I had the same reaction! DH & I first saw Wicked on our first trip to NYC together in 2010 (pre-kids). DH had read the book & I was reading it when we saw it & we both avoided listening to the music to experience it for the first time in the theater. Sidenote about the book: DH & I both enjoyed the book but we could never seem to get into the sequels. And I joked with DH in the theater as we sat to watch it “It’s a good thing I know the ending of the Wizard of Oz already to this story so the show doesn’t spoil the book for me”. And they are all so vastly different (the MGM movie, the book & the musical) that there’s no spoiling of anything.
Anywho, about the show, to say we loved it was a bit of an understatement. In the two years after seeing it in NYC we traveled to NYC again, San Francisco & Boise, all to see it. And it came to SLC (our home city) in 2012 and we saw it 4x in the 3-4 weeks it was here. It’s come again another couple of times since our obsession died down, but I’m fairly certain we saw it at least once, if not twice more that’s it’s come.
It’s coming again to SLC next year and it will be the first time our kids to get see it. And we’re debating if we take them to the movie in theaters first or wait until it comes and then watch the movie. Because we love the musical so much. But we have been waiting & hoping for a film that has been in talks ever since before we saw the show that first time.
And there’s no way we’ll make it to USF for the experience if it’s only seasonal, so I’ll be rooting for it to stick around until we can next make it out there. Maybe next summer? Or in February in the couple of days we don’t have planned yet after a cruise out of Port Canaveral.
So Hello Kitty is the OG fury? That… is not at all what I would’ve expected ever.
Also, why is the FBI the source of the definition of larping??
Larping is when “participants portray characters in an imaginary environment and interact with one another in real-time,” according to the FBI.
My kids know the Sanrio universe of characters from friends at school. My DD11 especially. She is half-Asian and her 2 best friends through elementary are both Asian and they’ve just always been into the Sanrio characters and each have their faves of all the different animals and their Christmas presents to each other through the years have involved at least one trinket of Sanrio something.
It’s a musical. That means the focus is more on the music and the personalities more than the plot or character development per se. But it has incredible songs, great production value, and amazing characters who are so fun to watch. The story arc in this case is the characters changing.
I can not BELIEVE you left before the best number in the entire show, and one of my favorite songs ever. Which is, of course, For Good.
Had you heard No Good Deed Goes Unpunished before you left? That’s another of my favorites and I used to belt it in the car whenever I was feeling angsty. It does have some weak songs between the hits, and I get if you & DD then 14 were just not having it, leaving early. But that song as the kids today, slaps. Almost as good as Defying Gravity.
This is hands down the best musical ever in creation, IMHO. Before Hamilton existed, Wicked was my 2nd favorite, Rent my third. Now it’s squarely Les Mis > Hamilton >>> a rotation of Wicked/Into the Woods/Rent depending on the day.
Oh and Phantom of the Opera & Lion King get honorable mentions. Phantom was my 2nd favorite after Les Mis before I knew anything else. And Lion King we liked when saw it but got re-acquainted with the music this year when DS13 was the lead in the show (Mufasa in the 1st act/Adult Simba in the 2nd) at his school and the “They Live in You” & “He Lives in You” songs touched me again at a so much deeper level.
It was probably right around then. It could’ve been during “March of the Witch Hunters”.
I have listened to the soundtrack in full though! It’s fine… I did overplay ‘Defying Gravity’, like most people, when it was at the height of popularity.
I should like Hamilton more than I do … But with my auditory processing disorder, I have to work WAY too hard to even comprehend what they are saying most of the time. I have watched it twice (on screen) and listened to the album countless times…but I can’t understand most of it.
I read the lyrics a LOT and in fact, for Hamilton I will always recommend people listen to the sound track at least 4-5x before seeing it, because yes it’s a LOT to take in.
We love it all. Our younger son is named Schuyler because of that musical. I remember feeling that Satisfied was overhyped until we saw it for the first time the stage. The way that they actually rewind and redo A Winter’s Ball/Helpless as it’s all recounted in Satisfied was masterful. And lately I’ve just been a total ball of sobs whenever One Last Time is on.
And yes, all the King George songs are favorites of the kid. Especially our Schuyler, who bought an Awesome, Wow shirt when he got to see the musical for the first time on stage last month.
I had such a bad experience seeing Hamilton that it made me hate the show.
TL;DR - Spent nearly $1K on theatre tickets. (DD just “HAD” to see it! )
About 1/3 of the cast that night were understudies that were so badly off-key it was painful to listen to! I can’t watch it, even on Disney+, without getting mad!!
We’ve only spent that much when we’re buying 4+ tickets. (Now that we have kids that like musical theater as much as we do…). I would be upset too for what you got for that price. Was it a traveling show? We’ve seen Hamilton when it’s traveled to SLC 2 of the 3 times it’s been here and both times, even with understudies, the cast has been great, especially the Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jerfferson; the actor who does him gets to have SO much fun with it and gets a little license to be silly. King George’s a little bit too.
It is such a different story than the musical. The names and settings are about what stayed the same. We prefer the musical but we also did enjoy the book, but it was definitely weird. Especially the explicit parts. So it’s not at all for everyone.
If I’d have listened to the Hamilton soundtrack I probably wouldn’t have got very far into it and I’m not sure I’ve have gone to see the show. But since seeing the show, I’ve listened to it practically once a week!
