Newsies -- the movie

Last night's trip to the AMC Hamilton 24 movie theater was a trip back in time -- to April 2013 to be more precise. That's when we saw "Newsies" on Broadway. Ashley was almost 11. As my blog post shows I found an awesome coupon, and great seats -- 5th row mezzanine. These comments reinforce why I blog -- so I 
can jog my own memory.

I've been hearing about the movie version for a while. They brought back the original leads (Jeremy Jordan and Kara Lindsay). Turns out while we did see Kara Lindsay on Broadway, we saw Corey Cott as Jack Kelly, not Jordan. 

I looked up the filming of this show and found a Playbill article about it. The play started as a limited run in New Jersey's Paper Mill Playhouse -- a theater I was was a little closer and easier to get to. The one show we did see we hit so much traffic it has turned us off from returning. The shame of it is the return trip was pretty easy.

The show was very similar to what we remembered -- though they seem to have added a solo by Crutchy in the Refuge that was added for the national tour. We recognized some of the actors from when we saw it (such as Kara Lindsay), but debated if we saw some of the others (most notably Crutchie, who I remembered reminding me of Chris Kubat, yet the actor in the movie did not -- I was right on that one; Ashley was right on Joseph Pulitzer).


A surprise for the evening was bumping into my sister Melissa and her kids, Hayden and Aimee. It was not a surprise that they saw the movie, only that we were at the same performance. We bumped into each other outside the theater. When we walked into the theater about 15 minutes before showtime instead of looking for the anticipated two seats together, we suddenly wanted five seats together. The theater was pretty full. We were about to take seats closer than we really wanted when a friend of a friend told us they were opening up another theater on the other side of the 24-plex. There were only two people in that theater, so we had a choice of seats. After grabbing prime seats in the center, we settled down for the movie.

Anyone who goes to the movies will tell you a 7 PM show doesn't really start until at least 7:15, maybe 7:20. With a run time of 2 hours and 24 minutes, I was gearing up for a late night (but totally worth it). Much to my surprise, the movie started exactly at 7. I guess that's what happens when the movie costs much more than normal (we always go to the cheap showing for $6.75 each, this one was all tickets at $21.38, plus another $1.50 each because I bought them online in case they sold out like the other ones did that week). The extra theater was between half and 2/3 full -- a comfortable amount.

If I had to add a negative, it was accepting 33-year old Jeremy Jordan as a 17-year old. There is a subplot where Snyder from the Refuge was trying to capture Jack Kelly to take him back. Dude, he is clearly an adult.

The movie was filmed on September 11. 2016 in front a life audience of fansies and reviewers in Los Angeles. The audience was in love with the show before they walked in the door. Their energy was contagious. Much to the embarrassment of my teenager, I found myself clapping at the end of every song, as if I was in the theater, too. A friend admitted to singing along to the songs.

I joked we paid less to see a Broadway show live. That was an exception. Clearly between ticket prices, and the cost for going into NYC, bringing theater to everyone, even at $21.38 a ticket, is a bargain.