Tarzan" bunch swings in for bows on synthetic vines. A fast-moving "Jersey Boys" brings on the cast, introduces the band, and whips through an "Oh, What a Night" encore in a speedy three minutes. "The Producers" gang bids ta-ta with a ditty aptly titled "Goodbye!" (See lyrics at right.)
Director Susan Stroman, whose 2000 staging of "The Music Man" bowed out the cast in band uniforms while playing instruments, believes such addenda can be "a natural extension" and that final impressions are crucial.
"The last image an audience takes away is something they really remember," observes Stroman. "So if you can find an idea that somehow sums it all up, that's good. Otherwise, actors should just bow and get off the stage."
Until 1993, when a revival of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" spun off a lengthy "mega-mix" encore of songs, most attractions ended with basic bows. Performers returned in the reverse order of the size of their role or billing, in a sequence briskly staged by the director and/or choreographer.
Curiously, one of the most thrilling curtain calls seen today is the mass movement created for "The Coast of Utopia," a non-musical trilogy. Each of Tom Stoppard's brainy dramas about 19th-century Russian radicals employs the same vast cast, in roles of varying importance.
Associate director Benjamin Klein says the challenge is, "How do you get a 44-member company through their bows in an equitable manner with some elegance and grace?"
Expert at staging Shakespeare and splashy musicals like "Hairspray," director Jack O'Brien devised an epic curtain call for an epic production.
As the lights come up, actors are seen grouped six rows deep at the farthest end of the Beaumont Theater's thrust stage. They walk swiftly across an impressive 54-foot distance toward viewers. Then the first two lines step forward, bow, turn on their heels and return to the back of the group, interweaving through the next two lines, which are already advancing for their bows.
After the key actors reach the front, everybody extends a leg and deeply bows -- in the classic "break-a-leg" attitude -- three more times in unison, toward the center, left, and finally to the right of the auditorium.
"It's the most ornately choreographed curtain call I've ever taken," says Martha Plimpton, who calls the "Utopia" bows an "incredibly cool" experience.
"It's the actors' only opportunity to give our thanks to the audience," she says. "I love to survey the house and look everybody in the eye."
Even more striking is when the cycle is performed on a marathon day. No bows are taken after the first two plays. When the trilogy concludes, the original curtain call template is augmented by another downstage march in three rows. Then the company bends on one knee with heads lowered and a hand over their hearts.
Plimpton notes several colleagues feared the gesture might seem "corny," but the results provoked "a massive emotional experience."
"We could finally break the membrane between actors and audience and express our appreciation for going through this with us for nine hours," says Plimpton. "The roof came off the place. We wept."
"A Chorus Line," also on Broadway, has the most integral curtain call. When the cast finally appears in its gold tuxes, performing "One," audiences applaud. But creator Michael Bennett intended the sequence to comment ironically on how its quirky characters have been uniformly ironed into a chorus line that kicks away forever.
Take a bow
Bows are an ephemeral tradition in western theater some historians date back as far as Roman times. Closing passages in Shakespeare's plays obviously are meant to elicit applause. By the late 18th century, when playhouses assumed their classic form, complete with curtains, actors began formal bows. Philadelphia's Walnut Street Theatre claims British star Edmund Kean introduced the curtain call to America on its stage in the 1820s.
The practice soon became standard. As late as the 1920s, Broadway and West End actors customarily bowed at the conclusion of each act, as well as at the end of the play. Even into the 1960s, an old-school star like Tallulah Bankhead insisted on a call that used a rising curtain to "accidentally" reveal her in a casual pose. (The film "All About Eve" recreates such a moment for Margo Channing.)
When choreographer Rob Ashford put finishing touches on bows for the new musical whodunit "Curtains," he drew from the show-within-the-show's Wild West theme. The dancing sequence features stylized black-and-white rodeo outfits for all. A reprise of the song "Show People," fitted with new lyrics, warns customers not to divulge the mystery's ending.
Ashford forged his concept with the dance arranger and presented it to director Scott Ellis and other creators. With their approval, he rehearsed the bows just prior to technical rehearsals.
"No matter how well-planned you are, teaching it should be the last-minute thing you do," says Ashford.
"It's best to be swimming in the essence of a show when you make them," agrees Stroman. For that reason, Stroman has yet to imagine what the bows for this fall's "Young Frankenstein" might be.
"I'm not that far along yet," she declares.
One more song
Here are the lyrics to the song "Goodbye!," written by Mel Brooks for the curtain call at "The Producers."
Thanks for coming to see our show.
Sad to tell you we got to go.
Grab your hat and head for the door.
In case you didn't notice,
There ain't no more!
If you like our show tell
Ev'ryone but ...
If you think it stinks
Keep your big mouth shut!
We're glad you came but we
have to shout.
Adios, au revoir, wiedersehen,
Ta-ta-ta,
Goodbye ... get lost ... get out!!!
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