Moulin Rouge! is Moulin Ruined!

Okay, tacky titles aside... I am seriously not a fan of the stage adaption of Moulin Rouge! The film version of Moulin Rouge! was this beautiful piece of art directed by the genius Baz Luhrmann starring the fantastic Nicole Kidman as the sultry, Satine and Ewan McGregor as

Christian, the writer, the cast also features Jim Broadbent as Moulin Rouge owner Harold Zidler, Richard Roxburgh as the comedic, but very sleazy Duke of Monroth and John Leguizamo as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. When I first watched this film, I admit that my first thought was "What the f*ck is going on?" but gradually as the film progressed I started to see the genius of the film. It blended pop culture songs perfectly into a 19th-century setting and it was gorgeous. In my head I saw this film as a musical I could see it on stage and I was so excited when I saw that it was being adapted for the stage. Unfortunately, the cast list then came out... It was announced that Aaron Tveit and Karen Olivo would play the lovers Christian and Satine and I was so confused by this. Out of everyone in the world why would you pick these two people? Firstly, I don't think that Tveit has that naiveness to play Christian and I would have cast many people before him, (My first choice being Jake Gyllenhaal) and these men would have brought more of the Christian naiveness/charm from the film. I also figured that they would go with a woman of color for Satine, but Olivo wouldn't have been my first choice (We'll get into that later on.) Now, before I go any further I'm going to say that I have not seen the recent stage adaption taking place in Boston at the Emerson Colonial Theatre. I'm only going off from photos/videos I've seen and the audios I've heard. Anyway... What was so great about the film was how the songs used perfectly blended into the story and didn't come out as a tacky jukebox musical. All of the songs used helped support and progress the story. The film also had some absolutely gorgeous design elements (The film won 2 Oscars for Best Costume Design and Best Art Direction.) It was this gorgeous film that was filled with beautiful sets, lighting, costumes that gave this seductive and alluring feel. However, everything that was great about the movie was removed from the stage adaption. For example the gorgeous "Elephant Love Medley" which blended about 10+ different songs from an array of artists ranging from Kiss to The Beatles to Dolly Parton. In the stage

Nicole Kidman

adaption, they completely rewrote the song and it now sounds tacky and the transitions between songs are extremely rough. The only song that they added to the stage version of "Elephant Love Medley" that would have been a great addition to the original version was "What's Love Got to Do With It" by Tina Turner. Another major change they made was to Satine's entrance. In the movie, Kidman comes flying over the audience of the spectators of the Moulin Rouge and sings "Diamond's Are A Girl's Best Friend" from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (With a snippet of "Material Girl" by Madonna) and Kidman sings it in her sultry voice that is so hypnotic and sexy. Unfortunately, the stage version was heavily rewritten and now includes "Diamonds Are Forever," "Single Ladies" by Beyoncé and "Diamonds" by Rihanna. Also, instead of it being this sultry number that lures you in Olivo belts her way through it and when the other girls join in it

Laura Mulcahy, Caroline O'Connor and Christine Anu

sounds more like a bachelorette party at karaoke. That has to be my major problem with Olivo being cast as Satine. Olivo is a belter and doesn't really seem to have that sultry, seductiveness that Kidman had. I think that is what made her Satine so great was of how gentle her voice was. That is why I would have cast Jessica Keenan Wynn in the role of Satine because her lower tone would have given Satine a new interpretation, but she also has that sultry tone to her voice. However, the most hurtful change, script-wise, has to be with what the creative team did to "El Tango de Roxanne." In the original, it is sung by the narcoleptic Argentian (Now given the name Santiago) and Nini Legs-in-the-Air dances to it while being manhandled by the different chorus men of the Moulin Rouge. This song is used to teach Christian a lesson about falling in love with Satine and it is also a way to taunt him for his "foolish mistake." In the stage adaption, they for some reason decided to change this to Christian singing the song and it loses everything, in my opinion. Other odd choices they made are changing Satine's song from "One Day I'll Fly Away" by Randy Crawford, a moving ballad about how she wants to get away from the life of being a courtesan and replaced it with "Firework" by Katy Perry which is a very odd choice and just seems to be an excuse for Olivo to belt. They also removed the incredibly powerful rendition of "The Show Must Go On" by Queen which again makes no sense because it's a perfect number. This is nothing compared to, what I consider the worst aspect of this production, the costume design by Catharine Zuber, I love

Zuber she usually creates absolutely gorgeous costumes, but I have no idea what happened. She had the chance to create these beautiful costumes and what would have definitely been another Tony in the bag, but instead, we got this (A dress of two different materials that don't even go together...) The film featured these gorgeous costumes as seen above-featuring dancers/actors of all shapes, sizes and colors. Each of the Moulin Rouge dancers has their own personality, name and style (A little bit like the Kit Kat Klub dancers from Cabaret), but the powers that be decided "F*ck this" and made them all ensemble members. Overly-sexualized and basic thin, pretty and mostly white ensemble members (As seen on the left). As always my question is why? Why does this need to be seen? Why do we have to have these overtly sexual costumes? Is it that hard for people to realize that it's possible to be sexy while wearing a decent amount of clothes. Probably the most skin you ever saw in the film version was a few guys wearing wife beaters and a guy wearing a vest with no shirt underneath it. The worst being a few of Nicole Kidman's costumes that exposed her legs and occasionally her stomach, but even then she wore them for no more than 15 minutes total. I don't see a valid reason as to why the costumes are like this. I really don't see the point of having these costumes except for having sexualness for the sake of having sexualness. The women in the film were just as beautiful and sexy and they all wore those big, poofy can-can dresses and mostly just showed off a lot of cleavage and only one or two of the women did that. Also, do we really need the codpieces on the men? Does that really need to be a thing? I just think that for numerous reasons that this show is a huge mistake. I think they had this amazing opportunity to create an absolutely amazing piece of theatre and they just went the wrong route. I'm hoping by the time it gets to Broadway they maybe recast and hire a new creative team, but otherwise Moulin Rouge! the musical is a huge let down to this fan of the original movie.