I was bored & watched the 2012 off-Broadway Production of Carrie the musical (AKA Broadway's biggest flop in 1988 even though Linzi Hateley won an award for it) & I decided to review it.
Carrie The Musical
Rating:***
Cast: Molly Ranson, Marin Mazzie, Christy Altomare, Derek Klena, Jeanna de Waal, Ben Thompson, Carmen Cusack
This adaptation of Stephen King's classic novel & one of the most famous horror films of 70's is rather mediocre compared to other shows, but is much better than the 1988 production. Molly Ranson plays Carrie White, a social outcast who experiences her first period which causes a stir with the other girls since her mother never told her, causing her to believe she's dying. Her fundamental religious mother constantly abuses her & believes she's sinned with 'the curse of blood' & forbids her to be a normal teenager.
Sue Snell, a girl from a popular clique which is led by the bullying & manipulative Chris Hargenson, begins to feel bad for taking part in the shower incident & decides her boyfriend, jock Tommy Ross, should take Carrie to the upcoming prom to show her a good time. While this is going on, Chris still hates Carrie & decides to humiliate her even further with the help of her boyfriend, Billy Nolan.
Carrie's gym teacher Miss Gardner, who acts as a confidante towards Carrie, convinces her to accept Tommy's prom invitation, while she's discovering she has telekinesis, which is triggered whenever she's upset or angry & decides to use it so she can confront her mother about going to prom, which she forbids. At prom, Carrie is gradually accepted by her peers & Chris forces her friend to rig the Prom King & Queen votes so Tommy & Carrie win, in order to act out her revenge for being banned from prom. The climax of the events show Chris & Billy dumping Carrie with pig's blood while she's on-stage, causing her to think everyone's laughing at her, flaring up her telekinesis & killing everybody inside as revenge. Causing more destruction on her way home, the ending, in my opinion, was weak & very predictable.
Like I said, this is much better than the 1988 version, but it's still average. The lyrics are horrible & the rhyming is odd & Carrie sings a solo all about her name & why nobody gets it right for some reason. My name is said wrong all the time because of the spelling & it bugs me, but I wouldn't randomly sing about it. The set design was actually quite cool, using projections for the bucket of pig's blood & the fire in the destruction scene. The costumes were OK, with the prom dress that Carrie wears looking like the one in the 1976 film.
Molly Ranson & Marin Mazzie were good in character, especially Marin as Margaret, being obsessed with religion & abusing her daughter, yet caring for her at the end. The other characters are bland & lifeless, with no individuality whatsoever.
Facts about Carrie
-Betty Buckley played Margaret in the 1988 Broadway production & previously played the gym teacher in the 1976 film.
-Carrie is based on 2 girls who Stephen King knew at school who were Christians & social outcasts & both died while in their 20's.
-In the 1988 production, pig's blood had to be poured on Carrie by Chris on-stage instead of on a cord above the stage as the body mic on Linzi would've clogged up & her song the Destruction started immediately afterwards so they couldn't wipe it off on time.
-The 1988 production started in Stratford upon Avon before transferring to London & eventually Broadway, which lasted for 5 performances & was Broadway's biggest flop. The next time this would happen was with Matilda the Musical over 20 years later, which would win the most number of Olivier awards for a show of all time.
-The gym teacher has had a load of name changes: in the novel, she's called Rita Desjardin, in the 1976 film she's called Miss Collins, in the musical she's called Miss Gardner & in the 2002 TV film, she's called Miss Desjarden. The 2013 remake will use the name from the original novel.
- Sissy Spacek was originally chosen to play Chris, but her husband convinced her to try out the lead role. She persuaded Brian DePalma by not washing her face, putting Vaseline in her hair & wearing a sailor dress her mum made her wear in year 7. She ended up being nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress.
- A sequel in 1999 called The Rage: Carrie 2 featured Amy Irving reprising her role as Sue & Emily Bergl as Rachel Lang, Carrie's half-sister who has the same telekinetic powers as Carrie. While the title references Carrie, she only appears in archive footage from the 1976 film which Sissy Spacek allowed them to use.
