Sydney Hainy

“let me tell you the whole story”

undeniably a technical feat, though i find myself dissatisfied in nearly every element of the adaptation from musical to movie. my biggest gripe is that it takes itself too seriously; each attempt at injecting more meaning into the characters and story ends up hollowing them out. the self-proclaimed “black sheep” have always seen themselves in our heroine-turned-villainess, but this time around they broaden her further to produce a blank slate for long-time fans and newcomers to project their identity onto, and end up losing some of her personality in the process. this film is not alone in the post-therapy liberal drivel that seems to always circle back to individualism, but it is also not immune. regardless, adding more backstory to a backstory when the stage show alarmingly traces each event and character to the source material with a taylor swift-level of easter eggs, is just plain excessive. grounding the film in reality injures other aspects as well, such as set design and costuming, distancing it from the source material even further. they work so hard to make the set not look like a set that they forget it’s a fantasy world. everything is sober and pared-down and made of a real material instead of fanciful and painted and two-dimensional (literally not figuratively). it’s especially sad when art nouveau is right there. the costuming, too, chooses to deviate from broadway’s somewhat infamous steampunk aesthetic and focuses more on futuristic design instead of blending old and new—which i’m all for, until we get jumbled messes like uniforms consisting of knock-off paloma wool graphic sweater vests and vaguely japanese-inspired skants, and dresses that tip the scale into the hunger games capitol attire, somehow leaving us behind the trend cycle. the cast spews improvised one-liners like “i cannot” from ariana, and bowen yang (who they flew out and back from new york every week) (get a different gay guy) quips “she doesn’t see color”, both of which immediately take you out of the it, but produced big laughs both times i saw it in theaters. nevertheless, the scale is huge and the scenery is lush; evidently much work went into planning every detail, so it’s disappointing the director is incompetent at showing it off, rather opting for copious cuts and close-ups where we see ariana’s disturbingly askew lashes and cynthia’s horrid green contacts (i’m convinced they were out to get her). all to say, the spirit of the beloved broadway show dies a little through the process of this adaptation. the prioritizing of celebrities in lead roles definitely resulted in some less than savory singing. erivo and grande are spectacular vocalists and trample everyone in their paths, but the riff-off challenge does get tedious. their reading of the characters are mismatched too, as grande hams it up while erivo is subtle and austere. there isn’t an established foundation for the leads to build a relationship off of, yet we’re supposed to buy into the whole gay situation between them. a possible saving grace is the choreography, but again one of the best dance numbers is completely backlit. defying gravity is interrupted by added dialogue every 30 seconds and relies heavily on extended shots of erivo flying through the sky, with a moment of her seeing her younger self in her reflection (inner child discourse) that was so ridiculous i had to laugh. thus, the epic climax of the musical winds up decidedly one note. a majority of the sanitization and modernizing i would guess has to do with optimizing marketability, and i must say it’s disgusting how much of a masterclass the campaign was. it’s only a little ironic because it’s the most popular show on broadway! anyway, i know this is long as hell, but so is the movie. eedless to say, i still cried.

every car has a dent

it’s okay that everything is wrong with my body

i have things in the mail

the bus is wrapped with an ai wallet ad

historic theaters stay open by throwing past-decades themed dance parties

roller-skating trans girls

if you’re bored with your desk job, you can always join the mission systems company

it’s cool, and often top-secret

discounted birth control

bleeding hearts in the boulevard

you can go to the store and not buy anything

sydney is a line cook from rural minnesota living in minneapolis. they are a jack of all trades—illustration, photography, and writing, to name a few—yet a master of none. they are inspired by the mundane, the popular, and the embarrassing. they are a self-designated “opinionist”. sydney also designed the logo for textpost poetry. you can find them on the internet @dinnerand.ashow.