The reviews are out, and they're wildly mixed. Show has New York Times and The Daily News (Chris Jones) cheering -- against jeering of other heavyweights like: USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, The New York Post and Rex Reid at The Observer
On the fence are The Washington Post and Entertainment Weekly
The movie, of which I am no fan, rates 60% on Rotten Tomatoes.
In recent years, Cirque du Soleil's efforts to conquer the Great White Way were met with spectacular failure. Another show that flew high on circus rigging, and then slowly crash landed, was Spiderman.
The one notable exception is Barnum, a big rousing hit with a fail-safe score from Cy Coleman. Show enjoyed a three year run. Unlike Water, I don't recall circus acts coming even close to stealing the show.
The smash Hugh Jackman movie, The Greatest Showman, would seem to have been a good bet to beat the odds, and as I recall, they tried taking it on the road as a prospective Broadway musical. In fact, the show is still actively in the works at Disney, said to be eyeing a possible Broadway premiere in 2024.
By and large, The Great White Way does not seem to be a good fit. Circus and theater are two very different animals. Billy Rose's Jumbo in the 1930s at the 5,000 seat Hippodrome gave New Yorkers the tale of a circus on the edge of insolvency. The show included real circus acts, and was, best of all, graced with wonderful Rodgers and Hart songs, among them, The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, My Romance, and Little Girl Blue. John Murray Anderson, who would years later direct Ringling Bros. Circus, directed the 233 performance run of Jumbo, a respectable number for the day (Babes in Arms ran for 289 performances). But Rose's exorbitant expenses spelled an early end.
As for today, my best guess is this: When the average tourist or family goes to New York, they are not going there to see circus. And if there is one redeeming attribute in Water, from fast scanning the reviews, it appears to be, ironically, the acrobats!
But you never know. Wicked got scathing reviews and is still running. Hair was panned by all the critics but Hair had a gimmick: Nudity. What has Water?
Broadway does not feel like a destination for circus going.
I'll take Big Apple Circus at Cunningham Park in Queens, any day.
P.S. Including reviews from unfamiliar sources that I did not include, there were a total of 19. And none of them took a look at the new Ringing?
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