Forbidden Broadway, Vol. 8 - Special Victims Unit
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
The eighth volume of Forbidden Broadway, Special Victims Unit, riffs off of the recently passed Jerry Orbach's dual career as Broadway leading man and television detective, as the long-running spoof show sets itself to "investigating homicides of a theatrical nature." Fans of the series know that means ruthless skewering of everything connected to the Great White Way through skillful mimicry and hilarious words set to familiar tunes. The victims include shows such as Bombay Dreams, Avenue Q, and Thoroughly Modern Millie ("the worst Best Musical ever!"); personalities such as Brooke Shields, Stephen Schwartz, the two stars of Wicked, and Harvey Fierstein; and trends such as pop-music-based shows, stars who miss performances, and revivals. One particularly amusing trick is turning Assassins' lyrical tribute to Jodie Foster and Charles Manson into a theater geek's tribute to Stephen Sondheim, "Unworthy of Your Words" ("I am unworthy of your words / I cannot sing your minor thirds..."). Broadway has been supplying creator-writer Gerard Allessandrini's franchise with fresh material for over 20 years, and it remains vicious and funny. --David Horiuchi
Forbidden Broadway, Vol. 8 - Special Victims Unit, Music, Gerard Alessandrini, Ron Bohmer, Jason Mills, Cast Recordings, Music Theater, Musical Theater, Musicals, Pop, Show Tunes, Soundtracks & Film Scores
Average customer rating:
- Forbidden Broadway 8: Special Victims Unit
- A few good laughs
- I laughed out loud -- a lot
- Need to go to Broadway
- Much good, wish there was more
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Forbidden Broadway, Vol. 8 - Special Victims Unit
Gerard Alessandrini , Ron Bohmer , and Jason Mills
Manufacturer: Drg
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD
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- Forbidden Broadway 2001: A Spoof Odyssey
- Forbidden Broadway Cleans Up Its Act!: The Unoriginal Cast Recording, Volume 5 (1998 New York Cast)
- Forbidden Broadway Strikes Back!: Another Unoriginal Cast Recording, Volume 4 (1996 New York Cast)
- The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (2005 Original Broadway Cast)
ASIN: B0007W7HTS
Release Date: 2005-04-26 |
Tracks:
- The Crime Scene (Tomorrow/On Broadway) * Ron, Megan & Jennifer
- Forbidden Broadway: Special Victims Unit * Ron, Megan, Jason & Jennifer
- Bombay Wet Dreams (Lullaby of Broadway/Hooray For Hollywood) * Ron, Megan, Jason & Jennifer
- You Gotta Get A Puppet (You Gotta Get A Gimmick) * Ron, Jennifer & Jason
- It Sucks To Be Us (It Sucks to Be Me) * Ron, Megan, Jason & Jennifer
- Thoroughly Perky Millie (Thoroughly Modern Millie) * Megan with Ron & Jason
- Movin Out (My Life) * Ron
- night Mother (Thats Amore/Ma, Hes Making Eyes at Me) * Christine & Jennifer
- Welcome To The Tonys (Welcome To The Sixties) * Ron, Megan, Jason & Jennifer
- The Boy Whos Odd (I Go To Rio/Everything Old Is New Again) * Jason, Christine & Jennifer
- I Love Patti (I Love Paris) * Megan with Ron, Jason & Jennifer
- Das Mel Brooks Song (Haben Sie Gehort Das Deytsche Band?) * Ron
- Wickeder (Popular/Defying Gravity) * Jennifer & Megan with Ron & Jason
- No Leading Lady Tonight (Luck Be A Lady Tonight) * Ron & Jennifer
- Forbidden Assassin (I Am Not Worthy Of Your Love) * Ron & Jennifer
- Julie Andrews hosts PBS The American Musical : The Next Hundred Years (Do-Re-Mi/Fun, Fun, Fun) * Jennifer with Ron & Jason
- I Am My Own Cast (Willkommen) * Jason
- Mamma Mi-diocre (Mamma Mia/Dancing Queen) * Megan & Jennifer
- Fiddler With No Jew (Tradition/Matchmaker/Sabbath Prayer) * Megan, Jennifer & Christine
- Harvey Fierstein as Tevye (If I Were A Rich Man) * Ron, Megan, Jason, Jennifer & Christine
- Bernadette Peters in Gypsy (Roses Turn) * Jennifer
- Ethel Merman & Friends (Theres No Business Like Show Business) * Megan with Ron, Jason & Jennifer
- Encore: La Cage Aw ful (La Cage Aux Folles/The Best Of Times) * Ron, Megan, Jason & Jennifer
Amazon.com
The eighth volume of Forbidden Broadway, Special Victims Unit, riffs off of the recently passed Jerry Orbach's dual career as Broadway leading man and television detective, as the long-running spoof show sets itself to "investigating homicides of a theatrical nature." Fans of the series know that means ruthless skewering of everything connected to the Great White Way through skillful mimicry and hilarious words set to familiar tunes. The victims include shows such as Bombay Dreams, Avenue Q, and Thoroughly Modern Millie ("the worst Best Musical ever!"); personalities such as Brooke Shields, Stephen Schwartz, the two stars of Wicked, and Harvey Fierstein; and trends such as pop-music-based shows, stars who miss performances, and revivals. One particularly amusing trick is turning Assassins' lyrical tribute to Jodie Foster and Charles Manson into a theater geek's tribute to Stephen Sondheim, "Unworthy of Your Words" ("I am unworthy of your words / I cannot sing your minor thirds..."). Broadway has been supplying creator-writer Gerard Allessandrini's franchise with fresh material for over 20 years, and it remains vicious and funny. --David Horiuchi
Customer Reviews:
Forbidden Broadway 8: Special Victims Unit.......2007-05-09
Very funny spoofs on Broadway tunes and shows - some classic, some new. These guys know Broadway, and they know where - and how - to poke fun at it.
A few good laughs.......2005-12-28
As with all the previous editions of "Forbidden Broadway," there are some hearty guffaws to be had. Unfortunately, whereas the first several albums were virtually wall-to-wall laughs, this edition's really meaty material is doled out in small portions -- and one has to suffer through some bland fare in between.
Mr. Alessandrini's brilliance in the past was two-fold: 1) The lyric spoofing was so vivid that the listener could conjure visuals even if they hadn't seen the revue live, and 2) the humor was just the right length -- it got the job done, and often left one wanting more. Much of the current material is not up to Mr. Alessandrini's usual standards, for it's difficult to figure out what's going on, and some of the segments are much too long [especially the opening crime scene sketch and the "'night Mother" parody -- the latter of which I gave up on after a couple of minutes]. Some of the contexts are much too obtuse to have any general comic appeal [the "Wicked" leads being friends; "Fiddler" ostensibly having no Jews in the cast]. Some of the titles promised more comic riches than were actually mined -- Julie Andrews presenting the next hundred years of the American musical could have been a cavalcade of wacky ideas of further trash that might be foisted on the public, but instead it's just some blathering about how more mediocrity is on the way.
The performers have a lot of energy, but they largely lack the vividness of Mr. Alessandrini's previous longtime rep artists. Part of this may be due to the fact that although the current artists have the requisite vocal chops to handle the material, their diction is less-than-ideal at times. [People have groused about previous recordings not having lyrics, but they weren't needed in the past.] On the plus side, these newest artists are very good at mimicking stars; indeed, the Bernadette Peters impression makes this CD actually worth the purchase price -- it is perfect and hilarious, from the Peters-specific line reading styles [the curious ascending pitch at the ends of some lines] to swallowing the same vowel sounds that Miss Peters does. [This performance really is quite brilliant!] Other highlights of this recording are the commentary on the trend toward puppets and unwieldy production designs in "Avenue Q" and "Lion King," the manic perkiness of "Thoroughly Modern Millie," the love song to Sondheim that pokes fun at the difficulty in singing some of his music, and the on-target skewering of how gay the Tony Awards have become. And the wacky quasi-Eastern chorus vocals in the "Bombay Dreams" send-up are Mr. Alessandrini at his finest -- like all great comedy, they are completely unexpected and thereby chortle-inducing.
This recording is only for completists like me [after only two listenings, I now have a short list of tracks I'll play]; anyone unfamiliar with "Forbidden Broadway" should check out the first three editions as a better introduction to this often brilliant series [the original "Les Miserables" sequence is still one of my all-time favorite comedic sketches].
P.S. Please, Mr. Alessandrini -- no more perfunctory Patti Lupone riffs and PLEASE no more rehashes of 'I'm 30 years old tomorrow' from "Annie" -- oy!
P.P.S. And even the Ethel Merman shtick is starting to grow stale. After the hilariously sublime "Swell! Now, how'd ya like to hear ME sing a duet?" years ago, everything subsequent has paled in comparison.
I laughed out loud -- a lot.......2005-12-18
After reading several of the disparaging customer reviews, my expectations were low for this edition of Forbidden Broadway (I have all the previous editions, and have attended two live performances). I was delighted to discover that, with few exceptions (especially 'Night Mother), I was thourghly entertained by the latest edition of the long-running series. If course, the more familiar you are with the business of Broadway as well as Bway shows and performers, the more times you'll laugh. And I don't mind that this edition offers an approach that isn't "fresh," but is similar to the approach FB has taken through the years. The Bernadette Peters/Gypsy piece is worth the price alone.
Need to go to Broadway.......2005-10-10
This CD is very funny and does poke fun at many things about the theatre industry. However much of the material depends on the person having been physically to Broadway, and not must be a fan of musicals, or theatre.
I have never been to Broadway in person, and was lost on some of the humor. I got many of the references, but have to wounder if this is because I am a Theatre Educaiton major, and do have some of the knowlege from my courses. I would recommend this CD though and will look in to buying the previous 7 volumes at some time.
Much good, wish there was more.......2005-06-17
As noted below, there is much to laud in this CD; the performers in the parody on "Wicked" are as good as the originals (and I prefer the parody more!), and the "Assassins" parody is sublime (as is the original). I would buy the CD for these alone, as well as the take-off on the Tony Awards show. And many other nice parodies and spoofs. But I just wish there had been more here that was new (some melodies from earlier versions are recycled), and that there were longer parodies on the shows (like the "Wicked" parody, or earlier "Les Miserables" parodies). While I enjoy the Liza/Ethel Merman/Patti Lupone parodies, we've heard the like of them before. 25 more minutes of fresh, new material would have brought the star-level up.
But, of course, for "Forbidden Broadway" fans, this is a must.
Music:
- Guys & Dolls (1950 Original Broadway Cast) [Cast Recording]
- Guys and Dolls (1992 Broadway Revival Cast) [Cast Recording] [Cast Recording]
- Hair - The American Tribal Love Rock Musical (1968 Original Broadway Cast) [Cast Recording]
- In Dulci Jubilo: A Christmas Celebration for Organ
- Into the Woods (1987 Original Broadway Cast) [Cast Recording]
- Jekyll & Hyde - The Musical (1997 Original Broadway Cast) [Cast Recording]
- Jesus Christ Superstar (Original London Concept Recording) [Original recording remastered]
- Jesus Christ Superstar: The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack Album [Original recording remastered] [Soundtrack]
- Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (1982 Original Broadway Cast) [Cast Recording]
- Little Shop of Horrors (2003 Broadway Revival Cast) [Cast Recording]
Music
Music