PETULA CLARK - Entrance, "Surrender," "With One Look" (2nd US Tour)

The obscenely bad 2nd US tour with Petula Clark hagging it up as Norma. Rushed and done on the cheap, it was the final attempt to make any money off of the show after all the major productions shut down.

This is bad, trust me. For "Sunset Boulevard" completists only. I see what Susan Schulman was going for with this; she wanted to do a surreal take on the show, making it look like a fantasy set entirely on a sound stage with simulated dollies and close-ups, etc. However, she did not have the time, money, resources or talent to pull this off. Shame. Note that by this time, the Isotta Fraschini has been reduced to a magnified cardboard cut-out and the set was just a staircase that looked like a rejected set piece from Maury Yeston's "Titanic." Lewis Cleale phones it in as Joe and Allen Fitzpatrick is horribly miscast as Max. Seriously, what's up with the beard and emaciated facial features? He looks like Skeletor with facial hair!

I also just LOVE the implication here that Norma had an affair with Rudolph Valentino; it has all the subtlety of getting run over by a mac truck.

I don't know what Petula Clark is doing with that last note, but something tells me I don't want to know...

Remember, showering ANY kind of praise on this makes Baby Jesus cry. There, I said it.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Petula
• Clark
• Sunset
• Boulevard
• With
• One
• Look
• Andrew
• Lloyd
• Webber
• Musical
• West
• End
• Broadway
• US
• Tour
• Lewis
• Cleale
• Allen
• Fitzpatrick
• Noir
• Billy
• Wilder

[rickyross3359]

well she was in the London production was ages with the Trevor Nunn production she is superb.

[HouseOnSunset]

@rickyross3359 In what alternate universe is she superb?

[annalee12345]

Surely you didn't post this just to get people to jeer at her? I was curious because all the intrepretations are very interesting (Clos, Page and Buckley, LuPone). Clark's voice is ok, but her interpretation is absurd. Overdramatic, flowery and lacks the subtlty of a actress who has been in silent films and can kill with a look. Close's interpretation is the most magnificent but she also has the weakest voice. LuPone, good voice but a very disaffected demeanour.

[HouseOnSunset]

Of course I did! Why else did you think I did it, to keep fifty year old gay men that don't get any entertained? :-P

[Richardverdun]

Strange how the negative folks writing here sound like a convention of the Bitches of Eastwick. Dirt for dirt's sake!

[HouseOnSunset]

...And yet Petula still sucks. :-P

[emlodik]

@Lindow

Shut the hell up, you stupid bitch. -_-

[DenzelLockheart]

This is a pure abortion. Petula sounds like she is choking on something, and her acting is just plain awful. How she was even picked amazes me.

[dogatemywookiee]

@HouseOnSunset The one where my mum took me to see every Norma on the west End, she beat Elaine Paige and Patti to second place... coming only to Betty Buckley whose acting blew the role apart.

Petula had the acting skills and the vocal ability to carry the role. She also had that cougar growl to close act one.

[lostinthestars100]

Horrible. The worst nightmare of a musical production. Sure, sets are cheap, lighting is bad, staging laughable, BUT PC is the one making Norma a clown, anti-star. Her performance is horrible. The ending of With One Look is a joke. I would have walked out after Surrender. Sorry to say.

[waynebrasler]

Clark did not come into the show casually or unprepared. She's talked about this. She gave deep thought to how to take Norma best and portray all the complications and contradictions evident in the character, particularly the tragic elements. She was also was very concerned about capturing the music in all its richness and above all to make Norma a living, breathing person. Whatever worked or didn't work wasn't the result of her not taking the project with utmost commitment.

[MyTimeOutt]

The hate campaign going on here is utterly astounding. So, let's get the da-da movement back--why not have Wendy Ho in the part? She'd be perfect, and Dolly Parton could be her understudy! --It's a toss up who is being hated the most, Petula Clark or older men? Why such hatred? That saddens me, but I'll move on--till I get another brilliant casting absurdity!

[MyTimeOutt]

The hate campaign going on here is utterly astounding. So, let's get the da-da movement back--why not have Wendy Ho in the part? She'd be perfect, and Dolly Parton could be her understudy! 

[ramona2400]

Petula Clarke suffered from cheap sets, bad lighting, tacky staging, worse orchestra and horrible direction. Ms Clarke did the best she could with the cheap traveling show they gave her. Somehow she reminds me of Debbie Reynolds - playing it almost for comic relief.

[ramona2400]

Diahann Carroll was the best Norma Desmond for me in both singing and acting. However they all brought something unique to the role - The worst was Rita Moreno

[tigandmouse]

Dannnggg I can probably do that better than her. Stratch that, my cat can do better than her.

[DogAteMyWookie]

The set is awful... in London they had Marks... marks for each point of the song which lead them around to vital points in the set from the bust of her head, to the organ, to the stairs etc....

[DogAteMyWookie]

@HouseOnSunset To be honest I think her story fits better with the character as at the time she was bowing out of the lime light... and I think it was after this that she really found her footing. I think Pet and Elaine were the best Norma's of the london cast :)