YOUR KIND OF MUSIC. YOUR KIND OF MUSICAL.
For five years, BEAUTIFUL, the Tony and Grammy Award-winning Carole King musical, has thrilled Broadway with the inspiring true story of one woman's remarkable journey from teenage songwriter to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
From the string of pop classics she wrote for the biggest acts in music to her own life-changing, chart-busting success with Tapestry, BEAUTIFUL takes you back to where it all began- and takes you on the ride of a lifetime.
Featuring over two dozen pop classics, including "You've Got a Friend," "One Fine Day," "Up on the Roof," "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling," "Will You Love Me Tomorrow," and "Natural Woman," this crowd-pleasing international phenomenon is filled with the songs you remember- and a story you'll never forget.
Certainly, its prime attraction is the marvellous Jessie Mueller, avoiding impersonation, but otherwise perfectly channeling the contradictions of King (neé Klein), as she goes from precocious 16-year-old tunesmith in the late fifties to singer/songwriter star with the release of her seminal album Tapestry in 1971. Jake Epstein, the Canadian talent who first rose to fame onDegrassi: The Next Generation, ably co-stars as her husband/lyricist Gerry Goffin with whom she wrote chart toppers like Some Kind of Wonderfuland The Locomotion for artists like The Drifters and Little Eva...With a spotty script by Douglas McGrath, Beautiful often feels like an extended (and somewhat sanitized) episode of TV's Behind the Music...King, in this version of the story anyway, handles her husband's affairs and breakdowns with admirable restraint and understanding. This doesn't quite work as drama, though Mueller is such a scene stealer, so charming in her self-deprecation, that Beautiful never falls entirely flat.
Carole King has apparently never seen the musical of her life that has now reached Broadway. She walked out of an early reading at intermission, finding it too tough to take. Anyone not named Carole King may toy with the same idea, but for a different reason: It's just insipid...None of this is the fault of Jessie Mueller, the rising Broadway star who plays King with genuine feeling and a lovely voice. This paint-by-numbers show would have been a whole lot better if it was just turned into a concert with Mueller singing King hits...Is there any lesson to be gleaned from this musical? Don't write songs for others? Don't marry men who are bipolar? Perhaps it's the same as the one from 'Motown the Musical,' the Broadway jukebox show playing nearby with a flimsy and idolizing book by record company founder Berry Gordy: Don't write honest musicals about living people without breaking some eggs.
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