Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

All surface

Performance and design can't redeem shallow The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame at La Jolla Playhouse
The Hunchback of Notre Dame at La Jolla Playhouse

The Hunchback of Notre Dame

The Phantom meets Les Miz on the belfry of Notre Dame.

Victor Hugo titled his 1831 novel Notre Dame de Paris. When the English translator changed it to The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hugo blew a gasket. He hated how it reduced the book to a single character. One shudders to imagine how M. Hugo would react to the musical at the La Jolla Playhouse.

Sponsored
Sponsored

The novel is about “ANATKH,” often translated as “fate.” It follows the intersecting paths of a host of characters: the cursed gypsy Esmeralda (and her father and mother); Archdeacon Claude Frollo (who has an Inquisition for a brain); the egocentric womanizer Captain Phoebus; deaf Quasimodo the “half-formed” Hunchback; Pierre Gringoire, the book’s protagonist, a penniless poet who marries Esmeralda but cannot touch her. And also her genius billygoat, Djali, able to count out sums and maybe glimpse beyond the pale.

Their combined fates build inexorable frictions. Esmeralda loathes Quasimodo, can’t stand to look at him. She falls for the Captain, but he dumps her for an aristocrat (he “came to a tragic end,” writes Hugo, “he got married”). No two of them ever match up. Except for Quasimodo, each loves for the wrong reason. The book’s a series of violent collisions, but so well written you wish they were otherwise.

From a contemporary perspective, the story’s also about Esmeralda’s limited choices: a rabidly repressed Archdeacon, a randy, faithless soldier, an otherworldly poet, and a hideous beast with a heart of gold (and the only one who doesn’t stereotype her as a gypsy). To Esmeralda, each is a kind of monster.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame at La Jolla Playhouse

For the musical, based in part on the popular movie-cartoon, Hugo’s novel gets Disney-ized.

Pierre, the protagonist, is out (I guess poetry doesn’t play?), as is Esmeralda’s mother, and the goat. Captain Phoebus is a comic figure, a Real Nice Guy beneath his bluster. And Quasimodo’s a cutie-pie. He’s only intermittently deaf and can sing up a storm. Plus, he and Esmeralda become brother and sister. She seals the bond with a kiss.

Esmeralda sings “God Help the Outcasts,” like Eponine’s “On My Own” in Les Miz, only the subject is plural.

And the Archdeacon? He’s the driven Javert in Les Miz. Both have a hellfire song (the Archdeacon’s is called “Hellfire”). And both fall in the end, though Javert descends vertically and the Archdeacon laterally, upstage.

The musical consistently dulls the novel’s edges. Instead of clashing personalities and the threat of the first French Revolution, the novel’s watered down to the Archdeacon vs. the world and yummy, why-can’t-we-just-get-along, mush.

Which is probably why this Hunchback of Notre Dame will sell and sell for years.

And with this cast. Led by Ciara Renee (Esmeralda), Patrick Page (Frollo), and Michael Arden (Quasimodo), and backed by Brent-Alan Huffman’s top-notch orchestra and the Sacra/Profana choral ensemble (over 30, dressed in gray monk’s habits), everyone sings up a storm.

The songs don’t offer much individual, take-home value, but the overall score has an architectural structure. It’s almost as if the intro song, “The Bells of Notre Dame, runs throughout, like a frame, and the others, from high-ceiling’d vaults to snarky gargoyles, are the building’s innards. Snatches of lyrics and motifs interweave; it’s like watching — nay, hearing — the growth of a cathedral.

The look has a double standard, however. This is story theater: members of the cast share some of the narration, an approach often used on a bare stage. But this is story theater with a budget. Alejo Vietti’s autumnal-hued costumes evoke 1482 in detail, but not the grime.

You could probably feed the 5000 with what Alexander Dodge’s set must have cost. A scaffold of massive timbers, with marble statues of haloed saints and kings, a glorious rose window, and one of the great design entrances in memory: the bells of Notre Dame float down from above — and are probably the actual size of the originals. But the set’s so epic it almost swallows the performers. It also betrays notions of a humble, story-theater approach.

Make no mistake, the production has a spectacular surface. But the musical’s all surface as well.

The latest copy of the Reader

Please enjoy this clickable Reader flipbook. Linked text and ads are flash-highlighted in blue for your convenience. To enhance your viewing, please open full screen mode by clicking the icon on the far right of the black flipbook toolbar.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Southern California Asks: 'What Is Vinivia?' Meet the New Creator-First Livestreaming App

Next Article

Poway’s schools, faced with money squeeze, fined for voter mailing

$105 million bond required payback of nearly 10 times that amount
The Hunchback of Notre Dame at La Jolla Playhouse
The Hunchback of Notre Dame at La Jolla Playhouse

The Hunchback of Notre Dame

The Phantom meets Les Miz on the belfry of Notre Dame.

Victor Hugo titled his 1831 novel Notre Dame de Paris. When the English translator changed it to The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hugo blew a gasket. He hated how it reduced the book to a single character. One shudders to imagine how M. Hugo would react to the musical at the La Jolla Playhouse.

Sponsored
Sponsored

The novel is about “ANATKH,” often translated as “fate.” It follows the intersecting paths of a host of characters: the cursed gypsy Esmeralda (and her father and mother); Archdeacon Claude Frollo (who has an Inquisition for a brain); the egocentric womanizer Captain Phoebus; deaf Quasimodo the “half-formed” Hunchback; Pierre Gringoire, the book’s protagonist, a penniless poet who marries Esmeralda but cannot touch her. And also her genius billygoat, Djali, able to count out sums and maybe glimpse beyond the pale.

Their combined fates build inexorable frictions. Esmeralda loathes Quasimodo, can’t stand to look at him. She falls for the Captain, but he dumps her for an aristocrat (he “came to a tragic end,” writes Hugo, “he got married”). No two of them ever match up. Except for Quasimodo, each loves for the wrong reason. The book’s a series of violent collisions, but so well written you wish they were otherwise.

From a contemporary perspective, the story’s also about Esmeralda’s limited choices: a rabidly repressed Archdeacon, a randy, faithless soldier, an otherworldly poet, and a hideous beast with a heart of gold (and the only one who doesn’t stereotype her as a gypsy). To Esmeralda, each is a kind of monster.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame at La Jolla Playhouse

For the musical, based in part on the popular movie-cartoon, Hugo’s novel gets Disney-ized.

Pierre, the protagonist, is out (I guess poetry doesn’t play?), as is Esmeralda’s mother, and the goat. Captain Phoebus is a comic figure, a Real Nice Guy beneath his bluster. And Quasimodo’s a cutie-pie. He’s only intermittently deaf and can sing up a storm. Plus, he and Esmeralda become brother and sister. She seals the bond with a kiss.

Esmeralda sings “God Help the Outcasts,” like Eponine’s “On My Own” in Les Miz, only the subject is plural.

And the Archdeacon? He’s the driven Javert in Les Miz. Both have a hellfire song (the Archdeacon’s is called “Hellfire”). And both fall in the end, though Javert descends vertically and the Archdeacon laterally, upstage.

The musical consistently dulls the novel’s edges. Instead of clashing personalities and the threat of the first French Revolution, the novel’s watered down to the Archdeacon vs. the world and yummy, why-can’t-we-just-get-along, mush.

Which is probably why this Hunchback of Notre Dame will sell and sell for years.

And with this cast. Led by Ciara Renee (Esmeralda), Patrick Page (Frollo), and Michael Arden (Quasimodo), and backed by Brent-Alan Huffman’s top-notch orchestra and the Sacra/Profana choral ensemble (over 30, dressed in gray monk’s habits), everyone sings up a storm.

The songs don’t offer much individual, take-home value, but the overall score has an architectural structure. It’s almost as if the intro song, “The Bells of Notre Dame, runs throughout, like a frame, and the others, from high-ceiling’d vaults to snarky gargoyles, are the building’s innards. Snatches of lyrics and motifs interweave; it’s like watching — nay, hearing — the growth of a cathedral.

The look has a double standard, however. This is story theater: members of the cast share some of the narration, an approach often used on a bare stage. But this is story theater with a budget. Alejo Vietti’s autumnal-hued costumes evoke 1482 in detail, but not the grime.

You could probably feed the 5000 with what Alexander Dodge’s set must have cost. A scaffold of massive timbers, with marble statues of haloed saints and kings, a glorious rose window, and one of the great design entrances in memory: the bells of Notre Dame float down from above — and are probably the actual size of the originals. But the set’s so epic it almost swallows the performers. It also betrays notions of a humble, story-theater approach.

Make no mistake, the production has a spectacular surface. But the musical’s all surface as well.

Comments
Sponsored

The latest copy of the Reader

Please enjoy this clickable Reader flipbook. Linked text and ads are flash-highlighted in blue for your convenience. To enhance your viewing, please open full screen mode by clicking the icon on the far right of the black flipbook toolbar.

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

San Diego Dim Sum Tour, Warwick’s Holiday Open House

Events November 24-November 27, 2024
Next Article

Now what can they do with Encinitas unstable cliffs?

Make the cliffs fall, put up more warnings, fine beachgoers?
Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

This Week’s Reader This Week’s Reader