Seeing “The Lion King” at the Pantages, you may get teary-eyed for how brilliant the crew is, but not because a young cub has such a sassy beast for an uncle. As in the movie, with its now “retro” animation, the simplistic but affecting story takes the stage and breaks your heart. Indeed, from the stage crew and costume makers to the cast, human talent is this theater production’s king. Brown, who plays the saucy and sardonic Scar, and Nathaniel Logan McIntyre, as the young and mischievous Simba. The stage morphs artfully with every change of setting, and the cast did a wonderful job, most notably Patrick R. Actors don animal head pieces and bright colors of green, red, yellow, blue and more. The costumes and props are strikingly impressive and elaborate. The soundtrack, the lyrics of which are forever embedded into many, is changed slightly-either cut short (“In the Jungle”) or less powerful (“Can You Feel the Love Tonight?”). That nostalgia may be the reason why the stage production doesn’t deliver the same pang when Mufasa dies, nor when Simba climbs Pride Rock to finally become king. The talented cast sings and dances to Elton John and Tim Rice’s memorable music, but “Hakuna Matata,” “In the Jungle” and “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” somehow sound different than what any '90s kid remembers from the movie. In many ways, the Hollywood Pantages' “The Lion King” differs from the beloved 1994 classic.
0 kommentar(er)
