Frontman Bono has “washed his hands of the show,” sources say. (joan marcus)
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Look out, Spidey, you’ve got a new villain to contend with: theater critics.
After months of bad press, delayed openings and more injuries than a “Jackass” movie, critics across the city and America finally published their opinions of the $65 million “rock-circus drama” yesterday, and the results have left the webslinger down for the count.
“Underbaked,” “dull” and “inconsistent,” critics cried. And those were some of the kinder notices. “Beyond repair,” “insipid mess” and “monumental anticlimax” were some of the harsher reviews.
Shows get panned all the time, of course, but the difference here is that “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” isn’t officially open yet. Critics broke long-standing protocol, which is not to review a show still in previews.
MICHAEL RIEDEL: ‘DARK’ SURE TO BE TURNED OFF
ELISABETH VINCENTELLI: CAN ‘SPIDEY’ FLY?
The musical supposedly opens March 15, but after multiple postponements, critics reviewed it based on the previously announced date, Feb. 7, infuriating producers. “This pile-on by the critics is a huge disappointment,” says “Spidey” spokesman Rick Miramontez. “Changes are still being made, and any review that runs before the show is frozen is totally invalid.”
In a Jan. 31 letter, Miramontez implored critics, “We understand that you are not accustomed to having to wait this long to weigh in . . . but this show is a unique animal, and simply does not fit the traditional Broadway model.”
Critics charge that producers knew “Spider-Man” would be DOA, so they kept rescheduling the opening to spread out the negative reviews and avoid something like yesterday’s tsunami. Meanwhile, the show continues to sell full-price tickets (from $69.50 to $277) to theatergoers who remain, er, in the dark.
Not true, says Miramontez. Keeping the show in previews is a “severe financial disadvantage.”
“Extending previews while continuing to work on the show — rehearsing during the day — makes the running costs escalate,” he says. “After opening, the cast and crew are in the theater for way fewer hours, and that greatly cuts down the weekly operating costs.”
Will the bad notices doom “Spider-Man” or make audiences even more curious? Says Miramontez: “Business remains brisk.”
Critics turn on the snark
LIKE Spider-Man himself, critics didn’t pull any punches. Here are a few sentiments you won’t find posted on the Foxwoods Theatre marquee:
* New York Times: “After 15 or 20 minutes, the central question you keep asking yourself is likely to change from ‘How can $65 million look so cheap?’ to ‘How long before I’m out of here?’ ”
* Bloomberg: “It imitates poorly what the ‘Spider-Man’ movies do brilliantly with computer graphics — and without putting live actors in jeopardy.”
* Washington Post: “If you’re going to spend $65 million and not end up with the best musical of all time, I suppose there’s a perverse distinction in being one of the worst . . . I haven’t seen every stinker ever produced, so I can’t categorically confirm that [‘Spider-Man’] belongs in the dankest subbasement of the American musical theater. But its application certainly seems to be in order.”
* Los Angeles Times: “Perhaps this is why the show’s long-term prospects seem to me nearly as grim as the fate of Bette Davis’ character in . . . ‘Dark Victory.’ Not since that 1939 weeper have the words ‘prognosis negative’ seemed so apt.”
* New York Post: “A snowballing budget, broken bones, a concussion, multiple delays, rewrites . . . and what do we get? An inconsistent, maddening show that’s equal parts exciting and atrocious.”