Paul's Broadway Watch - Good Vibrations

Good Vibrations
Music and Lyrics by Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys
Book by Richard Dresser

Directed and Choreographed by John Carrafa – “Urinetown”

Opened on Broadway 2 February 2005

Here are excerpts of some of the reviewsÂ…

Talkin’ Broadway – Matthew Murray:
“Those who found Mamma Mia! too intellectually challenging finally have a show to call their own in Good Vibrations, which just rode a tidal wave of cliché into the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. For anyone who just wants to hear tunes they know ahead of time and can't care less whether the show containing them has even a single thought in its head, this song-fest made up of the greatest hits of Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys will be as welcome as a warm day in the sun.”
“…To call Good Vibrations the nadir of the songbook book musical genre that's started to infect New York's stages would require my willingness to consider Good Vibrations a musical and the non-sung words uttered during it a book. I'm capable of capitulating to neither requirement.”
“But the charisma-free, eye-candy cast can't make the songs or the flimsy threads of dialogue tying them together in any way dramatic.”
“It's just that none of this matters in the slightest, and the entertainment Good Vibrations provides… isn't adequate compensation for what it lacks in satisfying content. Yes, the songs are great; "I Get Around," "When I Grow Up to Be a Man," "Car Crazy Cutie," and most of the others are enjoyable strictly on a musical level. But after sitting through two hours of this anesthetizing abomination of a show, the only song I could relate to was "I Just Wasn't Made for These Times."

Broadway.com – William Stevenson
“It aspires to be Mamma Mia meets Movin' Out. Unfortunately, it's more like Footloose meets Dance of the Vampires.”
“Good Vibrations features some of the cheesiest dancing in recent Broadway history. It also has perhaps the ugliest set … of any current Broadway show; the Act I set--with its exposed brick walls and radiators mixed with beach umbrellas and rafts--is even more hideous than the set in Brooklyn, which I believe was intentionally ugly.”
“The dialogue is so lame that it's a wonder Richard Dresser Â… left his name on the credits as the book-writer. Setting the scene at the beginning, one character says: "The girls were beautiful. The guys were cool. Everybody surfed." And the clichés just keep on coming for over two hours. Combined with Carrafa's tacky choreography and the terrible set (in which four chairs are used to simulate a car), the show seems more like a high school production than a big-budget Broadway musical.”
“Like Mamma Mia, Good Vibrations wraps a story around the catchy tunes. But the plot here is so unoriginal that the ABBA musical's book is positively Shakespearean by comparison.”
“Whenever the actors are allowed to stop their frenetic dancing and just sing, there are actually some good numbers. That's because there are talented singers in the cast.”
“The audience for this waterlogged musical should be limited to Beach Boys diehards, unsuspecting tourists and the actors' family and friends. Casting agents might want to go too, because there are talented singers here who in all likelihood will need another, better gig very soon.”

Theatermania – David Finkle
“The plot of Good Vibrations, attributed to Richard Dresser, is so negligible and so illogical that it's barely worth outlining. Suffice it to say that Bobby (David Larsen) persuades chums Dave (Brandon Wardell) and Eddie (Tituss Burgess) to quit their dead-end burg and accompany him to Surf City. Then he talks nerdy French Club president Caroline (Kate Reinders), who's had a crush on him for years, into chauffeuring the guys on their sybaritic quest. Once Bobby is catching waves in California, he realizes that he's interested in Caroline for more than her wheels -- but now Caroline is down on him because she has overheard the boys discussing how they'd tricked her. Yup, Dresser's plot is one of those that depends for its feeble complications on unintentional eavesdropping. To further detail what occurs would be to waste your time and mine. Does it all get straightened out in the end? What do you think?”
Before delving into the arm-length list of what's wrong with Good Vibrations, let me mention the couple of things that are actually right. Tituss Burgess -- playing the part of a guy who leaves his main squeeze, Marcella (Jessica-Snow Wilson), at home -- has a powerful voice and a great smile to go with it. Also doing potent vocal work is Sebastian Arcelus; and, in the "Help Me, Rhonda" number, Milena Govich as the helpful Rhonda dances well…”
“What's wrong with Good Vibrations? Everything else. Not only do the marvelous songs fail to register beyond their nostalgic pull, they are only passably sung by leads Larsen, Wardell, and Reinders, though a five-boy back-up group and a five-girl back-up group do pass muster. The lyrics to "Fun, Fun, Fun" sound like this: "Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah now, Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah now," and so on. (Tom Morse is the sound designer.) Part of the reason for the choral babble is that the singers are simultaneously executing some of the most uninspired choreography that Broadway has seen in a very long time.”
“You'll also have to remind yourself that Heidi Ettinger's cluttered, inert set is the work of someone whose sets are often wonderful eye candy. To suggest surf-boardable surf, Ettinger places a few static waves on stage, sends a few cast members down them (on skateboards?), and then leaves the stiff waves sitting there intrusively through most of the second act. To no effect, costume designer Jess Goldstein has the cast changing from T-shirts and shorts to other T-shirts and shorts, from bikinis and jammers to other bikinis and jammers. It's too easy to say that Good Vibrations sends out bad vibrations or that the show is far from fun, fun, fun. Help me, Rhonda, get it out of my head!”


Ouch!