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(More customer reviews)Primarily Barry Singer's compilation (with some re-editing) of pieces he wrote for a number of publications, perhaps most notably The New York Times, Ever After: The Last Years of Musical Theater and Beyond is intriguing as surface-level look at the last couple of decades in musical theater. It's useful for little else, however--Singer speeds through discussions of important shows, wastes time detailing events and productions of minor importance at best, and never provides a truly engaging or thought-provoking point of view. Instead, he attempts to pass his opinions off as fact, which results in a number of statements of questionable veracity that have been noted by theater writers and critics from the esteemed Mr. Miller to Peter Filichia. Perhaps even more unfortunate is that Singer's chronicle covers exactly the same time period as Ethan Mordden's forthcoming The Happiest Corpse I've Ever Seen: The Last 25 Years of Musical Theatre; Singer's Ever After does not stand up well to Mordden's latest volume, coming across more as a simpleton's whining screed opposite an intelligent and informed gentleman's thoughtful analysis. Ever After is perhaps most enjoyed and appreciated by those with little functional knowledge of the workings of New York theater; they're likely to find Singer's anecdotes more interesting than people who know it's possible cover the subject in considerably more depth than Singer attempts.
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Ever After is more than a detailed show-by-show history of the last quarter century in American musical theater. It explains how the storied Broadway tradition in many cases went so very wrong. Singer takes the reader behind the scenes for an unparalleled look at A Chorus Line's final bow, the creation of Rent, the real people behind Disney's uber-musicals, and even an afternoon with Andrew Lloyd Webber. Ever After also celebrates the promise of the next generation of young musical theater artists, especially Adam Guettel, Michael John LaChiusa, Ricky Ian Gordon and Jason Robert Brown, addressing not only their work to date, but their future projects. There is no other book currently available that covers this period and subject. Through his work for The New York Times, Singer has interviewed virtually everyone of significance. They are all here, very much speaking for themselves. Ever After is both anecdotal and analytical, featuring personality profiles of important creative figures, from Jule Styne to Stephen Sondheim to Jonathan Larson, while critically evaluating all of the many musicals produced during the past 25 years. Sure to generate debate, this is a book written not only for the musical theater aficionado, but for anyone who has seen a Broadway musical or has just enjoyed the movie version of Chicago and is curious to know more.
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