The Original Troupe is performing three concerts in Bercy, Paris this weekend (Dec 16, 17, and 18). Can’t you believe it, one week and four concerts with the Original troupe and back in France to boot. Hopefully the good people who go will share some one the concert on Youtube. Because Sharing is Caring.
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Will Jennings
With the new Asian Tour cast singing Will Jenning’s english lyrics, we must ask are Jennings’ Lyrics harmful. I would yes and no. I think performing an English version in Asian countries makes level of sense. Let’s face it, English is a basic skill in many countries, and odds that people in China, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore can speak English is pretty high and this way they can appreciate the show a bit better and since these people are not native speaker they are not as bothered by the awful lyrics.
Tina Arena played Esmeralda in the London Cast
And now the flip-side, Yes, Will Jenning is most certainly harmful to Notre Dame de Paris. First off here’s a little trivia, the London version wasn’t doing well so they brought in Dannii Minogue in a hope of increase sales. The show didn’t last much longer and as 2001 it ended in London and has never played again. The Las Vegas cast didn’t play for very long either and have never revived. Now personally I think Las vegas was a poor choice for this show. Las Vegas is a bright colorful place and Notre Dame de Paris is a pretty minimal on sets and props, I think it might do doing better in New York City. But the show English Lyrics are laughable and I am sure that contributed to show lack of success in its English version.
Dannii Minogue also played Esmeralda in the London cast
The problem is you can tell Jenning rushed the translation, he tried too hard to fit the measure and not the mood. As result we get lyrics like “Out of no where came the Age of Cathedral” (Didn’t Notre Dame de Paris take over 100yrs to build?) “I was born on a road that bends“(So, not Texas? vauge statement Esmeralda) “So look no more for love, love is you.”(this line just sound stupid when sung) “I feel love awaken me, deep down in me, too strong for me.“(oh that just laziness) “Oh Fleur-de-lys I am a man who knows no law” (I kinda like Belle in english, it’s not bad but this line is stupid, Phoebus is Law in the show or maybe he’s just bad at his chosen profession) “Free today, Flown away. Souls at bay find a way” (Free Today sounds like a local cable advert for a mattress sale- Free Today, just one day buy two on saturday and don’t pay till May (That maybe bad by no one is paying me to write lyrics), that’s just a few, go here (http://ndparis.narod.ru/eng/translations/english.html) and read for yourself, just pick a random song, there all pretty much horrible. Most of the songs are bad- rhyming me with me, all of Anchary (it’s just stupid), He is shining like Sun and Val d’amour and trying to turn the show into Le Miserable with “My Home in Sky”, really I could on and on, but this is an interlude. (when I get to Notre Dame de Paris I’ll probably go into this more, if I’m feeling suicidal)
Janine Masse played Esmeralda in the Las Vegas cast
The mood and emotion is why the show and the original cast are so great. And the translations just sucked it away and not even the alumni from the original cast could save it. Plus and I’m not sure what it is, but it seems that none of the performers can sing these lyrics properly they all seem breathless, mumbly and lost as they sing, which just adds to the weakness and lack of emotion. So you can’t really blame the singers.
So while I get that William Jenning has done some very lovely lyrics for popular songs “My Heart Will Go On
So to answer the title of this post “William Jennings Considered Harmful?”, Yes, Yes He is!
A Dancer performing in Bohomienne in The 2011 Asian Tour of Notre Dame de Paris
Original Cast of Notre Dame de Paris in Kiev December 13 2011
Just like in 2010 the Original Cast of Notre dame are set to perform another Notre Dame de Paris Concert in Kiev this evening December 2011. That means there are at least two peformance of the show, the Original cast and the Asian Tour Cast, Kind of Neat Huh?Hopefully we’ll get to see some decent video on Youtude ^^
Follow thehunchblogThis Video I found on Youku and it’s of Matt Laurent (Quasimodo) and Candice Parise (Esmeralda) singing an excerpt of “The Birds they put in Cages” from the English version of Notre Dame de Paris. This is not a perforrmance of the show but a concert for a crowd. Please forgive the Audio and Visuals but it’s better than nothing right? Enjoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIWTSskcRew
I’m going to give Parise and Laurent a pass on judgement till better audio clip comes around. (though I hear clips Laurent singing the role before) but I have a feeling Parise belts Esmeralda as did Tina Arena, which I do not care for but for know not going to pass judgement or criticism.
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Notre Dame de Paris Asian Tour Cast performing La Cour des Miracles
So the 2011 Asian Tour Cast has ended in it’s first location of Guangzhou, China and it’s heading to Shanghai. The show premires there on the 2nd (which techinally today-the day of the post) and it will be there till December 24. So if you’re in Shanghai go see it ^^
I will say that I find it funny that a big selling point of the show for the Asian Tour is William Jenning’s lyrics. William Jenning, of course is a well regraded lyricist who wrote the lyrics for “My Heart will go on” but the english lyrics in this show are terrible for the most part and yet that it’s a big selling point. *shakes head in disappointment*
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This video I feel remissed in not posting till now. This video uses the Bollywood Film Devdas 
Click here to view it on youtube
There are other Devdas videos to Notre Dame de Paris, I’ll post those sometime soon ^^
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With the new cast of Notre Dame de Paris I wanted something Notre Dame de Paris for Fan-art Friday and then I found this;
Notre Dame de South Park by deppangel818
Drawing by deppangel818
I think this is perfect! I especially love Phoebus and Gringoire.
Follow thehunchblogThis video is from 2009, The original Notre Dame de Paris Trio performed Belle on the Show “Vive les Comedies Musicales” and they switched out who they were singing to so that they addressed each other. The result, a silly rendition of Belle.
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So I going to start periodically posting hypothetical casting choices for either movies or musicals.
So First off, since there is a new english language cast of Notre Dame de Paris let’s start there.
The thing about the English version of Notre Dame de Paris is that there are a lot of awkward weird lines and just because someone is a good singer it doesn’t mean that these lines can be delivered naturally. There are very few people in this world that can sing song with truly weird lyrics and sound serious and/or sincere. One singer who can do this well for example is the late Dio
David Byrne
I only recently became of fan David Byrne when I was introduced to him for potential AMV (anime music video) ideas (Shameless plug- I worked on an amv using a David Byrne song to Mononoke TV click here to watch, and leave a comment if you like ^_~, the amv is called Dark Interlude).
Lot of his songs are strange out of the ones I have heard I think U.B. Jesus
So I had said the Robert Marien, Matt Laurent, and Myriam Brousseau were in the World Tour Cast but it seems that they are in the Asian Tour 2011-2012 Cast. I Suppose with two English Tour cast information get a little confusing. Or Perhaps I’m Waaay off and was wrong about a World Tour.
Anyway here is the Cast of the 2011 Asian Tour Cast
Cast of Notre Dame de Paris Asian Tour 2011
Confirmed Cast (Source) and (Source)
Quasimodo – Matt Laurent
Esmeralda – Candice Parise
Frollo – Robert Marien
Gringoire – Dennis Ten Vergert
Phoebus – Stephen Webb
Clopin – Ian Carlyle
Fleur de Lys – Lilly-Jane Young
Alternates
Quasimodo/Frollo – Nigel Richards
Gringoire/Phoebus – Tim Driesen (Source)
Esmeralda/Fleur de Lys – Myriam Brousseau (Source)
Quasimodo/Clopin -Marc Akinfolarin
Unconfirmed
According to Twitter posts, Rachel Muldoon and Tom Muggeridge are in cast, my guess is that they maybe dancers but I don’t know, some how they’re are linked with the cast.
EDIT 6/25/12
There is a World Tour. It Starts October 31th in Russia. Tour will be English.
(((I’m sorry I got it wrong, but I’ll post something when (and if) and cast news is released on the 2012-2013 cast unless the Asian Tour is in fact the tour that General Entertaiment Associates meant and if that’s the case, why did the say it would be 2012-2013 when the Asian Tour only going to last for a reported 8-9 months? My guess is that the Asian Tour is the Tour Cast and General Entertaiment should have been more clear in their write up. But still it would be cool to have a world tour of Notre Dame de Paris)))
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