Trust me, I know I have a lot of them--they frequent quite a number of blog posts, and I do apologize--but this one is kind of serious. Very serious in fact and beyond an obsession. It's been engrained in my head and very demeanor over the last month or so. At night, I dream about it--which isn't necessarily a good thing because the subject matter doesn't exactly warrant wonderful dreams and I kind of wake up depressed. During the day, I troll websites and YouTube for clips. I listen to the music constantly--whether on my IPod or directly from YouTube on my IPhone--and even when I'm not, the words and melodies are spiraling through my brain without prompt. I find myself relating all daily circumstances to it--thinking, "I wonder what so and so would think about me eating this granola bar right now."
It's actually prettty sick and I may need an intervention. My day doesn't feel complete without it. Like....I feel lost. Or that I lost a great friend and will never see them again.
That obession would be Les Miserables.
Victor Hugo's 1862 masterpiece--translated to "The Miserable" "The Poor Ones" or "The Wretched"-- which follows the lives of several characters from 1815 to the June Rebellion in Paris in 1832. In particular, the life of ex-convict Jean Valjean and his search to be defined by his actions and not the past that always seems to haunt him. In 1985, the book was adapted into a musical of the same name, and single-handedly introduced millions to the masterpiece and changed Broadway forever. It's the winner of countless accalades, awards, and launched the careers of many of Broadway's finest singers and actors.
And for those of you who have been living under a rock, it is now a major motion picture.
I'll admit, I wasn't too interested in the show before I heard about the movie. I love Broadway as much as the next girl and this show happens to be my late grandfather's favorite, as well as the fav for quite a few of my friends. I even sang "On My Own" from Les Mis for my college chorale scholarship audition--which I should actually send a little note of appreciation to the creators as that song single-handedly helped finance 4 years of college tuition for me--but I had no clue what the song was in reference to or who even sang it! I really didn't care either and had no inkling to investigate further.
Definitely not on my bucket-list to see.
A few months back, I started seeing these ominious and huge promotional posters in malls and movie theaters.
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| This is a GENIUS promotional poster! |
"You've never seen Les Mis?" he asked, looking at me like I had just broke out of Byberry (which if you're not from Philadelphia, Byberry is the infamous and now closed Insane Asylum right off Roosevelt Blvd in the far Northeast).
"I've heard of it, but never saw it," I told him, kinda scared I was going to get a verbal lashing.
He promptly grabbed my hand and marched me out to his car where, of course, he had the original cast recording. We sat in his car and he played me a few of his favorites--"I Dreamed a Dream" "One Day More" and "Castle on a Cloud" to name a few--and they were all great. But still had no clue what the story was about, just that the people sounded really really miserable.
As months went on and I saw more and more previews and more importantly the cast, my interest was greatly peaked. So I decided to turn to the internet to get some more information and decide whether or not I'd be joining movie-goers in December when it was released.
Being an avid-reader, I decided to turn to the actual original text first to look for a quick synopsis. Well, if you've ever seen Victor Hugo's book, you know it's huge and a synopsis is anything but quick. It's massive and split into 3 sections. If you aren't familiar with that particular time in history, it's basically the years during the French Revolution and following the executions of Louis XVI and Marie Antionette. France was in complete and utter turmoil and the poor--or "The Wretched"-- were in even dyer straits then they were with a monarch still on the throne. People were starving and the rich were only getting richer. So the book follows the lives of the down-trodden of French society and in particular Jean Valjean, who has just gotten out of prison after serving 19 years for stealing a loaf of bread--yes, you read that right, 19 years for stealing bread. The story evolves into a story of redemption for Valjean, as he tries to escape his past and help the people around him.
That description is pretty depressing, as it should be. And I wouldn't blame you for walking away from my blog now. "I'm not looking for a depressing history lesson, Penny!" you may be saying. Trust me, I wanted to stop my research there as well. But trust me, keep going with me on this!
Next I turned to the actual musical and to YouTube in hopes of finding some audio clips from the show. HOLY GOD is there a lot out there on the show. Like hundreds of videos. I scrolled through most of them and was pretty surprised to find that YouTube had the full 25th Anniversary Concert (from 2010) with the "Dream Cast" available in it's entirety. And it being a very slow week at work, I decided to watch the entire thing on my phone.
It was actually a really REALLY slow week, so I watched it twice.
Holy God (again) it was awesome! Like beyond anything I ever expected and now I understand why people are obsessed with it. Now that I knew what was going on, the songs made more sense and left me wanting more. The "Dream Cast" really was a dream--except maybe Nick Jonas, who had no business playing Marius when he barely had the vocal range for it--it included Broadway greats like Lea Solange, Ramin Karimloo, Alfie Boe, and Samantha Barks. Jean Valjean was played by Alfie Boe and his performance literally blew me away. I was glued to my seat, eyes focused on my tiny IPhone screen everytime he opened his mouth. His vocal range is astounding and I almost started clapping along with the audience at the end of "Valjean's Soliquy". I've heard a lot of excellent singers in my day--being in choirs and the theater quite a bit--but he definitely has one of the top ten voices of modern era.
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| The incomparable Alfie Boe |
Seriously, YouTube it. Have I ever steered you wrong?
After experiencing this--which it was an experience, not just entertainment--I was pretty excited for the movie. Actually, excited isn't the right word. Excitement doesn't quite capture the magnitude of my feelings towards it. The butterflies and longing--I told you it's semi-insane! I even tried to convince my family to break our "Christmas Sloth Day" tradition, get out of our jammies and go see it opening day. No one was willing, so I had to wait until the next weekend--which I don't know if it's fate or God trying to tell me something but they played the 25th Anniversary concert on PBS TWICE that week.
In the mean time, I heard plenty of reviews that either sang the movie's praises or more frequently, talked about what was wrong with the picture. Particularly that the singing wasn't up to par, it was too long and melodramatic and certain actors had no business singing at all (namely Russel Crowe who plays Inspector Javier). But I went in to the showing with an open-mind--how could they screw up something so perfect? Like come on, it can't be that bad!
Well I sat in my local theater, hands shaking and time going at a snails pace. The previews were entirely too long for me and I almost threw my large Diet Coke at the screen. Then the theater darkened, and the screen went blank, while from the speakers began the opening overture--which if you are a fan, you know what I'm referring to.
2 hours and 34 minutes later, I emerged from the theater not disappointed in the least. It was beautiful. I balled my eyes out multiple times. Anne Hathaway's Fantine, and her rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream" is assuredly Oscar worthy. I exclaimed "Was that necessary?" when you hear the splat of Javier's body hitting cement when he commits suicide at the end of the film. I felt the love of Marius and Cossette and the longing of Epinone. And Hugh Jackman. Hugh Jackman. He impressed me beyond expectation as Valjean. He's no Alfie Boe, but he really sang the shit out of the part. The emotions he evoked were real and it was simply a great performance. I loved every second of it and even downloaded the soundtrack the minute I got home that night.
That being said, I will now address the nay-sayers and bad reviews.
Yes, Russel Crowe is not the best Javier. As an actor, yes. As a singer, no. His voice was a bit warbly--meaning it sounded like he had marbles in his mouth--and sounded like he was singing in the back of his throat. I actually do a pretty good impression of his voice, if I do say so myself. But to say he's an awful singer really isn't fair. He can carry a tune and has good pitch and annunication. The part itself is very difficult to sound great at. The part is a pretty low bass part--hard even for a great singer to pull off. He doesn't have the soaring parts of Valjean, and his part is supposed to have a lower and darker quality as he is the villan in the play. So I defend the casting of Russel Crowe. Really he wasn't that bad. Not great, but not bad.
The songs were all performed live during filming. The soundtrack was not pre-recorded and the actors did not lip-synch to their own voices, which is what Tom Hooper wanted. He wanted to capture the raw emotions and realness of the actors performances. He wanted to allow his actors to live in the moment and not base their performance on a recording and decisions they made months before. No musical has ever done this before and many believed the songs suffered as a result. The singing lacked perfection, that can only be found in a recording booth. Honestly, I loved that they did this. It made the songs more real and with a subject matter that is so emotional and intense, it connects the viewers more easily. We felt those emotions deep down. Anne Hathaway's performance, which was emotional regardless, would not have been as powerful if it had been prerecorded. Yes, the songs weren't perfect but nothing is pre-recorded on Broadway! So shut your mouth and go buy a Justin Bieber album if you want manufactored perfection.
And finally, the movie was sort of long. But so is the show! Everything from the show was present and nothing was cut or shortened to make the movie shorter in length. Honestly, all of my favorite movies are pretty long in length (i.e the LOTR trilogy) and I loved them more because of their length--the director wanted his vision seen in its completeness and not chopped or watered down to fit into a 90 minutes standard movie format. I think people only thought it was long because there was no intermission, which would have been present if you had seen the show on Broadway. And yes, the subject matter is pretty intense to experience without a small break. But again I say, shut the hell up!
So that's it. My latest obsession and the subject of a pretty long rant on my blog. It's been a few weeks since I saw the movie, but it's still as real for me now as it was then. I am a reformed Les Mis fan and appreciator!
And now its a new addition to my bucket list: To see the staged Les Mis in London.
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