Thursday, April 16, 2009

Cats

Last night I saw the musical Cats at the Paramount.

WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!

Folks, I go to musicals for great music, and usually an entertaining show to go along with it. This show had neither.

The musical originally opened in London in 1981. The music was probably bleeding-edge at the time: almost entirely synthesized. What a waste!

Of course, the plot line... oh, wait, there isn't one. The entire script (with a couple of exceptions) are taken from some poems by T.S. Eliot. Somehow this became a legendary musical still making national and international tours after nearly 30 years. You've got to be kidding me.

To cap it off, it contained the staple of classic musicals, the one thing I abhor more than anything else in musical theatre, the utterly painful presentation -- the 10-minute dance number.

The rest is a waste of space, here's my ratings:

Music: 2 stars - replace the synthesizer with real music and you might make 3.
Technical: 2 stars - entertaining set with lots to look at, but nothing more.
Cast: 3 stars - adept and generally impressive, too bad they were in THIS musical.
Script: 1 star - spare me
Overall: 2 stars - I do not need to see this again.