At the start of the second half of Ivo Van Hove’s production of his own musical version of John Cassavetes‘ ultra-Seventies backstager “Opening Night” — with music and lyrics by Rufus Wainwright — the words “the aftermath” (in fashionable lower case) appear on the large screen that dominates the stage. The trouble is, the preceding storytelling has been so muddy, and the emotional temperature of the staging so leadenly unchanging, that audiences may well be asking, “The aftermath of what?”
Following the movie on which it’s based, the show follows the onstage/offstage life of Myrtle (Sheridan Smith), a leading actress who is as terrified of ageing as she is
→ Continue reading at Variety
