I love Follies New Broadway Cast Recording
I was lucky enough to have seen the 2011 Broadway revival of FOLLIES three times-- once at its first preview (where the audience response was electric-- every FOLLIES queen had to have been there), again at a later preview (not as electric, but still something), and a week before it closed in January 2012 (where things went awry). At the start of the run, Bernadette Peters as Sally was playing a slightly demented, delusional woman was nuance and pathos. By the end of the run, Ms. Peters was more mannered and self-indulgent than her SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE co-star, Mandy Patinkin (who was curiously restrained during his concert run with Patti LuPone the same year, but I digress...)
Thankfully, the nuanced Peters comes through on this recording. She is in the finest voice on a cast album she's been in since SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE. She plays Sally differently than the girly and warm, yet equally demented take Dorothy Collins had on the part in 1971. This is a Blanche DuBois-esque Sally. It is a shame she went awry by the end of the run.
Her co-stars, though, every time I saw Eric Shaeffer's elegant production, remained outstanding during the entire run, and of course, on this album. Jan Maxwell brings warmth and humility to the ice queen named Phyllis Stone, Ron Raines is a fine Ben, and the cast's standout, Danny Burstein, is a Buddy for the ages, making us sympathize with a once pitiful and unlikeable glad-handler. Elaine Paige also pulls through with a fierce "I'm Still Here", that is less of the anthem of survival Yvonne DeCarlo first sang, but an angry statement of disappointment.
I was glad to hear that this production was to be preserved, especially because of Maxwell and Burstein's performances. But I did not expect to be bowled over completely by a definitive cast album of a masterpiece, despite always admiring the fine PS Classics label and the album producer, Tommy Krasker. This recording is a gem-- capturing not only Stephen Sondheim's masterful score and Jonathan Tunick's splendid orchestration, but in a true shocker, much of the original James Goldman book. You see, Goldman revised FOLLIES heavily until his death in 1998, and his widow has become most protective of latter versions of the book, rather than the surrealistic and superb original version. (It has been reported that Sondheim has always preferred Goldman's original text.) For some odd reason, the Widow Goldman allowed Krasker to not only record much of the dialogue, but much of the original dialogue from 1971. This is quite a treat for any FOLLIES lover.
So not only do we get a beautifully produced recording of a great Sondheim score with its original orchestrations with a fine cast to boot, but we get some original Goldman gems not heard since closing night of the original staging in 1972.
FOLLIES has never been a mainstream hit. Despite a fine set of reviews for this production, and good business early on, business faltered by December, and houses were half empty by January. (The performance I attended for the last time in January had a part icularly tepid audience response.) I suppose it is too much of a "boutique" music al about growing older, the road not taken and disillusion and delusion for the MAMMA MIA! (and in 1971, NO, NO NANNETTE) crowd. But thankfully, after a botched original cast album, it has finally gotten the album it deserves.
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