Sunset Boulevard NYC Reviews and Tickets
Show-Score Member Reviews (1,050)
See it if You want to see a performance that will go down in history. The entire production is memorable, but Close has the role of a lifetime.
Don't see it if You don't like Andrew Lloyd Weber musicals.
See it if DO NOT MISS Glenn Close in this role!! She is AMAZING! This is the best of the best - especially if you love great musicals
Don't see it if you don't like 'grand' musicals. you saw the 1990s production and are expecting that fabulous stage.
See it if Brilliant performance by Ms. Close. I actually enjoyed this version more than the original Broadway production of years ago-beautiful music
Don't see it if If you are looking for a lavish production. This one is about the performances and music! Loved the show.
See it if You love lush full music based on a classic piece. You wish to see an epic star turn.
Don't see it if If you don't like melodramatic stories set in a previous day or based on a film.
See it if I thought Close's performance ranks among the best I've seen. The two male leads are great. A few weak spots but some real emotion.
Don't see it if The story doesn't interest you. You want to miss the best performance of this season (including Midler's).
See it if you want a close-up of Glenn Close at her luminous best. Her Norma Desmond is indeed a creature from another age, wounded and vulnerable.
Don't see it if aren't open to a less splashy and lavish version of this Andrew Lloyd Webber musical and a more concert-style staging.
See it if Like Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals.
Don't see it if You don't like scaled down productions.
See it if enjoy musicals. fan of Glenn want to see a great show. great staging great singing
Don't see it if you do not like musicals
Critic Reviews (74)
"The score, by Andrew Lloyd Webber is lush and gorgeous for the most part...The orchestra’s work is both glorious and rich, like an old-fashioned musical should sound. The downside is that at times the orchestra placement distracts from the very personal story that is being told on stage...When the show is attached to Close and her Norma, 'Sunset Boulevard' works, but without that star power, it shrivels down to a very pedestrian tale that doesn’t have the power to intoxicate."
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"'Sunset Boulevard' is ersatz opera of the outsized and mostly overwrought kind that Broadway audiences have been eating up, on and off, since the 1980s. It’s noteworthy, then, that this production cast Glenn Close, whose voice is, to put it politely, far from operatic. Her power resides in her acting; her Norma manages, at its best, to be both steely and vulnerable, sinking into herself and dominating everything and everyone. Most of the other cast members hardly register by comparison."
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"Price's staging, in a fatal mistake, fails to capture the darkness, being surprisingly upbeat, and with only scattered moments of the needed gothic anxiety demanded by the story...Close's...pitchy singing voice is not Broadway's best, but her acting is strong enough, even within the deliberately broad, almost grotesque, theatricality she adopts to jerk tears when she launches into 'With One Look.' But the emphasis on her exaggerations takes the show too far from its deeper implications."
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"Frequently Close’s unsure of her pitch...As this 'Sunset Boulevard' marches along, it’s clear that Close is on hand for the acting and for striding effectively about in the flowing robes and turbans...The whole script is credulity strained....What this 'Sunset Boulevard' does have in its favor is what it always had: the score. It’s enhanced immeasurably by one of the largest Broadway orchestras in years...The supporting players all possess musical and acting ability beyond the call of duty."
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"Vocal challenges notwithstanding, there is not a moment Close is on stage that is not pure gold. And when she's off, all you can do is await her return. It's a good thing, too, because as a musical, 'Sunset Boulevard' has little reason to exist. This is not one of Mr. Lloyd Webber's stronger scores, lacking the cohesiveness of 'Evita,' say...Lonny Price directs the enterprise the way Norma would want to be directed by Cecil B. DeMille, with her at the center of the universe."
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"Close gives a bravura performance: funny, over-the-top, ridiculous. The only vulnerability Close brings to the role, however, is her singing voice...Unfortunately, Price’s direction doesn’t solve the show’s many problems...Lloyd Webber’s opening four songs emerge as tuneless recitative with flat lyrics by book writers Don Black and Christopher Hampton, who completely muddle the story."
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"Although her voice sounded a bit pinched at times, her Norma Desmond is one for the ages. She is joined by a fine supporting cast...Instead of lavish sets, we get a 40-piece orchestra onstage. Unfortunately, the larger orchestra does not improve the quality of the music...If you love the film and are a fan of Glenn Close, you will have a good time. If you do not appreciate Andrew Lloyd Webber’s music, you might not."
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"Not only has Close deepened her interpretation, but Lonny Price’s new staging is an imaginative stripped-down retake of Trevor Nunn’s gargantuan 1994 edition. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s synthetic score and the simplistic book and lyrics by Don Black and Christopher Hampton still fail to approach the noir nightmare vision of Hollywood created in Billy Wilder’s legendary 1950 film. But with Price’s more intimate staging, Close’s magnificent performance is even more striking."
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