Postscripts to Les Miserables

[jo]

[jo]

On ATC --

Revisiting the Les Miz film 8 years later; only a my 2nd viewing
Last Edit: Delvino 09:17 am EST 02/06/22
Posted by: Delvino 09:13 am EST 02/06/22

The week of Jackman's B'way opening seemed a good time to take another look at Les Miserables. For inexplicable reasons -- I was an admirer of the show, having seen it with all the originals at the RSC/Barbican before it became a global phenom -- I haven't revisited the film a second time since my Christmas 2014 viewing. My biggest takeaway is how good Jackman is. It's not news exactly, but the performance isn't discussed much, and I was grabbed from the prologue, when the lean, head-shaved Valjean is so immediately accessible. I was impressed with his relative understatement, no matter how bombastic the famous musical swells may be. The live singing gives him a performance gravitas that the camera records. But he doesn't push when he doesn't have to, which I hadn't recalled. Was he under-appreciated? The Oscar nomination was fully earned.

I will cause outrage, but I remain curiously unmoved by Hathaway, as I was on the first viewing. In what we later learned was her 4th take out of 20+ for "I Dreamed a Dream," she certainly leaves it all on the soundstage floor. Perhaps she might've withheld about 20%. I have no critique of her work, she's an actor trusting her director, just Hooper's choice. I suspect this take, so agonizing from the start, impressed everyone on the production. But -- this is heresy, I know -- it's still a song, and I would've been happier to hear more of it. The film's reliance on closeups has been discussed, and Hathaway both benefits and loses something from the decision. Not much else to say, Bonham Carter is terrific, a standout for me, the young men all fine, Tveit intense and chilly, as befits the character. The movie is true to the stage show but still feels exhausting at times, chugging onward as that relentless score presses us into the next dark chapter, the camera furtively exploring the grisly era, the CGI unfortunately standing out more than I recalled.

Anyway, Jackman's next big week arrives, years in the making. If -- just my opinion -- Jean Valjean seems a slightly better fit than Hill, there's no denying his powerhouse presence in musical theater. It may be event casting, but despite cynics sometimes grousing otherwise, he's selling tickets for a reason.

[jo]

Is the tweeter referring to a stage show... it could not be the movie as that opened in Dec 2012.

Jo

[njr]

😂 She had obviously heard that Hugh Jackman was in Les Miz, not realizing it was a movie, not a theatre production! 😂 How she missed the movie for 9 months is crazy!

[jo]

This was the Les Miserables concert we never saw!

Held at Windsor Castle at a state banquet hosted by Queen Elizabeth 2 for the Prime Minister of France in 2004!

Very private affair!

Chosen to sing the role of Valjean was the original Marius and now performing the role of Javert - Michael Ball!

(On a side note : Michael also annotated the premiere of the film adaptation of Les Miserables at Leicester Square ( famous for hosting film premieres, including some of Hugh's other movies) in London. I remember Eddie Redmayne vowing to Michael to show his respect to the original Marius )

[jo]

[jo]

This came from the Annie Leibovitz photographic coverage for the Vogue issue featuring Les Miserables -- but had never been published ( to my knowledge) --

it is beautiful and captures the emotional tie that bound Fantine to Monsieur Le Maire, Jean Valjean!

[jo]

Jun 27, 2022 0:22:58 GMT -5 jo said:

This came from the Annie Leibovitz photographic coverage for the Vogue issue featuring Les Miserables -- but had never been published ( to my knowledge) --

it is beautiful and captures the emotional tie that bound Fantine to Monsieur Le Maire, Jean Valjean!

Beautiful...looks almost like artistic portraiture!

[jo]

Jul 18, 2022 2:50:38 GMT -5 jo said:

Playful Hugh

This was likely when he and Amanda Seyfried were promoting Les Miserables in Japan!

[jo]

Some discussions on ATC started by someone saying that Herbert Kertzmer ( the English translator of Boublil's lyrics in the 1985 Mackintosh English production, which was preceded by the original 1980 show in Paris).

re: misconceptions about Les Mis in 1980
Posted by: dlh 03:33 pm EST 11/18/22
In reply to: re: The unsung hero of Les Miz: Herbert Kretzmer - HadriansMall 04:59 pm EST 11/17/22
HadriansMall:
I am not an expert on the history of LES MISERABLES but wasn't the original French production just a slightly padded presentation of the concept album? Not really a show at all but more of a tableau? Actually adding a fleshed out plot most likely accounts for the bulk of the additional time.

I believe this is a commonly repeated misunderstanding. It's true the 1980 Paris production of Les Misérables has been described as a "series of tableau", but (caution: heresay) while tableaus akin to the barricade-spin in the Nunn-Caird production were a feature of that first staging, the structure and content of the show was very similar to the first English-language version in 1985. All the connective interstitial material was already there. The Trema "concept" recording predated and was not a very accurate document of the stage production.

Apropos of the topic, here's a video excerpt from the 1980 production, broadcast by Télévision Française 1 about a week before the show opened. I find this fascinating, language barrier notwithstanding.

Alain Boublil et Claude-Michel Schönberg à propos des "Misérables" de Robert Hossein

[jo]

This is the cited scene from the original French staging of the show in 1980 in PARIS.

Start at 1'48"

www.ina.fr/ina-eclaire-actu/video/i12067663/alain-boublil-et-claude-michel-schonberg-a-propos-des-miserables-de-robert

[jo]

My reply on ATC --

re: misconceptions about Les Mis in 1980
Posted by: jo 08:24 pm EST 11/18/22
In reply to: re: misconceptions about Les Mis in 1980 - dlh 03:33 pm EST 11/18/22

Merci bien!

Good to see how the original show was presented at Palais des Sports.

The original Valjean seemed more like the embodiment of the hero in the literary gem by Victor Hugo. Strong and forceful personality. This was baritone Maurice Barrier.

If there were gaps in the storytelling - maybe it was thought unnecessary because LES MISERABLES must have been required reading in school in France!

I have read the book and it does have such a complete portrait of life in France in that period of time...as well as a more complete portrait of the major characters.

Also, the film adaptation seemed to have incorporated many other passages which the 1985 English version decided to miss ( such as the flight to Paris and how they landed in the convent where Cosette spent her growing-up years, explaining why she grew up gently-raised and where Valjean hid in anonymity from Javert as a gardener ( he was once a tree -cutter in an earlier life).
Jackman did portray the stronger & more forceful persona of Valjean! The Crowe seeming indecision of Javert was also likely derived from the characterization in the book.

The novel and the show and the film endure - because it is the embodiment of human conditions in many places throughout time.

The English version allowed many audiences to appreciate Hugo's eternal story of humanity.

[njr]

Girl and her grandfather sing a couple of Les Miz songs!

fb.watch/h3AMoVZCUW/

Nancy

[jo]

[jo]

You can hear Hugh talking about it in the sound bar.


Jo

[jo]

[jo]

[jo]

[jo]

[jo]

[jo]

USA release was in December 2012.

[jo]

[jo]

[jo]

There is a new topic on BWW re songs written to qualify for an Oscar.

My response to one of the comments --

jo
Send PM
Broadway Legend
joined:5/15/03
Songs Written For The Oscar
#11
Posted: 3/13/23 at 9:49am

ErmengardeStopSniveling said: "I know SUDDENLY did qualify for the Oscars as a new song, but wasn't that actually a Les Mis trunk song that was cut prior to the English-language production? Or am I misremembering?"


It wasn't on the original concept album ( in French) which related to the Paris staging 5 years ahead of the Mackintosh English production.

There was nothing in the book by Edward Behr on the development of the stage musical English version that has any mention of such a song.

I think it was written for the film adaptation to fill in the gap of the missing second Valjean epiphany not highlighted in the stage musical version. Valjean's first epiphany was the grace of redemption ( articulated in Valjean's Soliloquy). The second one was the discovery of love through little Cosette through the song SUDDENLY. Both epiphanies were highlighted strongly in the Victor Hugo novel.

Interestingly, the song could also be interpreted as a romantic song when one meets "the one" or even as a wedding processional song (sung by the groom as he sees his prospective bride walking down the aisle). I think the Michael Ball version highlighted the romantic tone. Hugh Jackman's interpretation sounded more like a lullaby.

One of my complaints about how the Oscar ignores the relevance of the song to the storyline of the movie for which it was written is that SUDDENLY ( which was such a beautiful song embodying Valjean's discovery of how a small child can bring him the feeling of love for another human being) lost out to a song like SKYFALL (by Adele who sang it at the Oscars). It felt like it was the AMPAS reciprocating for some pop superstar's participation in raising the ratings of the awards show.

[jo]

RE a twitter exchange on the Les Miserables novel by Victor Hugo ... and its adaptations.