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Lost in "Wonderland" reviews
Published: 4/18/2011 1:07 PM
Last Modified: 4/18/2011 1:07 PM




Well, the reviews are in:
"Overproduced, overblown, confusingly dark and laboriously ambitious jumble."

"The musical's cumbersome plot…is a windy exercise in literary subversion. It turns over the magical tapestry … and reveals the messy knots of yarn on the backside…and questioning the comfortingly simple definitions of good and evil retailed by children's book writers."

“Does not, alas, speak hopefully for the future of the Broadway musical.”

“Not one of (the show’s songs) is memorable.”

"It's such a wicked waste of talent."

Actually, these aren’t excerpts from the reviews of “Wonderland,” the new musical that opened Sunday at the Marquis Theater on Broadway – although they could be.
“Wonderland,” which turns the story of “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” into a modern-day fantasy about a put-upon wife and mother who discovers a magical realm below the streets of New York City, was pretty well smacked with all sorts of negativity from critics, whose reviews started appearing about two hours after the show’s official opening night performance ended.
But the reviews quoted at the start of this entry are, in fact, opening night reactions to a show that debuted in 2003 – another show that took a well-known children’s story and turned it inside out: “Wicked.”
“Wicked” was panned by – in order – Newsday, Variety, the New York Times, The New Yorker and the New York Post when it first appeared. Yet the show continues to play to sold-out houses on Broadway, and its touring productions tend to sell-out whatever house they happen to visit – as was the case the two times when Celebrity Attractions brought the show to the Tulsa PAC.
We have an interest in the fortunes of “Wonderland” because Celebrity Attractions’ president Larry Payton and his wife Kay are among the dozen individuals, couples and organizations who are producers of this musical.
In a conversation prior to opening night, Payton said he was braced for bad reviews, in large part because the show’s composer, Frank Wildhorn, has long been a target of New York critics’ barbs.
As for what critics have been saying about “Wonderland,” most have had complimentary things to say about the cast, include Janet Dacal in the role of Alice and Carly Rose Sonenclar, who plays Alice’s daughter Chloe (and will be familiar to Tulsa audiences from her performances in the Broadway touring production of “Little House on the Prairie” that played here in November 2009).
But most draw unfavorable comparisons to the 1978 film “The Wiz,” which gave yet a different twist to L. Frank Baum’s Oz tales, and which itself was roundly panned.

Charles Isherwood, New York Times: “Instead of transporting us back to an anarchic childhood world where right and wrong are just words like any others, to be tossed about at merry whim, the show drearily suggests that even grown-ups have to keep doing their homework, working doggedly toward self-improvement day after endless day.”

David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter: “It would be gratifying to report that [composer Frank Wildhorn's] latest musical, ‘Wonderland,’ deserves a warmer welcome, but this clumsy Lewis Carroll update shuffles bland '80s pop imitations and third-rate show tunes to minimal effect. The actors all work hard and sing well, but they don't stand a chance amid this witless chaos.”

Steven Suskin, Variety: “There is a distinct lack of wonder in ‘Wonderland,’ the new Frank Wildhorn musical at the Marquis. Unless one was to wonder how a big, Broadway musical based on Lewis Carroll's wildly inventive and delectably fantastical characters can be so utterly devoid of the aforementioned elements. Or to wonder why – after a full-scale 2009 presentation in Tampa Bay and Houston – the producers saw fit to remount this less-than-scintillating, $15 million tuner on Broadway.”

Mark Kennedy, AP Drama Critic: “Part of the problem is the story's mishmash of directions, as if it was made by committee. Is it for children? Then why are there so many references to heads being cut off and enslavement and executions? If it's for adults, then what's with the often insipid dialogue? For both? Then neither walk away satisfied,
despite the references to bootylicious and ‘South Pacific.’ ‘Wonderland’ doesn't know whether it wants to be a fairy tale or a rock opera or a trippy joke or a cartoon.”

Then there is the lone, cautiously optimistic notice:

Philip Boruff, Bloomberg: “‘Wonderland’ (is) a hummable, cheerful Broadway fairy tale best suited to kids and their parents….The cast is appealing, the costumes and choreography are inventive and the score, by Frank Wildhorn and Jack Murphy, is easy on the ears. Adult entertainment it isn’t, notwithstanding a reference to the mad Tea Party and musical snippets of ‘Gypsy’ and other shows.”

Of course, by 10:30 a.m. Monday, the show’s public relations people had found some fascinating ways to transform all these lemons into something resembling lemonade.
It released a three page “pull sheet,” with excerpts from 10 print and online reviews, including the New York Times, New York Magazine, New York Daily News, Bloomberg and TheatreMania, that couch “Wonderland” in the most glowing of terms:

“INSPIRATIONAL”
“FANCIFUL”
“GROOVY”
“GLITTERY”
“FLASHES OF FRESH HUMOR”
“CLEVER”

And that's just the buzzwords culled from the New York Times review.

It’s going to be interesting to see if “Wonderland” is able to make itself appear “Wicked”-good to audiences, or if the critics will send this show back down the rabbit hole.





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ARTS

James D. Watts Jr. has lived in Oklahoma for most his life, even though he still has people saying to him, "Don't sound like you're from around these parts." A University of Oklahoma Phi Beta Kappa graduate, Watts has received the Governor Arts Award, Harwelden Award and the National Conference of Christians and Jews Beth Macklin Award for his writing. Before coming to the Tulsa World, Watts worked for the Tulsa Tribune.

Contact him at (918) 581-8478.

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