• REVIEW: To Kill A Mockingbird – Broadway Across America Cincinnati
  • BROADWAY REVIEW: “Take Me Out”
  • Doubly Great – I Shall Not Be Moved & Your Negro Tour Guide
  • REVIEW: Clybourne Park
  • REVIEW: Fortune
  • REVIEW: Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind
  • REVIEW: Lady Windermere’s Fan
  • FRINGE REVIEW: seXmas Cards
  • REVIEW: The Wolves
  • FRINGE REVIEW – ZOINKS! – NOT TO BE MISSED
  • REVIEW: Association of Controlled Dreamers
  • REVIEW: Skeleton Crew
  • Full Circle: A Story of Mentorship and Collaboration
  • REVIEW: The Thanksgiving Play
  • CCM’s Transmigration an Energetic Festival of New Works!
  • REVIEW: A Doll’s House, Part 2
  • REVIEW: Our Country’s Good
  • REVIEW: Ripcord
  • REVIEW: St. Nicholas
  • REVIEW: Eurydice
  • REVIEW: Mr. Burns – a post electric play
  • REVIEW: Misery
  • THE DROWNING GIRLS playing through Monday in Northside!
  • REVIEW: Jalz
  • REVIEW: The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)
  • FRINGE REVIEW: One More Bad Thing
  • FRINGE REVIEW: The Mountains Did Quake, The Hillsides Did Tremble
  • FRINGE REVIEW: of Monster Descent
  • REVIEW: Noises Off
  • Monday Matinee 5.7.18 – This Week in Cincinnati Theatre
  • REVIEW: A Great Wilderness
  • REVIEW: Ken Ludwig’s Treasure Island
  • Monday Matinee 4.23.18 – This Week in Cincinnati Theatre
  • REVIEW: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
  • REVIEW: Sooner/Later
  • REVIEW: Red Velvet
  • REVIEW: Transmigration 2018
  • REVIEW: Buried Child
  • REVIEW: The Pillowman
  • REVIEW: The Humans
  • REVIEW: Poor Behavior
  • REVIEW: The Color of the Leaves
  • REVIEW: The House
  • REVIEW: The Earth is Flat
  • REVIEW: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
  • REVIEW: Dracula
  • REVIEW: This Random World
  • REVIEW: Frankenstein
  • REVIEW: Hamlet
  • REVIEW: Typhoid Mary
  • REVIEW: Guest Artist
  • REVIEW – Cannibal Galaxy: A Love Story
  • REVIEW: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
  • THEATER OF WAR Opens a Dialogue about the Impact of Battle on Soldiers and Their Families
  • REVIEW: This Is Our Youth
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Invisible Girl
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Home
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Gen & Mabel
  • FRINGE REVIEW: God of Obsidian
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Balls of Yarns
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Busted Bumpers and Other Metaphors
  • FRINGE REFLECTION: Is That All There Is?
  • FRINGE REVIEW: The Disappearance of Nicole Jacobs, Part 1 – The Sister
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Pet Fish Are Made For . . .
  • I’m Feeling Fringe-y
  • REVIEW: Erma Bombeck – At Wit’s End
  • REVIEW: Master Harold and the Boys
  • REVIEW: On Golden Pond
  • REVIEW: Bloomsday
  • REVIEW: A Raisin in the Sun
  • REVIEW: All the Roads Home
  • REVIEW: Rabbit Hole
  • REVIEW: Jane Eyre
  • REVIEW: When We Were Young and Unafraid
  • REVIEW: This Wide Night
  • REVIEW: Her Naked Skin
  • REVIEW: Summerland
  • REVIEW: 26 Pebbles
  • REVIEW: Dragon Play
  • REVIEW: A Christmas Carol
  • REVIEW: The Second City’s Holidazed and Confused Revue
  • REVIEW: The Diviners
  • REVIEW: Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
  • REVIEW: Jitney
  • REVIEW: The Elephant Man
  • REVIEW: Brownsville Song (B Side for Tray)
  • REVIEW: Romeo and Juliet
  • REVIEW: Disgraced
  • REVIEW: The Road Through Damascus
  • REVIEW: The Diary of Anne Frank
  • REVIEW: A Prayer for Owen Meany
  • REVIEW: The Legend of Georgia McBride
  • REVIEW: Slut Shaming
  • REVIEW: Thom Pain
  • REVIEW: Horizons of Gold
  • It’s Opening Night . . .
  • Cincinnati LAB Theatre’s 2016 Festival of New Works Coming in August
  • REVIEW: The Fisherman’s Wife
  • REVIEW: The Star Spangled Girl
  • FRINGE REVIEW: The 4th Graders Present an Unnamed Love-Suicide
  • FRINGE REVIEW: My Left Teeth
  • FRINGE REVIEW: The Gospel of Fat Kathy
  • FRINGE REVIEW: FURLESQUE
  • FRINGE REVIEW: We Did It, Girl!
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Cessna
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Naked Strangers
  • FRINGE REVIEW: The Midnight Express
  • WRECKED: A Play Reading That Did Me In
  • REVIEW: Bad Dates
  • REVIEW: Satchel Paige and the Kansas City Swing
  • REVIEW: The Shape of Things
  • REVIEW: Mothers and Sons
  • REVIEW: Annapurna
  • Still Time to See EQUUS
  • Transmigration 2016: Another Successful Festival
  • REVIEW: To Kill a Mockingbird
  • Local Director to Stage EQUUS at Miami-Hamilton
  • REVIEW: Emma
  • REVIEW: Begotten
  • REVIEW: Miss Julie
  • REVIEW: Betrayal
  • REVIEW: Ah, Wilderness!
  • REVIEW: The Revolutionists
  • REVIEW: The Glass Menagerie
  • REVIEW: Prelude to a Kiss
  • REVIEW: Native Gardens
  • REVIEW: Grounded
  • REVIEW: The Realistic Joneses
  • REVIEW: Mockingbird
  • REVIEW: This Is Our Youth
  • REVIEW: A Christmas Carol
  • REVIEW: The Aliens
  • CCM Drama Hosts Play Reading Series
  • REVIEW: Relatively Speaking
  • REVIEW: Steel Magnolias
  • REVIEW: The Mystery Plays
  • REVIEW: Mad River Rising
  • REVIEW: The Norwegians
  • REVIEW: Buyer and Cellar
  • REVIEW: Sex With Strangers
  • Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune
  • REVIEW: Luna Gale
  • Monthly Matinee: September 2015
  • Cincinnati LAB Theatre Promotes Collaboration and New Works
  • REVIEW: Lysistrata
  • REVIEW: ONE MAN, TWO GUVNORS
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Love and Information
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Fixate
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Occupational Pleasures
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Shirtzencockle
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Shelter
  • FRINGE REVIEW: Mouthy Bitch
  • REVIEW: Circle Mirror Transformation
  • REVIEW: Three Days of Rain
  • REVIEW: Outside Mullingar
  • Five Reasons to See VANYA, SONIA, MASHA, & SPIKE
  • REVIEW: You’re Welcome: A Cycle of Bad Plays
  • REVIEW: Taking Shakespeare
  • REVIEW: Xavier’s Spring Awakening
  • REVIEW: Death and the Maiden
  • REVIEW: Race
  • Know Theatre’s SERIALS Adds More Intrigue to the Concept
  • BIRD BRAIN is a Charming Must-See
  • Five Thoughts About THE TAMING OF THE SHREW
  • HEARTS LIKE FISTS Now Playing at Know Theatre
  • REVIEW: Buzzer
  • REVIEW: Detroit ’67
  • REVIEW: Peter and the Star Catcher
  • Transmigration 2015 – Adventurous Theatre
  • REVIEW: Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike
  • Five Things I Learned From CSC’s “Hamlet”
  • Still Seats Left for Tonight’s Opening of “Every Christmas Story Ever Told (and Then Some)
  • A Klingon Christmas Carol – Special Pricing Tonight!
  • One More Chance to See “The Crucible” on Sunday
  • Looking Forward . . .
  • Klingons love theatre, and so do you!
  • Local Schools Producing Classic Theater This Fall
  • See “Light Sensitive” This Weekend
  • Good Will Hunting
The Sappy Critic

REVIEW: Newsies

Comments Off on REVIEW: Newsies

4-205309

I think I expected too much.  Disney’s NEWSIES, one of the more popular touring Broadway shows, opened at the Aronoff on Tuesday night.  The story of this group of young poor paperboys who fight the power and go on strike is remarkable – when you learn that its true.  But as a fictionalized plot, it falls flat.

But thank goodness for the dancing, right?  It’s fun but again, I was disappointed.  Too much of it was out of sync, much of it dumbed down from the videos I’ve seen of the Broadway production, and the energy level seemed low.  Actually, it reminded me of the last Disney show at the Aronoff as THE LION KING seemed to suffer from the same sort of road-fatigue.

It’s 1899 and Joey Barreriero is “Jack Kelly,” the leader of this rag tag group of newspaper sellers or “Newsies.”  Steve Blanchard is “Joseph Pulitzer,” the media mogul who decides to raise prices not accounting for what it will do to the economy or the people in the publishing ecosystem.  We also meet a reporter, “Katherine” (played by Morgan Keene, Kelly’s best friend, “Crutchie” (Zachary Sayle), and a brand new newsie named “Davy” (Stephen Michael Langton).

All do a fine job in their respective parts; perhaps my expectation of being blown away was out of line.  Maybe the hype was too high.  Or maybe the show just isn’t as good as it could be.

The set is very interesting and the projections interface seamlessly with the moving physical apparatus.  The music by Alan Menken is catchy enough and the staging is pleasant to look at.  However, the sound was muffled (or sometimes not even turned on at all!) and continues to be too frequent a problem in this space.

Regardless, NEWSIES will play well to Cincinnati audiences based on name recognition alone. And its certainly a family friendly favorite.  I just think history deserves a better retelling.

Please go see for yourself now through March 13th.  Support the arts!

If I were in town, I’d be checking out this Newsboys Variety Show playing on March 7th . . . but I’ll instead I’ll be immersed in Disney magic in Orlando this weekend.

NEWSIES plays at the Aronoff Center for the Arts through March 13th in Downton Cincinnati.  More information can be found here.

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)

Related