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Showing posts with the label Mandy Patinkin

Desert-Island Cast Albums

The NYT has had at least two pieces on "desert-island cast albums"-- which bits of Broadway would you want with you in solitary confinement? --and I thought I'd add some overlooked choices. *The Nathan Lane version of "Guys and Dolls." People suggest "Guys and Dolls" is among the closest-to-perfect works in Broadway history--a work so strong that even a bad high-school version can't fully dilute the charm--and the Nathan Lane version seems definitive. Lane is tremendous, obviously, and this version also has a canonical performance by Faith Prince, who went on to win the Tony. (The Times critic: "Prince is so expressive, she can make a one-act drama just from her bizarre pronunciation of a single random word, subsequently .") *Lea Salonga, "Miss Saigon." This is not a perfect musical, but the Broadway Original Cast (not Revival Cast) recording has three--count them, three--Tony-winning performances. Lea Salonga and Jonat...