Annie Live! serves up TV musical perfection - The A.V. Club

Photo: Eric Liebowitz/NBC

It’s a funny quirk of theater that Annie Live! was actually the least nervous I’ve ever felt sitting down to watch one of these live musicals. If there’s one group of people I trust to deliver consistency, it’s kids trained in musical theater. So even though this particular production opened with a bizarre Brechtian acknowledgement of the fourth wall by way of what felt like a Gap Kids ad, and then forced young star Celina Smith to go through the stress of a quick change on national television (talk about a “moment before”), nothing could throw this young cast off its game. Less than 10 minutes in, elementary schoolers were already doing butterfly flips across the stage while singing in perfect harmony. It’s hard to think of a better way to say “theater is back, baby!” than a pre-teen belting her face off while walking a live dog around the stage. The audience couldn’t stop themselves from applauding mid-song and neither could I.

In retrospect, I can’t believe we got A Christmas Story Live! and The Grinch Live! before someone thought to stage a production of Annie. Not only is it a beloved musical, it’s also a genuinely good show too. Charles Strouse and Martin Charnin’s score is full of bangers, not just in the show’s best-known numbers, but also in catchy songs like “I Think I’m Gonna Like It Here,” “Easy Street,” and “N.Y.C.” Between the popularity of the original cast album, the 1982 movie with Carol Burnett, the 1999 Wonderful World Of Disney version with Victor Garber and Kathy Bates, and the 2014 movie with Quvenzhané Wallis and Jamie Foxx, it’s a show that’s got buy-in from multiple generations. Plus it’s literally set at Christmas! Leaping lizards, what else could you want?

Best of all, NBC finally listened to the plea I’ve put in basically every review since these live musicals started: They filmed the show in front of a live audience and let the crowd actually laugh at the jokes, rather than just cheer like they were at a rock concert. I don’t know why it took eight full years for someone to think of treating theater like theater, but at least NBC made up for it by bringing in an audience knowledgeable enough to make sure Megan Hilty got her own entrance applause in addition to Tituss Burgess’ ecstatic reception after the duo arrived onstage together as Rooster and Lily St. Regis, respectively. That’s exactly how two Broadway legends should be treated.

Photo: Virginia Sherwood/NBC

Annie Live! threw down the gauntlet early by squeezing in “Maybe,” “It’s The Hard Knock Life,” and “Tomorrow” all before the first commercial break. And the show kept up that momentum for its full three-hour runtime. Even the flaws— Harry Connick Jr.’s horrifyingly fleshy Daddy Warbucks bald cap, a few crew members popping up in shots here and there—just added to the fun of the whole thing. These live musicals should be a touch ridiculous, otherwise what would we tweet about? Annie Live! reminded us that girls can be orphans, billionaires can be good, and Nicole Scherzinger can fan kick while scatting. So while, sure, maybe Smith’s unexpectedly raw, naturalistic take on Annie doesn’t necessarily make sense in the same show where Taraji P. Henson is going full twitchy pantomime villain as Miss Hannigan, it doesn’t really matter when both performances are wonderful in a cast without a weak link.

Annie Live! also hugely benefited from director Lear deBessonet’s simple, pared back staging. While some of these live musicals have gone big with multiple sound stages or concert-style productions, Annie Live! mostly unfolded like an actual stage show. Jason Sherwood’s elegantly simple set put the emphasis on the performers—especially the dancers, who stole the show in the big ensemble numbers. (You can feel how hungry these performers have been to put on a show after the pandemic put a kibosh on live theater for so long, and Sergio Trujillo’s choreography served them incredibly well.) And while Alex Rudzinski’s camera direction wasn’t always the best at complementing deBessonet’s stage pictures, that’s a fairly minor critique. On the plus side, other than a few late microphone moments, Annie Live! was basically the first of these live musicals to finally get the sound mixing right, which is a huge win in my book.

Photo: Virginia Sherwood/NBC

It also helps that Annie just feels like a nice thematic fit for our current moment. There’s something poignant about its lighthearted look at the power of optimism in the face of the Great Depression. (Hope you enjoyed that Herbert Hoover history lesson, kids!) Plus its celebration of found family is lovely too. Though this is definitely a fun-first show, I actually found myself surprisingly moved by Connick Jr.’s mournful reprise of “Maybe” when Daddy Warbucks thinks he’s going to have to say goodbye to little orphan Annie. And by the time Annie and Warbucks expressed their love for one another after she finds out her biological parents died years ago, I was full-on tearing up.

Annie Live! does what these live musicals should have been doing from the start: Pick strong source material, cast it well, and embrace the unique format of live theater, rather than try to turn it into something else. Perfectly paced and anchored by Smith’s star-making breakthrough performance, Annie Live! proved to be a lovely way to spend a Thursday night amidst the busy rush of the holiday season and the general scariness of the world right now. While so many of the previous live musicals have felt like fleeting ephemera I’ll never rewatch again, Annie Live! is one I might actually be tempted to revisit tomorrow.

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Stray observations

• Yes, I did clap for Annie’s big entrance in her iconic red dress, and I hope you did too.
• Nicole Scherzinger walks an unparalleled line between giving an earnestly great musical theater performance and a ridiculous camp musical theater performance, and that is her power.
• Some of the camera work was pretty scattershot tonight, but I did love that Steadicam shot down the steps in “I Think I’m Gonna Like It Here.”
• I also loved the fantastically colorful period styles from costumer designer Emilio Sosa, although I’m a little baffled by the choice to bookend the show with kids in modern dress.
• I truly can’t overemphasis what a difference it made to have a live audience laughing and responding to the show itself! It was especially sweet when the crowd broke into applause for Warbuck’s line, “I’m glad to see Broadway getting back on its feet in spite of the hard times.”
• I’d take a New Deal for Christmas! Or a kind billionaire who wants to adopt me.

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Annie Live! serves up TV musical perfection - The A.V. Club
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Best Albums of 2021 - The New York Times

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1. Best Albums of 2021  The New York Times
2. Best songs of 2021: NPR Music ranks its top 100  NPR
3. Max Heilman's Top 10 Albums Of 2021  Metal Injection.net
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Steven Spielberg hailed for bold 'West Side Story' decision | TheHill - The Hill

Four-time Oscar-winning director Steven Spielberg is receiving praise for his choice to leave out subtitles during conversations in Spanish in his remake of “West Side Story,” according to Variety. 

The film, which is scheduled to hit U.S. theaters on Dec. 10, is a remake of late playwright Stephen Sondheim’s and composer Leonard Bernstein’s 1957 Broadway hit loosely based on Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet.” 

The story takes place in 1950s Upper West Side and follows the rivalry between two gangs, the Sharks, mostly made up of Puerto Ricans, and the Jets, who are mostly New Yorkers of Polish and Irish descent, and a romance between former Jets member Tony and Maria, sister of the Sharks leader.

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Sondhiem’s play and the subsequent smash-hit 1961 movie famously cast predominantly non-Latino actors to play the Sharks and their families.

Spielberg’s forthcoming reboot is already getting positive reviews particularly for the changes he has made to the film like jazzing up its musical numbers and improving the diversity of the cast. In the original film, the characters of Maria and her brother Bernardo were played by two non-Latino actors Natalie Wood and George Chakiris. But in Spielberg’s remake, the parts were given to Colombian-American actor and singer Rachel Zegler and Cuban-Canadian actor David Alvarez, according to Yahoo. The supporting Sharks characters are also portrayed by Latino actors. 

In addition, Spielberg has received praise for forgoing English subtitles under the long stretches of Spanish dialogue between the Puerto Rican characters in order to “lend the movie an extra touch of authenticity,”, the outlet reported. The director as well as screenwriter Tony Kushner have been praised by early viewers for their choice to include more Spanish and Spanglish dialogue than what the characters spoke in the original. 

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'Laverne & Shirley' Star Eddie Mekka, Played Carmine, Dead at 69 - TMZ

Eddie Mekka, who most famously played Carmine, the "Big Ragu," on "Laverne & Shirley" has died ... TMZ has learned.

Eddie's brother, Warren Mekjian, tells TMZ ... Eddie was found dead at his home in Newhall, CA on Saturday. We're told friends and neighbors became concerned when they hadn't heard from him in a few days and called cops to go over and check on him.

Warren tells us Eddie had recently been hospitalized for blood clots and could barely walk ... there's no indication his death was suspicious or that there was any foul play involved.

Eddie played Carmine Ragusa -- Shirley's boyfriend on the show from 1976-1983. Carmine would regularly sing on the show. Eddie also had a role on one of "Laverne & Shirley" producer Garry Marshall's other shows, "Blansky's Beauties" -- and he'd been nominated for a Tony Award for his role in "The Lieutenant" ... prior to his TV career taking off.

Like a lot of 70s and 80s TV stars, Eddie also had guest roles on "Fantasy Island" and "The Love Boat" ... and later he was on the ABC hit, "Family Matters."

Eddie has one daughter, Mia, with Yvonne Marie Grace who he married in 1994.

He was 69.

RIP

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Five stars for Spielberg's 'moving' West Side Story - BBC News

Spielberg's version of the classic musical is "full of energy, passion and tragedy", says Caryn James. It is perfect for now, while also embracing "all that is sublime" in its source.

West Side Story, first staged on Broadway in 1957, is timeless, which isn't anything like being trapped in the past. Eternal works of art can be endlessly transformed, much the way West Side Story itself turned Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, complete with balcony scene, into the story of Tony and Maria, young lovers from opposite sides of an ethnic divide in a crumbling New York City neighbourhood.

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There was a magical, once-in-a-lifetime quality in that initial collaboration: Leonard Bernstein's heart-piercingly beautiful music, Stephen Sondheim's trenchant yet romantic lyrics, Arthur Laurents's book and Jerome Robbins' classically-inspired choreography. And there is a similar alchemy in the glorious new version. Directed by Steven Spielberg at his most masterful, with a smartly-conceived screenplay by Tony Kushner and crisp new choreography by Justin Peck, the film honours the production's roots while giving it a 21st-Century sensibility. Full of energy, wit, passion and tragedy, looking backward and forward at once, it is one of the most moving films of the year.

This new version is still set in 1957, and the artifice of its studio set, with tenement buildings and empty lots, is deliberate, evoking the story's origins on stage. But the film is also purely cinematic in the way the camera tells the story, swooping into the middle of a musical number at a gym, looking down from overhead on dancers filling the streets, gazing in close-up at Tony (Ansel Elgort) and Maria (Rachel Zegler) as they fall in love. The 1961 film version may have won 10 Oscars, but it's hopelessly stage-bound – as 1960s movie musicals often were – and Spielberg's never is.

The opening scene signals another important difference. The camera passes over the rubble of an area recently cleared by the New York Housing Authority – as "slum clearance" according to a sign – in order to make way for the new Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. Both the Puerto Rican and poor white residents of the area are about to be displaced, and Kushner's screenplay leans hard on that real-life disenfranchisement, as well as the ethnic rivalry. 

The film spends a bit too much time setting up this conflict and introducing the Sharks, the Puerto Rican gang led by Maria's brother, Bernardo (David Alvarez), and the Jets, the white gang founded by Tony and his best friend, Riff (Mike Faist). But the dancing and music are kinetic. Peck's choreography throughout keeps the DNA of Robbins's but adds an athleticism that makes it feel fresh. Twirling and leaping down the mean streets of the New York's Upper West Side, the Sharks and Jets are still the most balletic punks ever.

One of Kushner's variations is to give Tony a new history. Here he is on parole, having spent a year in prison for beating another man nearly to death, a stint that has left him determined to reform. It can be hard to buy the change from hothead to sensitive soul, but the shift adds another layer of tragic irony. And in the film's most inspired innovation, the drugstore where Tony works is no longer owned by a man named Doc, but by his widow, Valentina. Sharp-eyed and kind, she is played with a centred calm by none other than Rita Moreno, who won the best supporting actress Oscar as Bernardo's girlfriend, Anita, in the original film. Moreno and Valentina blend together to become the soul and conscience of this new version.

But the essence of West Side Story is still its ill-fated love affair. Tony and Maria finally meet at a dance at a gym. Anita, in a layered, dynamic performance by Ariana DeBose, is the centre of attention, swirling her skirt and dancing to the Latin rhythms that infuse the film. But soon Tony and Maria's eyes lock and they meet under the bleachers in a silent, elegant ballet of their own. Elgort's earnest performance gives Tony endearing sincerity, and Zegler – in her first film role –  is the ideal Maria, a young woman brimming with life and hope. Bernardo, furious that this white boy would even look at his sister, forces them apart, but by then their bond has already taken hold. 

This is where the film truly takes off, soaring into their romance. As Tony walks through the night streets singing Maria, Elgort's voice is clear and light, capturing the exhilaration of Bernstein's music. Hearing the lyrics so soon after Sondheim's death is a reminder of how irreplaceable he was. Who else could possibly have written: "Maria/ Say it loud and there's music playing/ Say it soft and it's almost like praying"?

Tony finds Maria and climbs the fire escape to her window overlooking a courtyard where laundry is strung between buildings. If we don't believe in their improbable love at first sight, of course, nothing else in West Side Story can work. But Zegler and Elgort are completely convincing. Zegler's face is both innocent and full of passion, and her voice strong and lovely as they sing Tonight. Spielberg stages this balcony scene dramatically as they race up and down the fire escape, yet intimate through his use of closeups, capturing the simmering sexual tension of their encounter. The sequence of Maria and Tonight creates the film's most exquisite episode. But we know that a rumble between the Jets and Sharks looms, and that it can't end well. 

Before that rumble, the film fits in an effervescent version of the comic number Gee, Officer Krupke, with the Jets bouncing around a police station while Krupke (Brian d'Arcy James) is out of sight. Nothing of the score is wasted, as Bernstein's melodies drift in and out the soundtrack with graceful ease. In other highlights, DeBose brings a volatile glee to America, a sequence staged as an elaborate dance down the stairs of her tenement out on to the streets. Zegler gets her own vibrant centrepiece in I Feel Pretty. But the most eloquent and moving moment belongs to Moreno. (This shouldn't be a spoiler, but if you are especially sensitive about revelations, skip to the next paragraph.) The song Somewhere, usually sung by the lovers as an expression of hope, is now sung by Valentina, alone in her store after learning that the rumble has led to two deaths, one caused by Tony. Moreno makes the lyric "There's a place for us" a quiet, mournful expression of grief for all the lost hopes that surround her. She and DeBose, who is as good at expressing sadness as she is at fiery energy, dominate the potent last part of the film.

Spielberg is wise enough to know that the original West Side Story was once-in-a-lifetime. He has created his own miracle, a diversely cast, socially-aware film for today that embraces all that is sublime in its incomparable source. It makes perfect sense that the film's premiere took place at Lincoln Center, completing a timeless circle, on and off screen.

★★★★★

West Side Story is released on 10 December

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Here's Why Britney Spears' Fans Think She's Already Married to Sam Asghari - E! Online

Is that the sound of wedding bells?

Just two months after announcing their engagement, Britney Spears and Sam Asghari are spurring speculation that they've secretly tied the knot. As the couple head off on vacation to celebrate Britney's upcoming 40th birthday, the "Toxic" singer's fans are up in a frenzy after Sam referred to his love as his "wife."

In an Instagram post shared on Wednesday, Dec. 1, Sam wrote alongside photos of himself with Britney, "I call you Lioness because I admire your relentless strength, I'm inspired by your beautiful heart, I celebrate your smile that lights up my world."

"Everyday is your birthday my queen," he added. "Happy 1st birthday to my wife."

Needless to say, Sam's caption—which also tagged Britney and included a hashtag of her Dec. 2 birthday—raised eyebrows. "wife???? Omg," one fan wrote in the comments section, while another replied, "wait did y'all get married??"

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