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They Changed It, Now It Sucks/Theatre: Difference between revisions

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They Changed It, Now It Sucks/Theatre (view source)

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* The [[Older Than Feudalism|ancient Roman]] playwright Terence adapted six Greek plays. All after the first contain "prologues" in which the playwright rants at the audience about criticisms of the previous adaptation. Apparently, the Romans accused him of "contaminating" the original plays by changing plot elements or tones, and at one point an audience even walked out after it became clear he had combined two similar but separate Greek plays into one adaptation.
* [[Stephen Sondheim]] just ''loves'' to tinker with his musicals even after their initial productions have finished previewing, resulting in different audiences seeing different versions of each show. None of these changes are supported by all the fans, but the most controversial is the addition of "Something Just Broke" to ''Assassins''. Depending on who you listen to, it's either the master stroke that pulls the whole thing together, or a disastrous break in the dramatic arc that should never have been added and should be erased from existence.
** Even more controversial were the changes made to the 2002 revival of ''[[Into Thethe Woods]]''. ''[[Assassins (theatre)|Assassins]]'', at least, has always divided both fans and audiences and has widely been regarded as a problem show; ''Into Thethe Woods'', on the other hand, is one of Sondheim's most successful, popular and beloved works as a composer-lyricist. The decision, then, to reintroduce a totally unnecessary (and not very interesting) sub-plot about the Three Little Pigs, as well as replace several existent and already excellent lyrics with new (and, according to some tastes, inferior) ones, seems baffling.
** Sticking with [[Stephen Sondheim|Sondheim]], John Doyle's actor-musician revival of ''[[Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (theatre)|Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street]]'' has enjoyed huge success and popularity with fans and critics alike, but its minimalism continues to rub some fans the wrong way. Some say that the score suffers in reduction from a full orchestra and ensemble choir to just eight actor-musicians; others found that Doyle's alienating production style prevented them from identifying with the characters.
*** This take was lampooned by the ''Forbidden Broadway'' cast, by the way, as "Teeny Todd."
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{{quote|''[[Lampshaded Trope|"He's good, but he's no]] [[The Producers|Nathan."]]''}}
 
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