Bad Vampire, No Biscuit

I love musical theatre. I adore the work of Stephen Sondheim--even when I think it doesn't work, I want to hear what he's doing. I don't care for the sort of overwrought faux Opera that a lot of musicals in the last few decades have become--part of what I loved about Hairspray was that it wasn't Phantom. Andrew Lloyd Webber--not my thing. And while I'm fond of The Lion King and thought the staging was impeccable, when you take away the staging you've got a Disney movie on the hoof (and I find most of Elton John's music pleasant wallpaper). I'm also not a fan of Anne Rice's Lestat novels; fought my way through Interview with the Vampire and decided that life was far too short.

This all goes to explain why, when I saw the first posters for Lestat, with Elton John's music and Anne Rice's characters, all I could think was that I'd probably rather have root canal. So I wasn't surprised, but did get a little schadenfreudian (?) thrill, to read the SF Chronicle's review: The vampire Lestat has settled in San Francisco. And he's singing in a new musical. Quick! Someone fetch the garlic and a wooden stake!. I suppose it's inevitable that the review concludes by saying that the show "sucks."

Meanwhile, the Chronicle's Leah Garchik included a bit of Anne Rice's bio in her column today:

Among the program's biographical notes about Rice, which I'm told came from her: "Each beloved character iridescently animated and virtually manifested before our eyes witnesses their creator's experience in triumph and in sorrow and in searching for some semblance of Happy Peace. ... Anne Rice gives herself -- her life in full -- as a gift to the world in every spellbinding chapter, every carefully turned page, every meaningful word. Mere footprints of a life lived in art."

Thanks. That makes it all so clear.