The bloody Broadway mess that wasDance of the Vampires.
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From the audiences perspective, it certainlysoundslike a smash.
And they arelosingit for their Dark God, the composer Jim Steinman.
And the disaster had a lasting impact for some.
Steinman went public, disavowing it.
Michael Crawfords Broadway reputation was burned to a cinder; he never returned.
(A dewySharon Tate plays Sarah, the breast-heaving, bath-taking point of the movies love triangle.
But Hollywood producers felt that Eastern European humor didnt translate.
It was no longer a spoof it was a mockery.
Kunze wanted Polanski to direct, and he wanted Steinman to do the music.
(Steinman himself no longer communicates with the press, after a series of strokes.)
Its not surprising that Jim would be excited [aboutTanz] because hes a vampire himself, says Sonenberg.
He stays up all night to sleep during the days.
Perhaps its because the hedonism was one part Ozzy Osbourne, two parts Richie Rich.
He is an extraordinarily bizarre and wonderful genius, says Sonenberg fondly.
(The demiurge, to be clear, is the one insatin pants.)
I wanted a vampire!
It was one of the most exciting productions I had seen in a long time.
By this point, Sonenberg had added a hat producer.
All their bats were in a row; Waxman and Williams were ready to bring it to Broadway.
He just needed to pick up a phone!
Reality intruded, though.
Polanski was a no-go.
Love and death and an American guitar
Without Polanski, all hands started fighting for the tiller.
The contentious process was too much for the British director John Caird, whod steered the workshops.
[Caird and I] were both very unhappy, Waxman says.
Sonenberg overrode [us] about who was going to star in it.
And at that point he wasI have no problem saying thishe was an impossible person to work with.
It has been 19 years, and Waxman is still unhappy about how things went down.
I do this because I love projects!
I dont just do it for money!
you’re able to tell because I didDoctorZhivago.
(Zhivagoalso lost about $9 million.)
Soon, Sonenberg was out too.
Casting was the crux.
In a 2007blog post, Steinman describes it as happening the other way around.
The pair had long resumes in film and television, but almost nothing in theater.
It was our rescue fantasy, laughs Boyett.
Ivess script wasnt ready, and Rando says now that the production desperately needed an out-of-town tryout.
Instead,Dancewas already committed to the Minskoff Theatre for 2002.
There was no development money left.
Rando remembers the full team being finalized late in 2001, and rehearsals were to begin the following September.
Barely nine months to prep a show that wanted to be the cross betweenLes MiserablesandPhantom?
Isnt that timeline … insane?
It was tight, says Rando.
Well never be as young as we are right now
Crawford was now signed.
Hopes inside the show were high.
Max von Essen was cast as Alfred, and the stage treasure Rene Auberjonois was cast as Abronsius.
Everyone felt on the cusp of greatness … and wealth.
I thought this was myPhantom, says Gallo.
I listened to those Jim Steinman songs and I heard,KA-CHING.
Excitementoutsidethe show, though, was taking a new form.
Crawford, one rumormonger swore, was demanding $180,000 aweek.
(Denials about that were issued then and now.)
Very few of the key production folk had megamusical experience.
Musical supervisor Reed and several of the designers did.
Carrafa refers to the show as an ocean liner, difficult to turn once it started moving.
And the script was an ocean liner in a bog.
And he wasnt the only muscle in the room.
There are not, to my knowledge, too many Italian vampires in the literature.
And because of his stardom, no one could steer him away from the choices.
Says that staffer: He was … not directable.
Reed and Rando and Gonzalez all say that Crawford did have moments of sweetness and humor.
Somebody in the producing team figured this out and invited them in to watch tech, says Kennedy.
Thats how ungenerous he was.
Reed was horrified at what was happening to the show hed built so painstakingly in Vienna.
You wanna see my balls?
The laborious make-it-sassier efforts echoed the way Hollywood had hacked apartThe Fearless Vampire Killers.Reed missed Polanski.
It was a bit like a university rag show, Reed says.
It certainly wasnt scary.
The original story had become a sleazy, crude and silly joke without theme or storyline, he says.
Without my consent the whole show had been mutilated.
It turned out John couldnt help me or the show.
At that point nobody could or wanted to interfere.
It was time to move into the theater.
There was a lot of love and affection.
It wasnt a tense atmosphere on a daily basis or anything.
But fissures in the production were already deep.
I kept telling people, its calledDance of the Vampires.
If it doesnt work, its my fault.
It was just too big for everyone.
The first day of tech, says Kennedy, we were working for probably eight hours in the theater.
We did not progress past the first thirty seconds of the show.
That is not exaggeration.
The first two previews were canceled; the team gave up and dropped some of the more elaborate sequences.
(He just walked on in darkness and peeped out from behind a curtain.)
Some of the cast were still game for changes.
Gonzalez remembers that a pair of boots she wore was meant to light up.
I had to plug them inonstage!
(They werent used either.)
There was also a graveyard that flew.
Kunze was in previews, trying to have some effect, but Crawford was implacable.
At the climax of the show, Michael decided to die on the castles stairwayactors love to die onstage!
And to die very dramatically, with arms spread out like Jesus, says Kunze.
Bravely he went up the stage, talked to Michael and returned.
What did he say?
John answered: He just said: Fuck off.
And the changes they were allowed to make werent working.
If that show had found its comic tone, it would still be running now, says Carrafa.
I mean people were laughing and cheering!
I thought we did it!
Then she said that.
But within fifteen minutes it became unbearable for me to be sitting in the seat.
I just couldnt believe what was going on stage.
I … just stepped out.
And I never saw it again.
Carrafa was nowheresville, says a production source.
It was utter confusion.
And Rando found himself dealing with a second crisis.
Previews were extended and extended.
He left for two weeks.
The opening night was delayed from November 21 to December 9.
(A cast member also ran a Yahoo mailing list about the show for years.)
With so many of the captains gone, the internet infiltrated the creative process.
Nobody knew what they wanted it to be.
Everything louder than everything else
Eventually, the show did have to open.
He flew back to Texas the morning after, on December 10.
The reviews were scathing.
The show that is dear to me is still running in Vienna.
The one at the Minskoff was just a job.
But people who remember his notes remember that he demanded all manner of cheesy jokes.
It came crashing down, says Gonzalez.
And that it broke the ice for us.
How do you build up your backbone?
He did that and we all laughed.
It really messed with me.
He [Simon] was the real vampire among us.
She says that her 17 years in the business constitute her way of vanquishing him.
Among people who were involved, theres a divide today about how they regard the shows evisceration.
Generally those from the music world or from the originalTanz der Vampirestill feel injured.
It was very difficult for me personally, says Sonenberg.
I think it was very difficult for Jim.
Steinman, physically incapacitated, has even granted him power of attorney.
Sonenberg does not, though, enjoy being blamed forDances failures.
He wont bow to that version of events.
That doesnt mean that you might talk trash!
You know sometimes, when you get pummeled, you eat shit.
I never ate it.
Those from the theater world, though, seem to take the debacle in stride.
They learned; they grew; it was all (barely) coming back to them now.
His investors were able to absorb the losses, and they stayed with him through his long Broadway career.
(Broadway investors are always losing bucketloads; its one of their most endearing characteristics.)
The first lesson about catastrophe for directors: Youre going to have to go through it.
Carrafa agrees: As a general principle, success doesnt teach you as much as failure.
Theres another group, though, that still thinks aboutDance of the Vampires.
If the internet helped kill the show, the internet has also kept it alive.
), and much of the Wikipedia entry on the American production.
Yet when Crawford was prowling the boards in a bonnet, DelGiudice was 12.
He never saw the show.
(These came to nothing.)
That kid was probably born the same year thatVampiressaw the sun … and crumbled into dust.
